The storm had followed them.
By the time Elara and the others reached the outpost city of Velden's Hollow, lightning had scarred half the sky. The air was thick with magic—erratic, untamed, alive. The wind didn't howl; it whispered, carrying strange voices through the trees as if the veil itself had begun to crack.
Inside the city's aging walls, people huddled in silence. Lanterns were dimmed. Prayers hung in the air like fog.
They knew something was coming.
---
The Dead Speak Softly
At the heart of Velden's Hollow stood the Hall of Echoes, a round marble building known to store memories carved into stone—a place where magic and memory fused. Elara stood before one such stone, hands pressed against its surface.
A voice began to speak—soft and female.
Her mother's voice.
> "If you hear this, Elara, then the Fifth has awakened. You must not seek the Sixth without knowing the cost. You are of the Veyra line… but you were never meant to carry all Seven."
Kael moved beside her. "That message is hundreds of years old."
Elara's hands trembled. "She left it for me before I was even born."
The magic in the chamber rippled. Liora and Mira stood guard at the door. Outside, the storm had grown teeth. The wind howled like wolves, and something began knocking on the edges of their wards.
Something not human.
---
A Hole in the Sky
It began just after nightfall.
A rip tore through the clouds—visible only to those attuned to magic. Mira saw it first. "There!" she shouted, pointing through the stained-glass window.
In the sky above Velden's Hollow, a jagged tear had opened. Lightning pulsed from within, but it wasn't light. It was shadows tangled in flame. Shapes twisted through it—impossible to name. And through the breach came the unmistakable sound of wings.
Massive ones.
Kael drew his sword, firelight licking the blade. "We need to close that tear before it opens fully."
"No," Elara said, voice suddenly cold. "That isn't a tear."
They turned to her.
"It's a door."
---
The Return of the Firstborn
Thunder cracked—louder than before. And then he stepped through.
Not Theren.
Not Nocthros.
A creature older than both.
He wore a robe of midnight stitched with bone, and his face was hidden behind a veil of smoke. But Elara knew him the moment she saw him.
The Firstborn Watcher.
Azeroth.
The room darkened. All warmth drained from the air. Azeroth stepped forward, eyes glowing with molten gold.
"You bear the Fifth, child of Veyra," he said in a voice that didn't belong to this world. "You are closer now. But you are not ready."
Mira readied a shield. "Then help her."
He turned his face toward her. "Help her? I built the gates to keep her from becoming what lies beyond them."
Kael stepped forward. "She's not the enemy."
But Azeroth's eyes stayed on Elara. "She could be."
---
The Shattering Trial
Without warning, the air shattered around them—like glass breaking in reverse. They were no longer in the Hall.
They were in a mirror world: same room, but hollow and silent. Time frozen. A test had begun.
Elara stood alone.
"Why am I here?" she asked.
Azeroth's voice boomed, echoing off invisible walls.
> "To face the truth: that every Marker you take brings you closer to becoming her."
"Elara is me," said another voice—her own voice. But older, darker, more sure.
From the shadows stepped another version of her—eyes pitch black, hands dripping with flame, a crown of embers floating above her brow.
Elara gasped. "What is this?"
"Your future, if you keep going," the Other-Elara said. "You think you're saving the world. But every step you take is the one I already walked."
The ground cracked beneath her feet. Visions spiraled up—cities in ruins, friends falling one by one, Kael turning to ash.
---
Choices and Chains
"I won't become you," Elara spat.
"But you already are," the shadow-Elara whispered, stepping closer. "You think love will save you? That your heart is strong enough?"
Elara closed her eyes, whispering Kael's name—not as a spell, but as a tether. A lifeline. A truth stronger than fear.
When she opened her eyes, the vision flickered, cracked.
"I know who I am," Elara said. "I'm not perfect. I'm not pure. But I choose who I become. And it's not you."
A pulse of pure light burst from her chest, hurling the shadow-self back. The vision dissolved. The mirror room collapsed.
And Elara awoke—in Kael's arms, back in the real world.
Azeroth was gone.
But a mark had been burned into the floor: "SEVEN WILL FALL."
---
After the Trial
Rain now fell over Velden's Hollow. Gentle. Cleansing. As if the storm had passed—at least for now.
Elara sat by the window, silent, the Fifth Marker in her lap. Kael leaned beside her, fingers grazing hers.
"You saw her, didn't you?" he asked.
She nodded. "The version of me I could become. If I let power lead. If I forget why we fight."
"You won't," he said.
"I hope not."
He squeezed her hand. "You have us."
Mira entered the room, followed by Liora. "We found a path," Mira said. "A Whisper Trail. Leads north through the Vale of Stars. Might take us to the Sixth Gate."
Elara stood, resolve returning to her eyes.
"Then we go."
---
Beneath the Mountain
Far away, in a sunless temple beneath the sleeping mountains, Theren knelt in front of a black altar. Before him, a sixth Marker pulsed faintly—dim, incomplete.
"I have three," he said. "She has five."
Behind him, a presence stirred.
Nocthros.
"Then we take what she has," came the voice. "And remind her what it means to be chosen."
Theren looked up, eyes blackening with shadow.
"It's time," he whispered.
---