Chapter 17: Beneath the Hollow Sky

They broke camp before dawn.

Though no true sun lit the skies above the northern wastes, a pallid glow stretched across the clouds like an open wound. The wind here carried ash, even though nothing had burned in centuries. Rael led in silence, each step forward echoing faintly with pressure—reality itself seemed thinner now, more fragile.

The Seed had changed him. Not visibly, not yet. But something stirred behind his eyes. The flame within him no longer crackled. It pulsed.

The others felt it too.

Selene remained close but unusually quiet. Her normal jests had vanished. She watched Rael like one might watch a fire creeping too close to dry grass. Not with fear, but anticipation.

Behind her, Caelaris moved with alert precision, fingers drumming against her spear shaft. She glanced up often, frowning at the sky, which shifted in ways it shouldn't—patches of cloud folding back like peeling skin, then resealing.

Nyssira trailed beside Rael, her presence tranquil, yet there was something growing behind her stillness. The way her eyes lingered on Rael longer than before. The way the dying vines underfoot recoiled at her passage.

Aelthaea, at the rear, walked in silence, ever the shadow that watched all.

The landscape itself seemed to resist their passage. Rocks shifted underfoot in places. Trees bled sap as they passed. Once, they came upon the corpse of a divine beast—a celestial serpent with silver scales shattered like porcelain. Its body was still warm. Its eyes were gone.

"It was drained," Nyssira whispered.

"By what?" Caelaris asked.

No one answered.

Hours passed.

They crested a ridge by midday.

Below them stretched a wide valley, carved long ago by divine forces no mortal had named. Bones of titans jutted from the ground like broken monuments. A ruined city slumbered in the heart of the valley—sunken domes overgrown with glass-shard vines and cracked idols.

At its center stood a stone gate, half-buried in rubble and humming faintly with divine resonance. The structure looked as though it had grown there—not built, but bled into the world.

"The Gate of Silence," Aelthaea said quietly.

Caelaris turned. "You know it?"

She nodded. "I passed through once. Long ago. It was a place of retreat for divine warriors after the Sundering. Now… it's something else."

Rael said nothing.

His hand closed and opened unconsciously.

The gate called to him.

But so did something else.

On the opposite ridge, shrouded in mist, stood a figure.

Cloaked in black and gold. Motionless.

A faint shimmer of divine power radiated from him—dense, controlled, cold.

Rael narrowed his eyes. "We're being watched."

Selene followed his gaze. "Friend?"

"No."

Nyssira's voice was soft. "He bears the mark of the Pantheon. But it's been… rewritten."

Aelthaea's fingers curled near her hilt. "A reconditioned herald."

"Let's move," Rael ordered.

Descending into the valley was like slipping into memory. The air grew denser with every step. Whispers rose and fell—not audible words, but impressions. Longing. Anger. Sorrow.

They passed statues of gods whose names had been violently erased. The stone faces had been chiseled away, replaced with spiral sigils and burn marks.

"Someone wanted them forgotten," Selene murmured.

"They failed," Nyssira replied.

At the base of the gate, Rael slowed.

The ground felt… soft. Not like earth, but like old flesh.

He stepped forward until he stood at the foot of the door.

It pulsed faintly.

His hand reached toward it—and paused.

A flicker.

A vision.

A battlefield.

His own body standing atop a mountain of ash. Women knelt around him, some weeping, others silent. And far above—a god split open, ribs stretched to the stars.

He blinked the vision away.

Selene's voice cut through. "Rael. You okay?"

He nodded once. "It knows me."

Nyssira approached. "This gate does not guard power. It guards certainty. Once opened, you cannot pretend you don't know what's ahead."

Before Rael could respond—

The wind died.

And blood began to fall from the sky.

Thick drops. Slow. Rhythmic.

The sound they made upon hitting the stone was louder than expected. Heavy. Final.

Everyone froze.

Selene unsheathed her blades. "Divine omen?"

Nyssira stared upward. "Not an omen."

She turned her head to the ruins.

"A herald."

From the shadows of a shattered tower, a figure stepped forth.

Tall. Armored in black and ash-gold. A cracked porcelain mask concealed his face. A rusted halo floated above his back, flickering like a dying star. His gauntlets were etched with the old language—each symbol a binding, a vow.

He bore no weapon.

He needed none.

Selene swore under her breath.

Rael stepped forward.

The figure's voice echoed—not from his throat, but from the sky.

"Flamebound traitor."

It was not spoken in anger. It was recited. Like a title.

"You walk where you should not. You wake what we sealed."

Rael's tone was steady. "You sealed nothing. You buried it and hoped we'd forget."

The figure tilted his head, slowly.

"I am Malveth. Herald of Aetherion. Last Warden of the Hollow Gate."

"Aetherion is dead," Caelaris said coldly.

Malveth did not look at her. "Even silence dreams."

He raised his hand.

And the gate behind Rael groaned open—stone dragging against stone.

Not by Rael's will.

By Malveth's.

A wind burst forth from the half-open gate.

But it was no mere wind.

Voices. Whispers, layered endlessly. Screams curled into language. Laughter pressed into grief.

Selene staggered back. Aelthaea gritted her teeth.

Nyssira stood still, her hair whipping around her like vines caught in a storm.

Rael took a single step forward.

The wind should have torn him apart.

Instead, he burned.

Not outwardly—but within.

His aura flared—gold veined with black, memory flickering in the flame.

The wind slowed.

Then stopped.

Malveth lowered his hand.

A pause.

Then, calmly: "Interesting."

Rael clenched his fists. "If you're here to test me, then do it."

"Not yet," Malveth said. "You are unripe. The Seed has only just taken root. I will see what fruit it bears."

He turned to go.

"But when the tree blooms… the axe will fall."

Selene stepped forward. "You think you're going to walk away after that display?"

Malveth looked over his shoulder.

"I do not walk. I linger."

And with that, he vanished into mist—like memory being erased.

The blood rain ceased.

The wind returned.

Rael turned to the gate, which now stood half-open.

A whisper drifted through the crack.

Rael.

Not spoken in reverence.

Not in threat.

In recognition.

Selene stood at his side again. "You really going in?"

He nodded slowly. "Whatever's behind that door… it remembers me."

Nyssira touched his shoulder. "Then go show it you remember yourself."

Rael stepped forward.

The air grew cold as he crossed the threshold.

The world dimmed.

And the gate closed behind him.