Chapter 25: The Burden of Knowledge

Aldric sat in silence, staring into the flickering embers of the campfire. His brothers had gone to rest, but sleep felt like a foreign concept to him now.

The whispers of the abyss were gone—for now. Yet, the memory of the vision still burned in his mind.

An ancestor, clad in black. A battlefield lost to time.

And words that felt more like a warning than guidance.

"Power is not taken. It is earned, shaped, controlled."

"The abyss does not rule you unless you allow it to."

What had he inherited?

What price had already been paid?

Valerius Watches

From the shadows beyond the firelight, Valerius watched his younger brother.

Aldric had always been one of the most reckless among them—driven, ambitious, but never patient. Yet, tonight, he sat unnaturally still.

The test had proven his control—for now. But Valerius knew better than to trust newfound power too easily.

He had studied the abyss long before Aldric had reached for it. He knew that, unlike the structured path of the Magi or the disciplined strength of the Knights, the abyss never gave without taking.

The real question was simple.

What had Aldric already lost?

Valerius stepped forward, his boots crunching against the dirt. Aldric didn't look up.

"You won't find answers in the flames," Valerius said.

Aldric exhaled through his nose, his voice steady. "I wasn't looking for answers."

"Then what were you looking for?"

A pause. Then—

"The cost."

Valerius wasn't surprised by the response. "And?"

Aldric clenched his fist, feeling the faint pull of abyssal energy still lingering at his fingertips.

"I don't think I'll know it until it's too late."

Unseen Movements

The night stretched on, and while most of the group rested, Valerius did not.

Instead, he sat in front of his private research station, deep within their temporary hideout. The stone chamber flickered with the soft glow of runes, ancient texts spread across his desk.

His mind wasn't on Aldric alone.

Something else had been shifting in the background of their journey. Whispers of hidden forces, movements in the dark.

Enemies they hadn't yet seen.

All of it pointed to one conclusion—their path forward would not be as smooth as they had hoped.

Valerius' fingers traced the edge of a forbidden tome, one he had retrieved from their family's hidden archives. It spoke of entities older than recorded history, of beings that predated even the first Magi.

And one name appeared more than once.

A name that felt dangerously familiar.

His eyes flickered with cold calculation.

The abyss was not the only force watching them.

The Road Ahead

By dawn, the brothers were preparing to move. Their next destination lay beyond the Silverfang Hills, a place rumored to house relics of a forgotten era—one that might hold the key to advancing both the Magus and Knight paths.

As they packed their belongings, Leonidas nudged Aldric with his elbow.

"You still all there?" he joked, though there was an edge of seriousness beneath his usual smirk.

Aldric gave him a sideways glance. "Yeah. Why?"

Leonidas grinned. "Good. Would've been a pain to drag your possessed corpse around if you weren't."

Orin rolled his eyes. "Let's move before the sun gets too high."

Tiberius was already ahead, scouting the trail.

Valerius, however, stayed a step behind.

His thoughts remained locked on what lay ahead.

And the name that had appeared in his research.

Because if what he had found was true…

Aldric's awakening was just the beginning.