From the golden rubble that once was Fructum Village, rage lingered in the air—
Thick and bitter, like smoke that refused to fade.
Doran rose.
Slowly. Unsteadily.
His limbs trembled beneath him, breath ragged, body aching with every motion.
"I will kill him," he muttered.
The words fell like ash from his tongue—low, raw, final.
He took a step forward.
Stumbled.
Caught himself—barely.
The pain echoed with every motion, each step a silent scream from muscles torn and soul frayed.
But he kept moving.
Not toward anything clear.
Not toward safety.
Only forward.
Eyes hollow.
Jaw clenched.
Driven by something he could neither name nor control.
A path unfolded before him—
Not one laid by roads or stars,
But by fury.
By grief.
By vengeance.
And Doran followed it.
Blindly.
He wandered.
Past the village's edge.
Past the cracked stones and twisted trees.
Past the lives frozen in gold.
The air was still thick with heat, though the fires had long since died.
Ash clung to his skin.
His legs moved without thought.
His mind burned with a single, searing name.
Daegryn.
But his body… it was breaking.
He stumbled further into the darkness of the dense forest, light barely reaching its mossy floor. Every sound felt like an echo.
Barely holding on to consciousness, he leaned his back against a tree, slowly sliding down, settling on the ground.
Fighting to keep his eyes open.
Fighting to keep his head up.
Then—
A shockwave split the silence.
Split the atmosphere.
A thunderous crack tore through the air—like the sky itself had shattered.
A flash of violet light swallowed the stars.
Doran's eyes widened.
The ground beneath him trembled—low and deep, like the forest was growling from the roots up.
Then he saw it.
In the distance—
Fire.
But not like the flames that had devoured Fructum.
This was alive.
The horizon blazed with color—blinding, impossible color.
A swirling inferno of orange and blue, surging upward into the night.
And from within it—
Wings.
They unfurled from the fire itself—vast and radiant—painting streaks of brilliance across the stars.
The body that followed burned with molten orange, its feathers edged in crackling cobalt blue—each one living, shifting, seething with power.
A phoenix.
It rose like judgment.
Ancient. Elemental. Eternal.
Its cry tore through the heavens—a sound that bent the sky, equal parts agony and wrath.
A voice from before memory, too large for the world to hold.
And then—
Movement.
A second shape.
Smaller.
Faster.
Sharp.
Bladed in shadow.
Trimmed in gold.
Daegryn.
He hurtled upward like a spear of darkness, violet light spiraling around him in fractal patterns.
Each step through the air bent gravity.
Time curled around his form like a servant obeying its master.
They met in midair.
Clash.
The first impact cracked the clouds apart.
The second ruptured the forest canopy below, sending trees flying in all directions.
The third—
The third came with no sound at all.
Only light.
A sphere of pale white bloomed outward, swallowing everything—then imploded in a spiral of heat and wind.
Doran threw an arm over his face as the trees around him bowed and snapped, leaves turned to cinders midair.
The heat brushed against his skin like the breath of a dying star.
He tried to understand what he was seeing.
But it was too fast.
Too bright.
Too wrong.
Daegryn was everywhere.
Twisting. Lunging. Vanishing and reappearing with impossible speed, his strikes trailing ribbons of violet fire.
The phoenix answered with sweeping arcs of its wings—blades of burning air that carved rifts into the sky.
Its body twisted mid-flight, feathers bursting outward like explosive shrapnel made of heat and light.
Each strike reshaped the space around it, setting constellations to flicker and dim.
Doran could only stare.
The forest around him had gone silent, save for the thunderous collisions far above.
No birds.
No insects.
No breath.
Just gods.
Or monsters.
Or both.
Another impact rocked the earth.
Another spiral of flame.
The phoenix plummeted—only to spin, wings tucked, before launching upward again in a corkscrew of blinding fire.
Daegryn met it head-on.
His body flickered like static—now whole, now blurred—his laughter breaking through the roar like shattered glass.
Doran's heart raced.
What is this?
What am I watching?
A wing of flame swept across the sky, clipping Daegryn's side.
For the first time, the air screamed in pain.
He spun through the clouds like a thrown blade, vanishing into the dark.
Then—
He reappeared above the phoenix, arm outstretched.
Six blue rings—jagged like lightning—crackled into existence around him, interlocked in a spiraling column of light.
"Six Rings of Despair!!"
Daegryn hurled the first ring down like a comet.
It spun through the air, tearing a scar into the sky.
Then another.
And another.
Each throw faster, sharper—screaming with cursed energy as they carved toward the phoenix.
The great bird swerved, wings tucking and twisting, dodging each with impossible grace.
Four.
Five.
Daegryn stopped—holding the sixth and final ring in his hand.
He grinned wide.
"Well, this was fun, Avon!"
He spun once in the air, arm pulling back like an Olympian with a discus.
"Sixth Ring—True Pain!!!"
He launched it.
The final ring tore through the sky, faster than sound, trailing streaks of azure fire behind it.
The phoenix twisted—
But this one…
This one was too close.
Just as the sixth ring neared its target—
Ash.
Ash filled the air like snow.
Thick. Choking.
It blanketed the sky in an instant.
The battlefield vanished in white and gray.
Daegryn paused mid-flight, scanning the haze below.
Confused.
"…Avon?"
He hovered, gaze sharp—waiting for movement.
For light.
For fire.
He forgot about the ring.
But the ring—
did not forget.
It kept going.
Tearing through branches.
Through stone.
Through space itself.
Until it found—
A heartbeat.
A broken body, too weak to move.
Doran.
And then—
Darkness.
A void swallowed the world.
From within that void, a voice—flat, omniscient, cruel—spoke:
"The Sixth Ring of True Pain:
the final technique of the Six Rings of Despair.
It gathers every trauma, every injury, every sorrow the user and the target have ever known.
And in a single, excruciating moment—magnified beyond comprehension—
the target experiences it all."
"What lasts 0.12 seconds… feels like centuries."
From the blackness, cracks of red and blue split the air—
Like lightning beneath glass.
The silence roared.
And Doran—
Shattered.
His body twisted by invisible hands.
Gashes tore across his skin—wounds he'd never received, yet remembered like scars.
Blood poured from him in waves.
Energy—orange and blue—flared around him in chaotic bursts, screaming against the rules of nature.
His mouth opened in a scream so deep it bent space.
His eyes, wide and bloodshot, glowed like twin dying stars.
Every bone fractured.
Every scar reopened.
Every buried grief was unearthed.
He lived every agony.
Felt every loss.
Carried every burden.
And then—
"…you, Doran, died."
The whisper came not with cruelty.
But with certainty.
His soul—
Torn apart, thread by thread, unraveling into the void.
"Souls are found in every living being…"
The voice was distant.
Like a god speaking from the edge of the cosmos.
And then—
Collapse.
Doran's body slammed into the earth with a final, shattering thud.
Blood pooled beneath him.
Limbs sprawled at unnatural angles.
Still.
Silent.
Broken.
But the world did not remain still.
A breeze stirred the ash.
Above him, glowing embers drifted lazily through the forest air—remnants of the phoenix's fiery form, still burning with an impossible radiance.
They spiraled downward, slow and deliberate, like stars returning to the soil.
The first flecks reached him.
They hovered above his chest, shimmering softly.
Then—
They began to gather.
The ashes swirled, drawn by unseen gravity, collecting over his heart.
They glowed brighter now—golden and blue—flickering in delicate spirals.
The forest dimmed around them.
The sky hushed.
And then—
Th-thump.
His chest rose.
A heartbeat.
Weak. But real.
The ashes sank into his body, disappearing beneath his skin in waves of warm light.
A golden glow spread slowly outward, chasing away the blood and darkness that clung to him.
The air pulsed.
The forest held its breath.
Th-thump.
His lips parted.
A soft breath slipped free.
Barely audible.
Barely there.
Then—
His eyes snapped open.
Blinding gold poured from them—radiant and wild,
Like twin suns newly forged.
From somewhere beyond the veil of waking, a voice curled into his ear—amused, arrogant, almost fond.
"Rise and shine, kid. We've got work to do."
"Oh, and that name? 'Doran'? Ugh. We'll fix that soon enough."
"Don't worry—you'll learn to love me."
Golden embers floated around him, dancing in the air like fireflies in slow motion.
The forest, silent only moments ago, seemed to lean closer.
Watching.
Waiting.
The earth remembered his name.
But it did not recognize the soul now wearing it.
The embers around him brightened—flaring with unnatural heat.
Heat that didn't burn, but rewrote.
His breath steadied.
His fingers twitched.
And the world held its breath—
As the one who should've died rose from the dust.
Changed.
And forever as two.