CHAPTER TWENTY

The rain fell in sheets, a relentless downpour that turned the battlefield into a sea of mud and blood. Skarlett Abetha stood at the center of it all, her crimson cloak clinging to her armor, her Toledo blade gleaming in the dim light. Around her, the air shimmered with heat and vapor, a swirling mist that obscured her movements and left her enemies disoriented. She moved like a phantom, her blade cutting through the chaos with deadly precision. This was her element—water and fire, life and death, the legacy of her father made manifest.

But long before she became the Blade of Aether, before she wielded the power of vapor and flame, Skarlett was just a girl with a father who believed in something greater than himself.

Caera Abetha was a man of fire. Not just in his magic, which burned with an intensity that could melt steel, but in his spirit. He was a soldier, a patriot, and a father who believed in the ideals of Aether with every fiber of his being. To him, Aether was more than a nation—it was a promise. A promise of order, of progress, of a future where no child would have to suffer as he had.

Skarlett remembered the stories he would tell her, his voice low and steady as they sat by the hearth in their small home on the outskirts of the capital. He spoke of battles fought and won, of sacrifices made for the greater good. But he also spoke of honor, of the importance of fighting for what was right, even when the cost was high.

"A soldier's duty is not just to obey," he had told her once, his hand resting on her shoulder. "It's to protect. To stand between the innocent and the darkness. That's what it means to be a patriot."

Skarlett had believed him. She had believed in him. And when he left for his final mission, she had promised to make him proud.

The mission was supposed to be routine—a skirmish on the northern border, a show of force to deter a band of raiders. But something had gone wrong. The raiders had been better armed, better organized than anyone had anticipated. Caera and his unit had been ambushed, outnumbered and outmatched.

Skarlett had been twelve years old when the news came. She remembered the knock on the door, the somber faces of the soldiers who had come to deliver the message. Her father was gone. His body had been recovered, but his Voluran staff—a symbol of his power and his loyalty—had been lost.

For weeks, Skarlett had been consumed by grief and anger. She had raged at the world, at Aether, at the raiders who had taken her father from her. But then, one night, she had a dream. In it, her father stood before her, his hand resting on her shoulder just as it had when she was a child.

"You are my legacy," he had said, his voice steady and sure. "But a legacy is not something you inherit. It's something you build."

When she woke, she knew what she had to do.

Skarlett had always been skilled with a blade. Her father had taught her the basics, and she had spent countless hours practicing in the yard behind their home. But now, she threw herself into her training with a single-minded determination. She would become a soldier, just like her father. But she would do it her way.

The first step was her weapon. She had her father's Voluran staff, recovered from the battlefield by a sympathetic soldier who had served under Caera. But it wasn't enough. She needed something more—something that would carry her father's spirit with her into battle.

And so, she did the unthinkable.

Using her father's bones, she carved the hilt of her Toledo blade, shaping it with painstaking care until it fit perfectly in her hand. She combined it with the remnants of his Voluran staff, fusing the two together with a ritual that left her exhausted but triumphant. The result was a weapon unlike any other—a blade that burned with her father's fire and flowed with her own affinity for water.

When she held it for the first time, she felt a surge of power unlike anything she had ever experienced. It was as if her father's spirit was with her, guiding her hand, lending her his strength.

Skarlett's rise through the ranks of Aether's military was swift. Her skill with the blade was unmatched, and her unique magic—a combination of water and fire that created a deadly vapor—made her a force to be reckoned with. But it was her sense of honor, her unwavering commitment to protecting the innocent, that set her apart.

She fought with a purpose, her every move a tribute to her father's legacy. And when she was offered a place among the Dark Six, she accepted without hesitation. It was a chance to make a difference, to ensure that no one would ever suffer as she had.

But as the years passed, she began to question the morality of her actions. The more she saw of Aether's conquests, the more she realized that the line between protector and oppressor was thinner than she had thought.

Yet she remained loyal. Not out of blind obedience, but out of a belief that she could make a difference from within. She would fight with honor, even if the world around her had none.

Now, as she stood in the rain, her Toledo blade in hand, Skarlett reflected on the path that had brought her here. She was no longer the girl who had lost her father. She was Skarlett Abetha, the Blade of Aether, a warrior forged in fire and water. And though the weight of her choices sometimes threatened to crush her, she knew one thing for certain:

She would never stop fighting. Not for Aether. Not for the Governor. But for the ideals her father had believed in—honor, justice, and the belief that even in the darkest of times, there was still a glimmer of light.

And if that light ever faded, she would be the one to reignite it.