The sky was ash.
The clouds above churned like molten lava, flickering with crimson lightning. Below, a land of ruin stretched endlessly—floating islands scattered through a blood-red void, each burning with black fire that never faded.
Kael stood at the edge of the floating platform, his cloak torn, his breath heavy.
Azrion's voice echoed inside him, calm but distant… too distant.
> "This is it, Kael. The Realm of the Forsaken Flame. The place where my kind became... something even gods feared."
Kael's chest ached—not from wounds, but from the pressure in the air. The moment they stepped into this realm, something ancient had awakened.
Massive, obsidian statues of horned warriors surrounded them—eyes glowing dimly with violet. Each carried broken weapons once used against gods.
"Why does this place feel like it remembers me?" Kael whispered.
> "Because it does," Azrion replied quietly.
"My father once ruled this realm. The last true demon king before the massacre."
Kael turned. In the distance, he saw a lone flame flickering atop a colossal obsidian altar. That was it—the next seal. But around it, the shadows moved.
The Guardians of Forgotten Wrath
As they approached, the ground trembled.
From the lava beneath the floating islands, three towering creatures emerged—burning with divine fire, yet chained by ancient demonic runes.
They weren't alive. They weren't dead.
Azrion's voice darkened.
> "These are the Wrathborn—created by my father using the souls of fallen gods. They were forged for one purpose: to kill the heavens."
Kael drew his blade—crimson and black, pulsing with Azrion's soul. The closest Wrathborn leapt, its body a mass of fire and rage, and—
Boom!
Kael blocked the strike—but the force shattered the island beneath him. He was thrown into the sky, crashing into another platform.
Blood spilled from his mouth.
But he rose.
His symbol burned brighter. The black lines around it pulsed, growing, stretching down his arm like roots.
Inside the Flame
The battle raged. One Wrathborn down. Two to go.
Kael fought like a storm—but it wasn't just power now. He was learning. Adapting. Every strike of the Wrathborn taught him something. His body moved like it had lived this war before.
Azrion noticed.
> "You… you're starting to remember, aren't you?"
Kael didn't answer. But something inside him had changed. A voice whispered from the flames. A memory not his own.
A man with crimson eyes.
A woman screaming.
A crown falling into fire.
Kael stood before the altar now. The final Wrathborn came charging, faster than anything he'd faced before.
And then—
He disappeared.
Azrion took over.
"You dare raise a hand in my father's realm?"
With a single word in the ancient tongue, Azrion twisted reality. The Wrathborn shattered into pieces of molten light, collapsing like glass under godly wrath.
The Seal Breaks
Kael, barely conscious, reached out to the flickering flame. The moment his fingers touched it—
Visions exploded.
Azrion's father. A massive war.
Demons rising, gods falling.
Then betrayal. A god, cloaked in gold and sorrow, driving a spear through Azrion's chest.
Azrion screamed inside Kael's mind, a roar of grief and rage.
The flame vanished.
The sixth seal was broken.
The World Reacts
Far above, in the realm of the gods, the skies turned black.
A divine council gathered.
> "The sixth seal has fallen," spoke the oldest god.
"Azrion's return is no longer a threat. It is a certainty."
But another voice—calm, cold—spoke from the shadows.
> "Let him return. I've waited for this war."
End of Chapter 18