The air above the vault shimmered with heat and silence.Ash drifted through the broken ceiling like falling snow — soft, weightless, eternal.
When The Nameless One stepped into the open, the light struck him like memory.The sky over Valyria was gray and veiled in smoke, its clouds faintly red with the glow of distant fire. What had once been the heart of empires now lay broken, its cities drowned in shadow and ruin.
He inhaled slowly, eyes tracing the horizon. "So this is what remains."
Behind him, Vaerynna emerged — wings unfurling slightly as she blinked against the light. Her scales reflected faint ribbons of crimson fire. Every motion she made left trails of embers that faded as quickly as they appeared.
This place… it reeks of death.
"It's not death," he said softly, looking over the shattered towers. "It's history that forgot how to die."
She tilted her head. Was this your doing?
He smiled faintly. "No. This was theirs."
They walked through the ruins of the Valyrian Freehold — avenues once paved with silver stone now cracked and filled with stagnant water, statues of Dragon-lords toppled and melted. Broken spires reached toward the gray heavens like the fingers of dead gods.
They built all this, Vaerynna said. And lost it.
"They thought themselves eternal," he murmured. "Every empire does."
How did they fall?
He looked up at the twisted horizon. "By believing they could master creation without consequence. Fire obeyed them for a time… until it remembered who it belonged to."
Vaerynna's golden eyes gleamed. > They bred my kind. Changed them.
He nodded. "Yes. They tamed dragons until they forgot what true dragons were."
She regarded him curiously. > And me? What am I?
He turned to her, his gaze steady. "You, Vaerynna, are the reminder the world forgot."
She said nothing — but the faint pulse beneath her scales brightened, as if her heart answered before her mind could.
They walked on in silence for a time. The wind hissed between the ruined arches, carrying faint echoes — half-sung whispers that might once have been the chanting of Valyrian mages.
Then — click.
The Nameless One stopped.
Another click.A scraping sound, like stone dragging against stone.
His head turned slightly.
What is it?
"Remnants," he murmured. "Or perhaps something that never learned how to end."
From the shadows of a broken corridor, the shapes came — stumbling, lurching, dragging limbs that had long turned to stone.
The Stone Men.
Their eyes burned faintly red beneath cracked skin, and the sound of their movement echoed like distant grinding metal.
Vaerynna tensed, smoke curling from her nostrils.
They are diseased.
"Grayscale," he said. "A sickness that turns flesh to stone."
They look like echoes.
"Echoes that remember pain."
The creatures shambled closer, encircling them — their breath shallow, their movements jerky, inhuman.
The Nameless One watched them, calm, expressionless. A faint smirk touched his lips."Seems the dead remember hunger too."
Shadows flickered at his fingertips, forming into a narrow blade of Valyrian steel. Its edge shimmered faintly with reflected flamelight.
He raised it lazily. "Let's begin."
The first Stone Man lunged.
He sidestepped, letting it pass close enough for the air to shudder but never touch. The blade flashed, clean and silent, and the creature fell — its chest split open like cracked stone.
Another came from behind, screeching.He pivoted sharply, the steel turning in his hand, slicing through the arm before it could graze him.The limb fell harmlessly to the ash. The second stroke followed, splitting it from shoulder to spine.
Vaerynna watched, her mind a whisper of awe and unease.
You avoid them… as if afraid.
"Not for myself," he said, stepping aside from another blow. "Your skin is still young. Not yet hardened against this world's sickness."
She stilled at that, realization flickering across their shared bond.
You fight carefully… for me.
His sword blurred in another arc, cutting down two more."Even an immortal learns caution," he said simply.
A third staggered close. He turned with fluid precision, letting the creature's strike brush against the empty air where he had stood. The sword found its mark in the creature's throat before its claws could fall.
The last few rushed him at once, shrieking like broken glass.He moved through them like wind through reeds — quiet, precise, untouchable. Each strike deliberate. Each motion measured. Not one touch of infected flesh reached him, nor her.
When the last fell, the silence returned.
Only one remained — crawling weakly, its half-stone fingers dragging lines in the ash.
He approached, not pitying, not cruel — only final. The blade sank into its chest, shallow and sure. The light in its eyes went out.
He withdrew the sword, his expression unchanged.
Vaerynna stepped closer, wings folded tight, her breath steady now.
You could have ended them all with your power.
He looked at her, cleaning the blade with the edge of his cloak."If I always use power," he said, "then I stop remembering what it means to live as a man."
Since when have you been a man?
He looked toward the horizon — gray sky, black ruins, red flame still burning far away."Since I came to this world," he said quietly.
And before that?
He smiled faintly. "Before that, I was many things. None worth remembering."
She studied him, her molten eyes softening.
Then you are different now.
"Perhaps," he said. "Or perhaps I simply remember how to pretend."
Pretend to be human?
"To be alive."
Her tail brushed lightly through the ash.
Then this world has changed you.
He met her gaze. "Every world does."
The wind carried the silence between them — a silence that wasn't empty, but full of thought.
Then he turned, sliding the sword across his back. The shadow took it, consuming the steel until nothing remained."Come," he said quietly. "There's still life somewhere in this graveyard."
Vaerynna lowered her head slightly, matching his pace.
Then we will find it together.
He smiled, faint but real. "Together, then."
And they walked on — man and dragon, through the ruins of Valyria, where ash fell like snow and the world itself seemed to breathe again for the first time in centuries.