Darkness wasn't always Cain's prison.
Once, it had been his home.
Ten Years Ago – The Orphan's Cell
They told the children it was for their salvation.
They told them the needles, the chains, the sleep-sickness—it was all "to prepare them for His gift."
Cain was seven the first time he saw a beast through the bars.
It didn't have eyes.It didn't have skin.It whispered in his voice.
"Let me in, Cain."
The orphanage was deep underground, beneath a forgotten chapel sealed by flame. The children were kept in numbered rooms, fed gruel laced with binding salts, and read scripture every morning by blind priests.
But Cain remembered her most of all.
Elira.
Older than him by two years. Burned along her left side. Hummed lullabies that weren't taught by the Church.
She used to draw pictures in the ash with her fingers: wolves, moons, and a girl with black fire for hair.
"The Church can't chain what they can't name," she whispered once.
She was gone the next morning.
Cain was alone when the dreams began.
They weren't normal dreams.
They came with cold air, with breath on his neck, with a shadow that curled around his cot and stared into his spine.
"You're almost ready," it said."Almost mine.""Almost free."
The priests called it "Veil Sickness."
But Cain remembered what Elira said:
"Sickness is just what they call awakening."
The Ritual
They took him on his eighth birthday.
Strapped him to the Stone of Binding, etched with ancient sigils glowing with crushed bone ash.
Ten children had gone before him.
Only two came back.Neither spoke again.
The bishop raised his hands.
"Let the pure beast choose the vessel. Let fusion sanctify the soul."
But Cain wasn't chosen.
He reached first.
The shadows obeyed.
The bindings cracked.
The priests screamed as Nyx tore through the chamber, formed of Cain's blood, of Cain's scream, of Cain's rage.
He doesn't remember the next few minutes.
Only that when he awoke, the bishop's eyes were gone. The chamber was frost-burned and black. And carved into the stone, in claw marks:
"MINE."
Aftermath
They didn't kill him.
They marked him.
Branded his wrist with the Unholy Glyph, and threw him into the wilds.
Let the beasts eat him, they said.
Let the cursed child die alone.
But he didn't die.
Nyx whispered.
"You gave me a name. I give you teeth."
Memory Sync Complete
[System Alert – Core Memory Unlocked]➤ Title Gained: The Unchosen➤ Passive Skill: Veilborn Resilience – Moderate➤ Nyx Affinity: +12%➤ ??? Trait Awakened: Moonlink (Dormant)
"You have remembered the price. Now reclaim the purpose."
Cain awoke in the forest with his heart hammering.
The brand on his wrist pulsed faintly.
And in the distance—over the trees, beneath the broken moon—he saw a flicker of black fire.
The girl from his dreams.
"Elira…?"