Alex moved through the ruins like a shadow.
His footsteps were near-silent on the moss-covered stone, each step deliberate, each breath measured. The tunnels beneath Gravepoint Hollow twisted in on themselves, old passageways collapsing into chasms and forgotten crypts. Magic still clung to the walls—dormant glyphs flickering as he passed, their meanings lost to time.
He didn't stop. Not even when his body cried out for rest.
The two Order agents he had slain were only the first. He could feel others nearby, stalking him from the dark. Waiting.
But it wasn't fear that drove him forward now.
It was instinct. And the pull of something deeper.
The further he descended, the louder it became—a hum at the edge of perception. Like the whisper of a blade unsheathed. It resonated not in his ears, but in his bones.
Kaer Thalor remained silent.
Alex didn't know if the spirit was resting, or watching.
Eventually, he reached a corridor different from the rest. It was intact, the stone smooth and unmarred, the glyphs along the walls glowing faint silver. The air was dry here, heavy with the scent of old incense and forgotten rites.
At the end of the corridor stood a door.
Tall. Forged of black metal veined with white crystal. A mark was etched into its center—a sword encircled by flame.
Alex reached out and touched it.
The door pulsed.
The mark flared to life.
A rush of memory slammed into him.
A sword raised against an army of shadows. A warrior kneeling in a field of fire. A voice—his own voice, or someone else's—speaking words of blood and legacy.
He staggered back.
The door opened.
Beyond it lay a chamber bathed in golden light. Unlike the ruins above, this place had been preserved. The walls were lined with murals—paintings of battles, of kings, of rituals. In the center stood a pedestal.
Upon it rested a sword.
Not ancient. Not dusty.
Pristine.
Its blade was long and straight, forged of silver metal that shimmered like water. The hilt was wrapped in red leather, and the pommel bore the same sigil etched on the door.
Alex stepped closer, drawn by a force he didn't understand.
He reached out—and the moment his fingers brushed the hilt, light exploded through the chamber.
Flame surged around him, not hot but alive. It burned through his mind, through memory, through every wall he had ever built inside himself.
And he remembered.
Not everything.
But enough.
The battlefield.
The voices calling his name.
A woman with fire in her eyes and a crown of iron—his ancestor.
And the sword. Her sword.
His birthright.
He dropped to his knees, the weapon still in his grasp. It hummed with power, not like Kaer Thalor's searing presence, but something older. Quieter. Resolute.
Kaer Thalor stirred.
"You have awakened the Warden's Blade," the spirit said, voice tinged with reverence. "Few are worthy. Fewer survive."
Alex rose.
The sword felt... right. As if it had always been his.
Outside the chamber, the tunnels trembled. Dust rained from the ceiling. A roar echoed in the distance—low and inhuman.
"They've brought something else," Kaer Thalor said. "Something not of blood or bone. A summoning."
Alex sheathed the Warden's Blade.
His injuries still burned. His strength was not whole.
But something had changed.
He was no longer just a boy from Bramblehold.
He was the heir of Eldoria.
And he had a sword that remembered.
The roar came again—closer now.
He turned, cloak swirling, eyes burning with renewed resolve.
Let them come.
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