The battlefield was a furnace of ruin.
The acrid stench of smoke, blood, and charred flesh hung thick in the air, mingling with the metallic tang of spilled magic. The ground beneath Ciel's boots was torn and scorched, craters pockmarked the earth as if a thousand dragons had clawed and burned it raw.
Groans and cries of the dying, mingled with the hiss of extinguishing fire and the occasional shattering of enchanted steel, filled his ears.
Ciel's body was a ruin of its own. His left arm was gone, the stump ragged and still dripping blood, and his wand lay shattered in the mud. His blonde hair dyed red, as his bright eyes that looked like the clear sky, darkened by the horrors of the war.
Cuts and burns carved his face and torso into a map of suffering, yet his breathing was ragged but steady fuelled by nothing but sheer will. He had to end it.
He looked around at the remnants of the war, mountains of bodies, comrades and enemies alike, twisted and lifeless. Faces flashed in his mind, Godric, Rowena, Salazar, Helga… friends, the younger students he'd trained with all the care of a guardian, all gone.
All for this.
All because of a fucking cult, and their monstrous leader, Vesna.
And yet, somehow, they were both still alive.
Vesna stood across the broken plain, his own body a canvas of agony, half-charred, smoke curling from deep burns, yet still upright, still calm. The aura of corrupted magic surrounding him writhed like living shadows, sustaining him in defiance of death itself.
Ciel dug the haft of his sword into the cracked earth, using it as a crutch to pull himself upright. Step by step, he limped toward Vesna, the rage coiling in his chest, each breath burning in his lungs.
"The lightning wizard… Stoneheart… Tide-breaker… Vengeance… The four handed demon" Vesna's voice sliced through the haze, calm, measured. "All these titles... I have heard since yester-year and yet I don't know your name."
Ciel's eyes flicked to him, scanning the same twisted remnants of the cult's magic that they used, keeping him alive. "You took the people who gave me my name," he said, each word a growl. "You have no fucking right to hear it."
"Ah, those four... sure." His tone carried the casualness as if they were just another number.
"Vengeance, it is then, a true title as you have fulfilled your purpose." Vesna said with a faint smile. "It truly is a shame, a few days more, and I would've fulfilled my purpose as well, it would've been sooner if it weren't for your mentors..."
Ciel had no patience for monologues. His body was battered, his magic nearly spent, but fury surged where strength faltered.
"Shut it." His voice was a rasp, a promise of death.
He dragged his sword across the ground, the last vestiges of magic he could muster coiled around it like liquid fire, coating the blade in a faint shimmer of green light. Dark magic, anyone could tell what it was in an instant, Godric Gryffindor's iconic magical sword style which now seemed twisted with rage and darkness, far from the hope giving light it usually gave out under the former.
"The famed blade… it truly is wondrous, as they say," Vesna murmured, unflinching. "It's such a shame that a wizard of your calibre, can't see it…" He said his voice heavy as if he truly regretted it until it lit up again, "But fret not, Vengeance... the cult will rise again and so will your peers, this war isn't over. It never will be until we fulfill our duty, and then maybe one day your soul shall finally witness as it returns to its rightful place.."
Ciel lifted the sword as Vesna's voice continued, cold and certain.
"And when it does, she shall rise. And when that day comes, the world will finally be wrapped around-"
Ciel's grip tightened, and without another word, he swung.
"-her embrace..." Vesna's last words were cut off mid-sentence, his head soaring through the smoke-choked air before hitting the scorched ground with a hollow thud.
The cult leader, Vesna, the wizard if he could even be called that, who had threatened the entirety of the world, laid like any other corpse scattered across the battlefield.
And so too did the hero.
Ciel's knees buckled. His sword dug deep into the charred earth as his grip faltered, the metal clattering against stone and mud as his body slumped forward.
The heat, the chaos, the stench, it all remained, but the war was over. A war with no victor.
Was it regret, he wondered.
The thought came faintly, through the haze of pain and smoke. His breaths were shallow, ragged, his vision flickering like the dying embers around him. He tried to move, but his body refused, even the act of breathing felt like a war he was losing.
Regret… yes.
That was it. Bitter and heavy, it clung to his chest as his heartbeat slowed.
If he had been stronger… faster… wiser... maybe they'd still be here. Maybe he could've saved them.
He let out a dry laugh that cracked like broken glass. Foolish. He'd wasted so much time, fooling around with the students, arguing with Godric over silly duelling stances, sneaking bread from Helga's kitchen, letting Rowena scold him for not reading enough. The memories cut deeper than any wound.
And Salazar… he thought of the man's piercing eyes, the quiet strength that never wavered even when the world seemed to crumble. He never got to say goodbye to any of them. He didn't even know where they'd fallen... only that they were gone.
His vision blurred. The battlefield dimmed until all that remained were memories... warm and distant.
He saw the first time he met them, four adventurers, arguing in a tavern about magic. A conversation, he somehow got involved in. And yet, they'd taken him in a nameless orphan, a boy on the brink of becoming an Obscurial, they had given him everything.
They'd given him a name. A home. A purpose.
He remembered those early days in Hogwarts, when laughter echoed through half-built halls and magic shimmered freely in the air. Every day was bright, every lesson an adventure.
Godric's booming laugh when he fell during the training. Rowena's sharp wit and knowing smile, when he did something he wasn't supposed to do. Helga's soft hands as she healed his scraped knees. Salazar's quiet pride when he finally mastered a spell.
Those were the days he truly lived, before all this.
Now there was only silence.
The fire still burned in the distance, but its heat no longer reached him. His limbs felt weightless, his heartbeat distant. The memories grew softer, fading like dying sparks in a storm.
So this is it, he thought. The end of Vengeance. All the life lost on the whim of a crazy man.
His eyes grew heavy, his breathing slowed, and the world around him dissolved into black.
....
"Ciel, wake up."
The voice was warm, insistent, unfamiliar. He stirred, heavy-lidded, trying to remember where he was.
"Ciel?"
He forced his eyes open. A smooth white ceiling greeted him. The acrid stench of war was gone. In its place was the faint sweetness of soap and something he couldn't name.
A woman leaned over him, her hand reaching for his forehead. He instinctively moved away, grabbing her hand before it could reach him.
'Wait, hand?', He distinctively remembered the spell that tore his arm clean off, and yet it was here, albeit it was skinner and shorter than how it previously was.
"Jesus, you gave me a fright," she said giving out a small laugh.
Her hand went to his forehead again while he was too busy staring in amazement at his own hand.
"Good, it seems the fever is down. Dinner's ready. Be down at the table. It's summer, so if you're feeling fine, you should enjoy your time, play around with the other kids but don't push yourself too hard."
He blinked as he watched her leave, still trying to piece together what was happening. His eyes wandered over the room observing everything, the clean sterile room, the mattresses beneath him that never felt so soft, the clean clothes on him that didn't smell of ash or sweat.
He swung his legs over the edge of the bed, barely reaching the floor. "Why am I… tiny?" he muttered, voice higher than expected.
His gaze fell on the furniture, unfamiliar in shape, polished and smooth, lacking the sturdy roughness of the medieval halls he remembered. And then… the mirror.
It loomed against the wall, almost comically large.
"A noble's house? Without magic, a mirror this big… who could afford this?" He couldn't help but mutter as mirror that large without magic could only mean, the owner of the house was extremely wealthy.
As he approached the mirror, his reflection greeted him, a small boy, blue-eyed, dirty-blond hair, looking exactly like he had when the four had first taken him in centuries ago.
A strange flutter rose in his chest, hope? Excitement?
He couldn't help but wonder if he had somehow maybe went back in time. Then maybe he could...
He took a tentative step forward, only to stumble slightly.
He moved to the window sill, trying to make sense of where he was only to be left dumbfounded.
Below him, metal carriages raced along smooth, black roads, humming like nothing he'd ever heard.
People walked in strange, colourful garments, carrying odd bags in their hand. Far off, he could see the buildings of glass and steel stretched impossibly into the sky, towering over anything he'd known.
And then, slicing across the sky with a roar, a dragon...a metal dragon, he squinted his eyes, as he could barely make out a hunk of metal flying in the air, its wings not even giving a flap as it flew leaving a trail of smoke gliding in air.
He staggered back from the window. "What sorcery is this?"