Dahaka - 03

The air was unnaturally still. Not even the crows dared to caw as the eight hounds took their positions in the dark, jagged ridge overlooking the Bone Village.

Aden Vasco stood at the center path, just beneath a thinning mist, the scent of smoke and blood already staining the wind. Around him, the forest was quiet—but he knew it wouldn't stay that way.

They had split into two squads, each wrapping around the outer perimeter of the village, armed with torches and oil-soaked cloth. The objective was clear—burn the huts on the outskirts, drive the orcs into panic, and bait the high orc into stepping out.

"Remember the signal," muttered the hound captain. "We strike when the fires take." He glanced at Aden. "You're sure you want to go through the front alone?"

Aden didn't look back. "Don't worry about me. Just follow the plan."

"Tch, arrogant bastard," one knight scoffed, adjusting his grip on his blade.

Another leaned in toward the captain. "If he dies, it's on him."

A third smirked, "Wouldn't be the worst thing."

Aden heard it all. 

When the first fire lit the sky in the east, Aden stepped forward. He could already hear the cries of confusion from within the village—the howls of orcs waking to flame and fear.

Then came the second blaze from the west. That was his cue.

Aden drew his blade, its edge catching the firelight, and charged through the open front.

The village exploded into chaos.

Orcs stormed from their dens with jagged cleavers and rusted axes, roaring as they rushed to meet the sudden threat. Aden met them head-on, his movements sharp, calculated. His blade whistled through the air like a falling star.

Blood spattered across the scorched earth.

An orc lunged from his left, Aden ducked beneath the swing and carved through its side in a clean arc. Another came from behind, and he spun, driving his blade into its chest.

The rhythm was brutal. One slash, one step, one breath. Again and again.

But it wasn't just instinct guiding his blade.

As the battle raged, fragments of the poem from the Vasco memoir surfaced in his mind. Verses once cryptic now echoed with meaning.

"Flow not like a stream, but crash like the wave."

His blade moved with a new brutality—not elegant, not refined, but fierce. Crude. Furious. Each motion a scream carved in steel. Every swing felt like fire unleashed.

From afar, One knight watching from the flames muttered, "Is he... improvising?"

The unusual movement of Aden's sword made the hounds remember one single individual.

The old guide watched with narrowed eyes, silent and still. Perhaps remembering something. Perhaps fearing it.

They realized what it meant—and what it stood for. A name covered deep in blood and scars of battle, hated and despised by many but defeated by none.

Vasco.

The outskirts were chaos. The hounds had set fire to half the village, smoke curling like serpents into the sky. Orcs roared and howled, charging into the fire only to meet the blades of the hounds waiting within.

"Keep the pressure! Drive them toward the center!"

"Watch the rear! More coming from the well!"

"Where the hell is Vasco?!"

Back at the village's heart, Aden fought like a man possessed. Blood coated his hands, his breath was shallow, and yet his feet moved with the same tireless rhythm.

To the others, it looked like madness.

To Aden, it was clarity.

This technique—buried in riddles and grief—was never meant for beauty. It was meant to destroy.

The embodiment of wrath.

Suddenly, the battlefield shifted. Aden paused, blade in hand, eyes scanning the field.

And then he felt it.

Not a sound. Not a footstep.

A presence.

A flood of killing intent drowned the battlefield in an instant. His instincts screamed. He turned.

Emerging from the smoke stood the High Orc.

Thrice the size of a man, its muscles knotted like steel cables. A jagged crown of bone leaning from its skull, and in its hands was a weapon too large to be a sword—more a slab of metal shaped by hate.

Its eyes locked onto Aden.

The fire cracked behind him.

And in that flame-lit moment, the sky seemed to hold its breath.

The blood-soaked winds whispered a truth no one wanted to say aloud:

Dahaka was a cruel punishment.

And Aden Vasco had just stepped into the flame.