Chapter 12: Ashbound Training

The first lesson wasn't about flame.

It was about control.

"You're not a torch," Ilara snapped. "You're not a wildfire. You are the forge."

Elian's body trembled from exhaustion, steam rising from his skin as the old woman walked circles around him.

They stood atop a jagged plateau, surrounded by nothing but wind, stone, and silence. The cliffs plunged into bottomless canyons, and the sky above was darker than night, layered in ash clouds. It was here, Ilara said, that the last Ashbound cultivator had died—defiant to the end.

Elian wasn't defiant.

He was angry.

"Why are you holding back?" Ilara barked.

"I'm not," Elian growled, forcing the flickering ember in his palm to expand. It sputtered like a dying candle.

She hit him.

A crack of her cane against his shoulder made him stumble.

"You're trying to force the flame to obey you. That's not how it works. Ashbound is not about domination—it's about harmony."

Elian gritted his teeth. "I'm not here to learn patience. I need power. Now."

Ilara's eyes flared. "Then die now."

Her palm struck his chest.

A blast of heat knocked him off his feet, slamming him into the rock wall. His bones ached. His spirit veins roared.

"You think this is a shortcut?" she snarled. "The Ashbound Path kills cowards and kings alike. The fire you carry is sentient. You don't command it. You awaken it."

He lay on the stone, breath ragged.

"I felt it," he whispered. "When it entered me… that golden light. It was like I was part of something bigger."

Ilara's gaze softened. "You were. You are."

She knelt beside him.

"The Ashbound Flame is ancient. Older than any sect. It was sealed away because it could evolve beyond the boundaries of human cultivation. Those who wielded it became too powerful. Too different."

"Is that why the Order hunts me?"

Ilara nodded. "They serve balance, not justice. And you, Elian… are imbalance incarnate."

He looked down at his hand, where faint golden lines shimmered just under the skin.

"I never wanted this."

Ilara chuckled. "No great power is ever truly wanted. But now that it's yours… you must master it."

She stood and raised her cane.

"Again."

The days that followed blurred into one another.

Each dawn began with fire meditation—Elian seated cross-legged atop a slab of blackened stone, the wind howling around him. He focused not on his outer body, but on the inner flame. The Ashbound Spirit was elusive, a golden flicker hiding deep within his core.

Ilara guided him to breathe with it. To listen.

At first, all he heard was silence.

Then… whispers.

Then songs.

By the third week, he could summon fire without his blade.

Not crude fire. But liquid flame—smooth, dense, controlled.

Ilara smiled for the first time when she saw it. "Now you're beginning to understand."

Combat training was harsher.

Ilara summoned constructs—creatures of ash and smoke. Wolves, falcons, serpents. They attacked without mercy. She forbade Elian from using Ashbound at first, forcing him to rely on instinct, footwork, and pain.

"You don't need more power. You need to know how to fight without it. Otherwise, you'll die the moment your flame falters."

Elian fought with broken ribs, slashed skin, and blood in his mouth.

He never quit.

Every injury made his will harder. Every fall taught him a new rhythm.

By the fifth week, he was dancing between the constructs—silent, precise, deadly.

Then Ilara let him use Ashbound again.

The results were terrifying.

He moved like lightning, his blade trailing ribbons of golden fire. With every strike, his enemies disintegrated. Not burned. Not cut.

Erased.

"You're changing," Ilara murmured. "You're merging with the Flame."

But the flame had its costs.

Some nights, Elian woke screaming.

Visions plagued him—cities drowned in fire, corpses burning in golden light, a throne of ash with him seated on it, laughing.

He'd fall to his knees, gasping, clutching at his chest as the warmth turned into hunger.

Ilara found him once, after one such nightmare.

"You're seeing echoes of past wielders," she said. "The flame remembers every life it's touched. The good… and the monstrous."

"Will I become them?"

Ilara didn't answer.

She didn't need to.

One morning, the sky split open.

Elian and Ilara were in the middle of a meditation session when a rift tore through the clouds above the plateau. A beam of black light fell like a spear, crashing into the canyon floor with a sound like thunder weeping.

Ilara's face paled.

"No…"

She stood quickly, eyes narrowed at the horizon.

"What is it?" Elian asked, hand on Ashbound's hilt.

"They've found us."

The Order.

They were coming.

But this time… not shadows.

Not constructs.

Real ones.

"They've sent a Hallowed Seeker," Ilara said. "A cultivator who's abandoned their humanity to embody the Void."

Elian's breath caught. "Can we fight them?"

"No," Ilara said simply. "Not yet."

"Then what do we do?"

She turned to him.

"We run."

But escape was not so simple.

The Seeker moved faster than they could. As they descended the cliffs through secret tunnels and stone bridges, the sky darkened behind them. Birds died midflight. Rivers turned still.

When they emerged at the forest's edge, he was there.

The Seeker stood alone.

No robe. No hood.

Just a man with silver eyes and black veins running down his arms like tree roots.

"Elian," he said, voice smooth, calm. "The Flame welcomes you. The Order does not."

Ilara stepped forward, cane raised. "You cannot have him."

The Seeker tilted his head. "I'm not here for him. Not yet."

He raised one hand.

The trees behind Elian turned to dust.

Ilara moved.

The ground cracked.

Her cane struck the Seeker's chest, and light exploded—brighter than the sun.

Elian shielded his eyes.

When the light faded, Ilara was gone.

Only her cane remained.

The Seeker smiled. "She was strong. But old."

Elian drew Ashbound.

And something inside him snapped.

His flame surged—wild, raw, alive.

The Seeker's smile faded.

"You're… evolving."

Elian didn't speak.

He let the flame take him.

Golden light burst from his body, swirling like a storm. His veins glowed. His eyes burned.

He attacked.

And the sky burned with him.