The sun had barely risen over the Kael'Zyth desert, but the heat already weighed like an invisible burden on Arien's shoulders. The sand was not golden as in ancient tales, but black and opaque, like the remains of a primordial fire that never cooled. He walked in a straight line, though he knew direction mattered little in that dry sea. There, even the horizon was uncertain, always shimmering with mirages that suggested towers, bones, or wells that disappeared as soon as he drew near.
With each step, his thoughts turned to Mahran. To what was left. To what had been stolen.
There was no noise but the muffled sound of boots against the sand. And there was no wind. The air was stagnant, as if time itself had stopped, imprisoned by some ancient force. Deep in his chest, Arien felt something more painful than thirst: the fragment of the Static Flame, hidden in his leather pouch, throbbed like a heart out of sync.
He remembered what Khron had told him:
— It's not the heat that kills, Arien. It's the emptiness it leaves. The static flame consumes what cannot be seen.
Back then, he hadn't understood. But there, surrounded by a vastness where everything seemed dead yet on the verge of awakening, he began to grasp its meaning.
After hours of walking, he spotted something between two dunes: a hunched figure, wearing a cloak that shimmered like smoke. Arien approached slowly, his fingers gripping the shaft of his old spear.
— Who crosses the desert of flameless embers? — the figure said, voice low and roughened by time.
Arien recognized him immediately. Beneath the hood, the hermit Khron's eyes gleamed—the same as when he would visit him in Mahran for old tales. He looked unchanged. No older, no weaker. Still before time, as if he belonged to another reality.
— I came for answers, master, — said Arien, firmly. — I want to understand what destroyed my village. And why.
Khron did not smile. The look that came to his face was one of resignation. As if he already knew what Arien would say, what he sought, what he carried.
He reached out and touched the boy's shoulder. It was a gentle touch, but Arien felt a silent spark shoot down his spine. The sand beneath his feet seemed to tremble.
— This is a place where truths do not shout. They whisper. And those who do not listen are devoured by what they thought they understood.
Arien lowered his eyes. The hermit pulled from his cloak a piece of dark cloth and carefully wrapped the fragment of crystal, placing it in the young man's hands.
— To see the static flame, you must first cross the altar. This desert. Walk for seven hours without stopping. When night falls, look for the red stones. There is a hidden well there. Drink from its water. If you can.
Arien held the cloth as if it were a blood inheritance. He felt the fragment pulse inside, stronger than ever.
— And what will I find after that? — he asked.
Khron took a few steps back, turning to the east.
— An echo of what you lost. Perhaps a piece of who you are. But remember: the desert gives nothing without cost. And it only returns what you are ready to lose.
Without another word, the hermit vanished among the dunes, swallowed by dust and stagnant heat. Arien stood still for a few seconds, feeling the weight of silence. Then he looked east, where the sunlight built a wall of heat on the horizon. He began to walk.
Time there distorted. The seven hours felt like days. Hunger came and went. Thirst never left. And tiredness, though always present, was never enough to stop him. It was as if the desert tested him at every step, but never let him rest.
He saw things among the dunes. Forms that weren't there. Or that were, but didn't see him. Creatures of sand, shadows crawling under the surface, distant eyes between half-buried crystals. At one point, he heard familiar laughter and almost ran. It was his sister's voice. But when he reached the source of the sound, he found only his own footprint, being erased by the wind.
By dusk, the sky turned crimson. Shadows stretched like blades and, between two reddish stones, Arien saw a crack. He dug with his hands until he uncovered the rim of a well.
The water there was dark. Cold. Nearly tasteless. But as he drank, he felt something awaken. An image flashed in his mind: his family's house, still whole. His sister's laughter. His mother's voice calling for him. All for a second. And then, the fire. The fire that did not burn. The flame that devoured without consuming.
Arien staggered back, bracing himself on the well's edge. The crystal, even wrapped, trembled in his hand. It was not just a memory or a hallucination. It was a call. Something had awakened—within him and around.
On the horizon, tiny lights began to flicker. They weren't stars. They were much too close, blinking like distant beacons or watchful eyes. They were signs. Marks left by something—or someone—that had watched him from the beginning.
With steady knees and a racing heart, Arien stood up. He wiped his lips with his forearm and slowly turned east, where silhouettes of tall stones emerged in the dusk. The place indicated by Khron now seemed clearer, more real, as if the well had been the key to seeing it.
And then he knew: he was no longer just walking through the desert. He was being drawn into it.
The fragment in his pouch vibrated as if answering the call of the distant lights. And Arien, spear in hand and throat still dry, took his first steps into the unknown, not knowing that, just ahead, the desert would begin to speak with the voice of those long forgotten.