The temple of Elmsfall stood at the village's heart like a tooth too rotten to pull.
Once whitewashed and proud, its walls had long since faded to the color of bone. Cracks slithered through the stone, like veins beneath skin. Crows nested in the bell tower, and the holy flame in its brazier hadn't been lit in over a year.
To the villagers, it was sacred.
To Kael, it was a tomb of lies.
---
Midnight.
The square lay silent under a shroud of mist. Kael crouched near the well, watching the temple's front door through the veil. The villagers were asleep. Goran had drunk himself unconscious again. Even the priest had retired early.
Everything was as Kael had hoped.
He moved like a ghost—silent, controlled, every step calculated. The lock on the temple door was old iron. He could have melted it with a whisper of flame, but tonight wasn't about force.
It was about truth.
He slid a thin, glowing thread of essence into the keyhole—*"Whisper Thread,"* he named it—his first true original spell since reincarnation. It tickled the tumblers into place.
The lock clicked.
He slipped inside.
The air was thick with incense and damp mold. Rows of crumbling pews lined the aisle, their cushions half-eaten by rats. A massive iron flame-shaped idol stood at the altar's end, draped in faded red cloth. But Kael didn't go forward.
He went down.
Behind the altar, hidden behind a loose panel, was a narrow stairwell—just as his instincts had warned. The stone steps spiraled downward, into the earth. Into silence.
Kael summoned a faint flame above his palm and descended.
---
The first chamber was a crypt. Old bones in cracked glass coffins lined the walls. But these weren't the bones of saints. He recognized them.
Mage bones.
Some still had burnt robes wrapped around them—sigils half-carved into their ribs.
> "He's been killing arcanists," Kael murmured. "Or someone has. And hiding them beneath holy ground."
Something flickered behind him.
He turned.
A shadow danced along the far wall—but there was no source.
Kael's flame pulsed brighter. "I know you're watching."
The shadow didn't flee. It moved—slowly—and then twisted into the shape of a **glyph** Kael had never seen before.
Then it vanished.
---
The second chamber was worse.
A workroom. No windows. Just stone tables, iron tools, and bloodstains baked deep into the floor. A cage hung from the ceiling—empty now, but still warm.
At the center of the room, chained to the floor, was a **stone slab** carved with a summoning circle. At its heart was an object wrapped in oiled cloth.
Kael approached.
He pulled it free.
It was a **grimoire**.
His own.
Or rather—its remains. Scorched at the edges. Pages ripped, but familiar. The sigils, the ink, the way the margins bled with unfinished formulas… all his.
From his past life.
> "He found this," Kael whispered, gripping the book. "And studied it…"
That's when the door slammed shut.
---
Footsteps echoed behind him.
"I wondered how long it would take," said a cold voice.
Kael turned.
Priest Dalan stood at the stairwell, robe pulled tight around him. In his hand, not a relic or holy symbol—but a staff etched with dark runes.
"You're not a boy," Dalan said softly. "Not truly. I knew it the moment you entered the temple for the first time. Your eyes see too much."
Kael raised his flame higher.
"And yours hide too much."
Dalan chuckled.
"I thought to use you. Shape you. But the glyph in your soul… it's older than anything I've seen. You were never meant to belong here."
Kael stepped forward.
"I don't."
Dalan thrust the staff down.
The chains around the summoning circle rose—hissing, alive—and lashed toward Kael like serpents.
---
Kael didn't flinch.
He dropped the grimoire and **snapped his fingers**.
The flame above his hand expanded—blazing into a whirling sigil of blue fire. The chains struck it, but the fire devoured them.
> "Spellname: *Flameroot Bind.*"
He flicked his wrist.
The flame shot forward—wrapping around Dalan's staff. The priest screamed as the runes on it cracked, backfiring violently.
Kael stepped into the circle, his hand glowing with power, and placed it over his grimoire.
The symbol on his palm pulsed—triangle and spiral—and synced with the book.
**A surge of memory flooded in.**
Screams. Lightning. The smell of burned flesh. His tower, his death. Serana's betrayal. His own final spell—
> *Eclipse Requiem.*
He gasped, stumbling back.
Dalan was already gone.
---
Kael stood alone in the dark chamber, the weight of his past pressing down like stone.
But he wasn't broken.
He was rebuilding.
> "You tried to study my legacy," he said quietly to the empty air. "Now watch what happens when I reclaim it."
Above him, in the village square, the holy flame finally flickered back to life—burning not white or gold, but faintly **blue**.