The night had fallen over the scarred battlefield.
Fires from shattered war engines crackled in the distance, their embers rising like desperate prayers into the dusk. The air still hung heavy with ash and soul-deep grief. No one slept. No one spoke. Even the wind had grown reverent, carrying only the echoes of names once shouted in fury, now whispered in mourning.
Kane sat alone beside the spot where Arasha vanished, his hands wrapped around her pendant, his forehead resting against it. His cloak was damp with dew and blood, his armor cracked at the shoulder where he'd shielded her from the last shockwave.
He hadn't moved for hours.
The world was broken—and so was he.
But then…
Ping.
A sound so foreign, so out of place in the silence that Kael nearly mistook it for madness.
Ping.
Again.
And this time, a flicker of cold blue light appeared in the corner of his vision—one he hadn't seen in years.
[System Alert: New Primary Quest Assigned]
Kane's head lifted slowly, eyes hollow.
"No…"
[Quest: Fulfill the Legacy of the Fallen Commander]
Objective: Ensure the full realization of Arasha's vision. Protect the Awakened. Unite the fractured kingdom. Stabilize the remaining rift lines.
Status: 0% Complete
Estimated Duration: Unmeasurable
Difficulty: ???
A dry, broken laugh escaped Kane's throat. It started small, then built into something cracked and raw—half mad, half grieving. His shoulders shook with it.
"Now?" he hissed to the air. "Now, when nothing is worth living for?"
He stared upward, laughter turning into bitter tears.
"What was the use of doing all those quests and gaining all those skills from you when she still died?! When I needed just one more moment—when—" He broke off, his voice collapsing into silence.
But the system wasn't done.
[Reward: Singular Temporal Ascendance]
Unlock condition: Completion of Arasha's full Legacy Arc
Description: Upon successful completion, user may choose to traverse timelines to a defined convergence point.
Optional Designation: [Soul-Reunion Permitted]
Kane froze.
His breath caught. His heart thundered.
He reread the final line a dozen times.
[Soul-Reunion Permitted]
Slowly, his grip on the pendant tightened.
The grief didn't leave him—nothing could ever take that pain away. But something settled in behind it, deep and consuming. Something sharp. Something resolute.
"I see…"
He rose, slow as a man reborn from ash. His eyes no longer wandered in despair. They narrowed with fire, with purpose.
Leta, watching from a distance, didn't move. She saw the shift in him and, through her tears, placed her hand over her mouth.
He wasn't the same.
Not anymore.
"I'll see it through, Arasha," Kane whispered. "I'll finish every plan you made. I'll build the peace you dreamt of. I'll save those you couldn't. Even if it takes me a thousand lifetimes…"
The wind carried his voice into the dark.
"…I'll find you again. Even if it's a world where we've never met—I'll find you."
And as the last flicker of system light faded from his vision, Kane turned toward the camp.
To begin again.
To carry the impossible burden.
To become not just the sword she trusted…
But the flame that would burn until the stars realigned—
And he meets Arasha again.
****
The news spread like a cold tide through the kingdom.
There was no formal proclamation. No bells rang. No royal decree. The palace said nothing.
But the people knew.
It came from the looks in the knights' eyes who returned bloodied and hollow. It came from the silence that followed Kane's march into the horizon. It came from the storm of tears that swept the loyal cities, the villages, the strongholds once fortified by Arasha's unwavering command.
And then the message arrived at Duke Lionel's estate.
Duke Lionel, the iron pillar of the western front, the man whose composure had weathered revolts, invasions, and betrayals—collapsed to his knees.
The missive trembled in his hand.
"No…"
His voice cracked like dried wood.
"No, not her. Not Arasha."
He curled forward, letting the Scion Order seal-stamped parchment fall to the floor as if it burned him. His son, Levi, had never seen his father cry. But now he wept as a child, clutching the arms of the servants who tried and failed to hold him up.
Levi himself stood frozen at first. The words hadn't fully registered.
But when he read them—when he realized they spoke of his sister in all but blood—he fell to the ground, clutching his stomach, gasping between sobs that wrenched from his core.
"She… she promised…" he whispered again and again, fists pounding the earth. "She promised she'd come home..."
The rest of the household wept in their own ways. Some in stoic silence, others openly in the halls. Even the hounds lay quiet, sensing the loss of a soul too powerful to be gone.
In the distant east, Valmira received the letter herself.
Her arm was still healing from the arrow wound. She sat beneath the whispering tree Arasha once napped under as a child. When she read the words—"commander perished in final confrontation… rift closed… body unrecoverable"—her hands trembled.
"No. No, little flame…," she whispered.
Tears slid down her cheeks without restraint.
She did not wail. She did not collapse.
She wept—with the agony of a blade drawn slow and deep.
Then she rose, walked into her command room, and summoned her close aides.
"From this moment," she said, voice raw but steady, "Arasha's work is our doctrine. Her dreams, our orders. Her legacy will not fade—not while I breathe."
And none dared to doubt her.
Cassian was alone when he received the news.
A private informant delivered it in low, solemn tones. Cassian gave no reply. No reaction. Just a nod.
He dismissed the messenger and locked the door.
The first bottle broke against the far wall.
The second he drank until the world blurred.
He collapsed against the cold stone of his office, the shattered remnants of his stoic mask lying around him. He clutched a small carved trinket in his hand—a gift he once meant to give her but never found the courage.
"I was going to tell you," he whispered, his voice hoarse. "Just one more victory. Just one more safe day…"
He screamed into the silence.
But no one came.
****
All across the kingdom, the news spread like wildfire cloaked in black.
The Awakened Ones gathered in their sacred hall, a quiet vigil held as hundreds knelt in silence. For hours, no words were spoken. They simply stood—shoulders squared, eyes lit with tears and fury.
"She fell for us," one whispered finally.
"And we won't let them erase her," another replied.
Then, like thunder on the mountain, a chorus of voices echoed through the hall:
"For Commander Arasha."
In cities and towns, villagers lit candles and built quiet shrines in her name—using stones from the earth and old blades once rusted with disuse. Children asked who she was, and parents answered with pride in cracked voices.
"She was the light that stood between us and the dark."
Even nobles, those few not tainted by greed, mourned behind closed doors—aware now how much weight Arasha had carried so they could pretend their world was safe.
But not all grieved with dignity.
Some in court moved fast, sensing an opportunity in her absence.
They spoke of dissolving her Order, of redistributing her holdings, of revising the historical record.
They did not expect the backlash.
The people protested. The Awakened Ones marched. Knights under her command rallied openly in cities, raising her banner on towers with defiant hands.
From whispered alleys to grand halls, a single truth rang out:
"She may be gone—but her will remains. And we—we are her legacy now."
And thus, the age of Arasha's mourning became the age of resistance.
For though the flame had flickered into ash—
Her fire still burned in them all.