On the final day, the sky wept blood.
The thick layer of gray clouds over Nihil had split open, and the rays of the setting sun cast a rust-colored, sickly crimson glow over the city. The arena was overflowing. Lord Arthus sat in his private box. Madam Vex sipped her champagne. Verrick waited with his stopwatch in hand.
But Kaelen saw none of it.
He saw only the pain.
It had been twenty-four hours since he had refused Verrick's medicine. His body was in the throes of withdrawal. Every breath felt as if shards of glass were filling his lungs. His right eye burned so intensely beneath the bandages that a constant scream echoed inside his brain.
Giant... Rico's voice sounded distant, as if coming from the bottom of a well. The boy was crying as he fastened Kaelen's armor. Don't do it... Withdraw... You can't fight like this. You're going to die.
Kaelen placed his hand on the boy's shoulder. His hand was ice cold.
Death, Kaelen said, his voice cracked and deep, is better than forgetting, Rico.
The iron gates ground open.
Kaelen stepped out onto the sands of the arena, beneath that crimson light.
The roar of the crowd vanished instantly. Because Kaelen was not alone. The opponent emerging from the opposite gate was not a monster. It was not a machine.
It was a mirror.
A young man. Around the same age as Kaelen. His body was covered in the same experimental scars, cuts, and burns. But his mutation was not in his eye; it was on his back. Sharp protrusions erupted from his spine, standing like wings made of bone. And in his hand, he held a sword so similar it could have been a twin to Kaelen's, though it was rusted.
The man's eyes... Kaelen recognized those eyes.
Those gray, mournful, and familiar eyes.
The announcer's voice boomed through the arena:
And here is the surprise of the finale! From the Vaults of the Alchemists, unseen for years, Specimen 0-2! Name: REN!
Kaelen froze.
Ren.
The name struck the locked door in his mind like a sledgehammer. The wall built by Verrick's medicine cracked. The first image to leak through that crack was a bloodstained laboratory floor.
Ren raised his sword. But he did not take a combat stance. He simply looked at Kaelen, his lips moving.
Remember...
There was no sound, but Kaelen heard the word in his soul.
FIGHT!
Ren lunged. But his goal was not to kill. His goal was to wake Kaelen up.
The blades clashed. CLANG.
That sound was not just metal hitting metal. It was the collision of two old friends, two broken souls.
Grief trembled. The sword recognized the metal before it. It, too, had been forged in the same hearth.
Strike me, Kaelen! Ren shouted. His voice was raspy, like someone who had not spoken in years. Kill me! Otherwise, I cannot give you that memory!
Kaelen recoiled. No... I know you...
You don't! Ren attacked ferociously. His blade grazed Kaelen's armor. You forgot us! They brainwashed you with those needles! They turned you into a weapon!
Swinging his bone wings, Ren knocked Kaelen to the ground. He pressed his sword against Kaelen's throat. But he did not push. Tears streamed from his eyes.
Save me, Kaelen, Ren whispered. Save me from this hell. This is the only way. Grief... Grief must take my soul. It must take it so I can show Her to you.
Kaelen's right eye throbbed. The void energy saw the unbearable agony inside Ren, that desperate longing for death. His friend had been tortured in laboratories for years. He was the living dead.
And he wanted liberation.
I can't, Kaelen said, weeping.
You have to! Ren threw his sword aside and bared his chest. Right over his heart was a number branded by the alchemists: 0-2.
If you want to remember Her... You must sacrifice me.
Kaelen gripped the hilt of Grief. The sword burned its master's hand. The violet runes screamed.
Kaelen stood up. Ren was on his knees. He was smiling. A peaceful smile.
Thank you, brother, Ren said.
And Kaelen delivered the hardest blow of his life.
The sword entered Ren's chest.
And the world stopped.
Sound ceased. The image faded.
Grief absorbed Ren's soul, his pain, and his most precious treasure. And it pumped it into Kaelen's mind, unfiltered, raw and pure.
VISION
The floor is cold. White tiles smell of blood.
Kaelen is lying on the ground. Still a child. His body is shaking. The Trial of Herbs has failed. Black poison courses through his veins. He is dying.
Ren is beside him. He is also in agony. Bones are protruding from his back.
But neither of them cares about the pain. Because there, inside a glass cell, is Her.
A young girl. Wearing a white dress. Her hair is the color of silver. Her eyes... her eyes are the most beautiful, most mournful ocean Kaelen has ever seen.
The girl looks at them from behind the glass. She places her hand against the pane.
Kaelen crawls to the glass. He places his bloody hand on the surface, right where the girl's hand is.
And in that moment, he hears that voice in his mind. For the first time.
...Do not be afraid, Kaelen...
The voice is so soft, so warm, that Kaelen's pain subsides.
...I am here. I will not leave you...
Kaelen leans his forehead against the glass.
Who are you? the boy asks with his child's mind.
The girl smiles. That smile turns the gray laboratory into a paradise.
I am Elara...
Then the doors burst open. Verrick enters. Soldiers enter.
Separate them! Verrick shouts. The specimens have bonded! Break the resonance!
Soldiers drag Kaelen away. Kaelen struggles. ELARA! ELARA!
Ren screams from the corner. Don't forget her, Kaelen! Don't forget her name! ELARA!
Verrick plunges that first needle into Kaelen's neck. The blue liquid enters his veins.
And Elara's face fades. Her voice is drowned out. Her name... her name is lost in the darkness.
ELARA!
Kaelen's scream made the windows of the arena tremble.
When he returned to reality, he held Ren's lifeless body in his lap. That peaceful smile was still hung upon his friend's face.
But Kaelen was not at peace.
He was shattered.
He remembered. Everything.
The coldness of that glass. The scent of Elara. How Verrick had torn her away. And how that disgusting blue medicine had stolen not just his pain, but his love.
The void he had been searching for all these years, that meaningless pull... it was always Her.
Kaelen lifted his head to the sky. To that crimson, bloody sky.
The tears flowing from his eyes mixed with the blood on his cheeks. The darkness in his right eye took complete control for the first time. But this time, it was not for savagery, but for pure, distilled grief.
Elara... he whispered. His voice was sharp and full of pain, like broken glass. Forgive me for forgetting you...
Then he turned to the box.
Verrick had stood up. His face was deathly pale. His experiment had spiraled out of control.
Kaelen gently laid Ren's body on the ground. He took Grief in his hand. The sword no longer burned with purple, but with a pitch-black flame. For the blade, too, was weeping. It shared in its master's mourning.
Kaelen raised the sword high and roared with a voice that everyone in the arena, the entire city, and even the gods in that damned Silver Tower could hear:
VERRICK!
In that scream, there was no human. There was no monster.
In that scream was the hatred of a man whose lover had been taken and whose memory had been stolen—a hatred great enough to burn the world.
The stands fell into a deathly silence. No one cheered. No one jeered.
Because everyone felt that what stood upon the sands in that moment was not a champion, but a catastrophe.
Kaelen looked at the Silver Tower. It was no longer a target.
It was Elara's prison. And Kaelen was coming to tear that prison down upon the heads of its jailers.
I am coming, Elara, he said, his voice trembling. This time, I will not forget. This time, not even death will part us.
The rain intensified. It washed the blood from Kaelen's body, but it could not extinguish the fire within him.
The story was not over. It was only just beginning.