Kaia

After a long restless night, I left with Eris the next day. The Ashlands spread before me like a scar upon the earth, vast and desolate. Ash and heat hung in the air, remnants of a land that had long since been burned and scarred by the first Pyrosoul's wrath. The jagged mountains loomed ahead, casting long shadows over the fractured landscape. This was the place where destruction had been born, and the ground here still trembled with the memory of it.

Eris walked ahead, her boots crunching on the ash. I matched her pace, my mind heavy with thoughts of the task before me. I had been bred for this moment. The cult had made sure of that. I was their weapon, created to be the vessel that would end the Pyrosoul's reign of fire and destruction. Nothing had ever been clearer.

"Do you think we'll make it in time?" I asked, my voice steady but filled with the weight of what we were about to do.

Eris glanced back at me, her face unreadable. "I don't know. But I do know that if we fail, Solvurn will burn."

The thought of Solvurn being consumed by Kori's fire had been a constant in my mind. He was no hero. He was no misunderstood soul. He was the Pyrosoul. A bully, a tyrant, and soon-to-be king. It didn't matter how powerful or cruel he was—it didn't matter who he thought he was. He was a threat. And I was his opposite.

I remembered the stories I had heard growing up, the whispered legends of the Pyrosoul who could bend fire to their will, who could burn entire cities to ash without breaking a sweat. But none of the stories had prepared me for the real thing. And yet, I had no illusions about who he was. The Pyrosoul, Kori, was just another obstacle to remove. The path ahead was clear.

"The Nexus will help us," I said, more to myself than to Eris. "Once we find it, we'll be able to do what the cult always intended."

Eris nodded, though she didn't seem convinced. "But are you ready for that? To take on that kind of power?"

I didn't hesitate. "I've been ready my whole life. The cult shaped me for this purpose. They gave me everything I needed to defeat him."

"And you still think that's all you're meant to do?" Eris's voice softened, but there was an edge of concern there, a doubt I wasn't used to hearing from her.

I didn't answer immediately. Of course, that was what I was meant to do. It was the only thing I had ever known. The only reason I had been kept alive. The only reason they had torn my body and soul apart in their pursuit of perfection.

I feel better today, but I'm still the same girl.

But now, as I stood on the edge of the Ashlands, with the mountains stretching ahead like a grim reminder of what awaited, I felt the weight of it all more than I had before. Kori wasn't just a force of nature. He wasn't some distant legend. He was real. And as much as I despised the thought of it, he was my equal in this twisted game. 

I shook my head, pushing the thoughts away. "We'll stop him, Eris. And then it'll all be over."

Eris didn't respond, but the silence between us spoke volumes. She knew what I had to do. And she knew that there was no turning back.

As we neared the mountains, the air grew thicker, the heat from the volcano pressing against my skin. I could feel the pull of the Nexus calling to me, like a dark promise. The power to stop Kori, to end the cycle of destruction, was within reach.

But even as I took the first steps into the heart of the Ashlands, I couldn't shake the thought that perhaps I was walking toward my own destruction. The Nexus might give me the power to defeat Kori, but at what cost? Was I willing to sacrifice everything—myself, my humanity—to ensure that he never took another life?

I paused, the weight of the question settling like a stone in my chest. The Pyrosoul. Kori. If he was truly my opposite, if he was everything I wasn't—then what did that make me? If he was a tyrant, a bully, a force of destruction, then what was I? What was I becoming by following this path?

I had been raised to fight against the fire that burned in him, but now that we were drawing closer to the inevitable confrontation, the lines felt blurred. I wasn't a hero. I wasn't some chosen savior. I was the vessel for a power born of darkness, the one who had been molded to take him down, to destroy him.

But if he was the Pyrosoul, what did that make me?

I closed my eyes for a moment, feeling the weight of the air around me pressing down on my chest. I was bred for this. I was made to end him. But there was a gnawing doubt now, one I couldn't silence.

. I couldn't afford to question it. If Kori was evil, then I was simply the necessary balance. The opposite to stop him. And if that meant becoming something darker, then so be it.

I didn't have time for second thoughts.