The forest was still burning.

  Not with fire, but with memory.

  Charred wood bent like broken spines, the ground littered with half-collapsed shrines and temples. The air was heavy, painted with ash that never seemed to settle. Each step I took felt like trespassing in a place that had already been destroyed once, long ago.

  My hand brushed against a ruined altar, blackened stone scarred with carvings I couldn’t read. For a moment, I thought I saw it again - the shadows twisting, unintelligible screaming, bodies with unidentifiable faces strewn across the ground. A flash. Just a flash. Then gone.

  I pressed forward, my boots crunching through the brittle earth. The shadows followed my every step, just beyond my peripheral vision. They grew restless in this area, as though they remembered it.

  The forest whispered.

  Figures flickered at the edges of my vision - warped faces, half-human, twisted. I saw them as if they had always been here, running through the smoke, mowed down by men in black cloaks that covered everything. The men armed with swords flicked open, fire wrapping their blades. Bodies piled high, flames devouring them until the screams became silence.

  I froze.

  Ahead of me lay the mouth of a tunnel, collapsed in rubble. Broken stone and steel beams sealed it shut, but the air seemed to breathe from below.

  That was when I heard it.

  Children.

  Faint voices. Screams. Wailing. Pleading through the cracks in the earth. Some familiar, some not.

  I stood there, staring, my heart refusing to beat faster, my face as blank as the day I first crawled out of this cursed place. But the longer I stared, the louder the cries became. Louder. Louder. Until even the shadows at my feet grew restless, swirling in agitation, feeding off it.

  My body refused to move. My throat clenched tight.

  The shadows started to move through the cracks. As if they were drawn by something inside, something lost and forgotten.

  The cries of the children grew louder.

  The shadows seemed to pull me, as if I could swim through the cracks as they did. As the cries got louder and louder, they matched it by their urgency.

  I was fixated.

  I took a step forward, my mind pierced by whispers of unintelligible language and screams.

  When I suddenly heard footsteps behind me.

  “Ah, young master Damian.”

  I turned in a split second and my hand was already halfway to my revolver. The weight of it came free from my coat before my eyes actually registered who stood there.

  A soldier stood there, leaning lazily with a bolt-action rifle slung over his shoulder. His uniform was auburn-dark, patched and scuffed from use. His hair was messy, brown like bark, and his eyes a sharp green that seemed too alive for a place like this.

  My grip loosened, the revolver dropping back into its holster with a sigh.

  “A warning next time would be appreciated.”

  The soldier, without even looking the least bit shocked, only smiled.

  “You seemed to be in a bit of a daze. I thought I’d snap you out of it before you went mad, young master.”

  I rolled my eyes. “I’m not part of Arthur’s house yet.”

  He grinned, brushing the dirt off his sleeve. “If you need a full guard entourage just to walk outside the city walls, you might as well be.”

  I shook my head, brushing my fringe out of my eyes. “You could drop the title.”

  “Not a chance. Makes me sound respectable.” He tilted his head at the collapsed cellar. “Find what you were looking for?”

  I looked back at the rubble, listening one last time to the phantom screams below. Then I forced the air out of my lungs and said, “No. Doubt I’d find it here anyway. My past was buried alongside the cult it seems.”

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  We left the ruins behind, pushing through the last stretch of burnt trees until the gravel road opened up. A carriage waited, black wood polished to reflect the weak sunlight. Two older soldiers stood at attention beside it, wearing the same clothes as the one next to me - albeit much more neat and presentable.

  Both saluted as I approached. “Young master.”

  I sighed. “That got old really quick.”

  The soldier beside me smirked. “We could swap places if you want.”

  “Adrian, my friend,” I muttered, climbing into the carriage, “I would if I could.”

  He laughed, sliding in after me. The two soldiers mounted the driver’s bench. With a whip-crack of reins, the horses jolted forward, wheels clattering over gravel.

  The forest fell behind us. Ahead, the city rose.

  Home sweet home.

  Morren.

  The place I had started to call home four years ago.

  Three walls encircled it like ribs around a heart, dividing the districts into neat circles. Smoke drifted faintly from the outer rim, where forges and taverns shared streets with tenements. Beyond the walls, cathedral spires clawed toward the sky, their stained glass catching the afternoon sun like eyes that wouldn’t blink. A city that held half-a-million souls, one that had seen many battles in its past.

  Adrian’s gaze lingered on the ruins a second longer than I expected. His usual grin faltered, his voice lowering.

  “That place always gives me the creeps. Lord Arthur did well to burn it down and destroy the cult, but…” He shook his head. “Doesn’t feel gone, does it? Almost like it’s still watching us.”

  I could only shake my head, still gazing towards the city.

  More than you know.

  Adrian stretched, knocking his boots together, his playful demeanour plastered back on his face in an instant. “So, let me guess. Apartment?”

  “Yeah,” I said. “Need to gather a few things before I meet Arthur. Don’t wait. I’ll take the scenic route to his manor.”

  He raised an eyebrow. “You? Sightseeing?”

  I leaned my head on my hand, careful to avoid the bright sun.

  “It’s a nice day for it.”

  Adrian chuckled. “I’d rather be drinking in some piss-stained pub in the outer rim. Betting who gets into a fight first.”

  A faint smile tugged at my lips, my right eyebrow raised. “Don’t you get paid enough not to bet?”

  “They couldn’t pay me enough not to.” He tapped the side of his rifle like it was a punchline.

  At some point, Adrian dug into his coat and pulled out an envelope. White parchment. Red wax seal, lion surrounded by nine knives. He handed it to me with mock ceremony. “Straight from Arthur. Try not to throw this one in a fire.”

  I grabbed it, shoving it into my own pocket. “It’ll be hard, but I’ll try.”

  The carriage rattled on, subtle laughter swallowed by the sound of hooves.

  The suns rays reflected lightly off the green leaves of the now sparse forest. The city seemed so large compared to the pastures outside of it, where I could see animals resembling cows, sheep and pigs.

  It was at moments like these, where I felt most melancholic. Even if it was for a place I didn’t have any memories of, I still felt a sting of longing.

  I wonder if there are any others like me out there. If so, I’d like to meet them.

  I just hoped I wouldn’t come to resent that sentiment later.

  —-

  By the time I got back to my apartment, the sun had dipped behind the cathedral spires.

  The room wasn’t much - one large window facing the city, books stacked against the wall, and a desk buried in loose reports. Not the home of nobility, but too polished to be common. It felt like home to me, unlike the opulent residences the Nobles lived in.

  I tossed my coat over the chair and caught sight of myself in the mirror.

  Dark hair that fell to my brow, my fringe kept in check by a dark brown flat cap. Tired brown eyes that didn’t match the face of someone my age. Shadows clung to me faintly, like stains I couldn’t wash out. For all the titles people tried to push onto me, all I saw was a stranger.

  Adrian’s envelope sat on the desk. White parchment. Wax seal, lion circled with nine knives. Arthur’s crest.

  I smirked. “So dramatic.”

  The seal started to dissolve as I pressed into it with my thumb. Smoke curled into the air, faintly smelling of roses.

  I took the letter out of the envelope, but the page was completely blank, revealing nothing.

  Of course. As cautious as ever.

  Another quick prick of my finger. A drop of blood fell onto the parchment. Crimson lines spidered across it like veins until the whole page was consumed. Words poured into my skull - not written, not read, but carved into thought. A location. A time. Orders. Always orders.

  The paper burned away into ash, leaving nothing but the faint sting in my finger.

  I leaned back in my chair, staring out the window at Morren’s distant walls.

  “So it begins.”

  Even after four years, this world felt like a stage play I was never meant to be cast in - rituals, nobility, inquisitors with halos and bloodstains. A man with no past, trying to navigate an uncertain future.

  But tonight was the night.

  I would carve my name into this world.

  Whether it liked it or not.

  After all, I had a goal that I had to achieve at all cost.

  I opened my drawer and pulled out a tattered journal. Its dark brown leather was slightly damaged, and the cover had scorch marks. In the traditional language of the Empire I lived in, the cover held my name.

  But inside was a different story.

  It remained mostly empty, except for the first page.

  Unlike my name, this one was written in a foreign language, English. Unmistakably in my own handwriting.

  Inside held my only chain to my past, and in turn, my future.

  In rushly scribbled letters, it held eight words.

  The most important eight words in my life.

  The Empire must survive, or everyone will die.

  here!

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