The wind howled like an injured animal, clawing at the abandoned village nestled between the frozen ridges. Snow fell in silence, but it wasn't peaceful. It felt… watchful.
I stood alone before the ancient gate — half-buried in frost, carved with runes that pulsed dimly like a dying heartbeat. My clothes were torn. My hands were bleeding. I had no memory of how I got here.
But one thing was clear: the gate was open, and I had already stepped through.
My breath fogged in the air as I glanced down at my arm. Someone had etched a name into my skin, rough and desperate, like it had been carved with shaking hands.
Lior.
I didn't know if that was my name… but it felt right. Or maybe I just didn't have anything else.
Who am I?
Why am I the only one alive?
A voice echoed faintly in my skull. Not mine. Not human.
You weren't supposed to wake up yet, Lior.
I froze.
That voice—
It was like a whisper trapped in metal. Ancient, hollow, and oddly… familiar.
I stumbled backward, heart pounding. Behind me, the gate shimmered with a strange blue fire, as if it was deciding whether to close or consume me. I turned toward the village — or what was left of it.
Wooden homes, collapsed and rotting. Frozen corpses with eyes wide open, as if they died mid-scream. Black vines crawled through the snow like veins.
There were symbols on the ground. Circles. Runes. Blood. Too much blood.
And in the middle of it all, something moved.
A shape. A shadow, writhing like smoke but heavier. Wrong.
They're watching you now.
The voice again. Closer.
I grabbed a rusted dagger from the snow. It felt too light to save me. But I wasn't ready to die without answers.
Who wrote my name?
Why was I here?
And what the hell was Echo Vale?
Snow crunched behind me.
I turned.
And saw eyes — glowing white, lidless, in a face made of shifting ink.
It whispered just one word before lunging:
Lior.
The world snapped.
It moved like a blur—liquid shadow—rushing toward me with claws of smoke and glowing eyes. I barely had time to raise the dagger. The impact hit me like thunder.
I was thrown back into the snow, the wind knocked from my lungs. My vision doubled, then steadied. The Shade stood over me, its form pulsing like a dying star.
"Why can't you remember?" it growled, voice layered with sorrow and rage.
I rolled, narrowly dodging another strike that scorched the earth where I'd just been. The snow sizzled. Steam rose around us.
I stumbled to my feet, the dagger trembling in my grip.
"What are you?!" I shouted.
It didn't answer.
Instead, it split.
The shape unraveled—twisting—until two identical shadows faced me. One took a step forward, its head twitching unnaturally.
"You called us once, Lior…"
The other's voice followed.
"You opened the gate… You started this war."
My chest burned. A sharp ache pulsed beneath the skin—right where the name had been carved.
The memory wasn't clear. Just flashes.
A tower.
A voice screaming.
Fire raining from the sky.
Eyes—my own—filled with light.
"Lior," the voices echoed together now, growing louder.
"Lior. Lior. Lior."
They charged again.
I screamed, raising the dagger—and it answered.
The runes on its blade blazed to life. Blue flames ignited, cutting through the dark. The Shade shrieked as the weapon struck one of them, the scream so loud it tore through my skull.
Light exploded. Snow melted in a sudden pulse of heat.
And then… silence.
The clearing was empty. The gate still glowed behind me, quiet once more.
I collapsed to my knees, panting.
Burning in my palm, the dagger hummed—alive.
And inside my head, the voice returned.
"The Gate remembers you now.
And so will they all.
My hand wouldn't stop shaking.
The blood—*my blood*—dripped into the snow, staining it red like some fucked-up warning sign. Every breath was a razor in my lungs. The cold no longer bit; it burned.
But the voice in my head?
Calm.
Too calm.
Pain means you're still alive.
"Yeah?" I spat. "Then what the hell does this mean?"
I ripped open what was left of my jacket. The veins under my skin pulsed blue, glowing softly like embers trapped beneath flesh. The rune patterns had spread from my hand to my arm—twisting, ancient, *alive*.
Then I heard it.
A laugh.
Low.
Mocking.
I turned, fast, dagger ready.
Nothing.
Just trees and mist.
But something was there. Watching.
You survived a fragment," the voice said, amused now.
They'll send worse next time."
Suddenly, shifted in the snow ahead. Not footsteps shapes. Tall. Humanoid. Four of them, walking like they owned the land. Their eyes burned gold. Their skin looked like obsidian stretched too thin. And every one of them carried a different weapon—bone axes, curved blades, claws sharpened to kill gods.
I backed up slowly.
One of them sniffed the air.
He reeks of the Gate's touch."
He bleeds like one of them."
Then he dies like one."
I didn't wait.
I ran.
They followed.
Fucking fast.
They moved like nightmares—blurring from tree to tree. I ducked, slid under a fallen trunk, scrambled uphill like a cornered animal. I could feel them closing in.
Then the ground vanished.
A cliff.
I fell—hard.
Cracked through branches, smashed into rock, and hit the snow below like a sack of meat. Everything went white for a second.
The world rang.
I couldn't move.
Could barely breathe.
The sky above me was a swirling mess of snow and shadow.
And then they landed.
All four.
Silent.
Cold.
The leader stepped forward. His axe dripped something thick and dark—fresh. Not mine.
He crouched low, eyes locked on mine.
"You've forgotten who you are," he said in a guttural growl.
"But we haven't, Lior.
He raised the axe.
And I…
I screamed.
Not in fear.
In fury.
My veins lit up. The dagger leapt into my hand like it had a will of its own. I slashed upward, catching the bastard across the face. His mask split with a hiss.
ENOUGH!
The voice in my head *roared*.
Time buckled.
Wind howled.
And everything around me—Shades, snow, trees froze mid-motion.
Only me. Only the voice. Only the flame in my chest.
"You want the truth?" it whispered.
"Then bleed for it."
And I did.
As the dagger melted into my skin, and the runes carved deeper, I screamed again—not from pain.
From memory.
Flashes.
A battle.
A betrayal.
A promise carved in bone.
The Gate.
Me—standing on its threshold, holding back a fucking army of shadows, my name echoing across a dying sky.
Lior.
The Betrayer.
And now… The last one left.
My lungs burned as time snapped back into motion.
The Shades moved again, snarling, but something had changed.
They hesitated.
They could feel it too.
The air crackled around me—static and rage—and my blood felt like fire under ice. The runes had spread to my chest now, burning with a light that wasn't mine. Or maybe it was, and I had just forgotten.
That's when the sky opened.
Not with light.
With sound.
A horn.
Low. Ancient. Carved from something dead.
It echoed across the mountains like a scream pulled from a god's throat.
The Shades froze.
Then they ran.
Full panic.
The leader hissed one last time.
The Watchers… they know…"
Gone.
Just like that.
I tried to stand, but my legs gave out. I dropped to my knees, clutching my ribs, shaking, bloodied, confused.
Then I saw her.
A silhouette at the edge of the trees. Cloaked in black. Eyes like dying stars.
She stepped forward, snow not even touching her boots.
And smiled.
Found you," she whispered.
Before I could speak, the ground beneath me cracked.
The runes on my skin burned like someone had branded me from the inside.
And the world?
It collapsed.
Literally.
I screamed as the earth swallowed me whole—dragging me down into the cold, screaming dark, into a tunnel of light and shadow that twisted like a serpent's spine.
Everything went black.
Except her voice.
Sleep well, Lior. You'll need it.