horizon in the west

Chapter Thirteen: Stoneheart Rising

They left Zyphir under gray skies.

The towers behind them smoked and flickered—wounded but standing. Too many wards had collapsed. Too many names had been spoken aloud.

N'Aseru was watching now.

And they couldn't hide anymore.

So they walked.

Kyoko, silent as ever, shadows flickering around his hands.

Apya, more solemn than usual, her ears tucked protectively, still glowing faintly with the golden glyph.

Vaern Kael, trailing behind with his greatblade dragging a line through the dirt, smoking his pipe like nothing mattered—but checking over his shoulder every few steps.

They traveled east, toward the Craterlands—a broken continent swallowed by the Earthlong War over a century ago, now buried under stone and myth. There were rumors of Old Constructs sleeping beneath the ruins. Machines that once served Balance… or maybe tried to destroy it.

Whatever waited there, Vareth had told them it might hold a key.

To memory.

To weakness.

To truth.

They saw him first as a speck on the horizon.

Then a moving silhouette.

Then a shadow the size of a fortress.

As they climbed a shattered ridge, the shape grew clear.

A golem—twenty meters tall, stomping through the cracked landscape like it was made of wind and stone together.

It was not lumbering.

It was graceful.

Built from layered slabs of black marble, obsidian joints, and veins of glowing red crystal. Its arms ended in massive fists, one of which carried a tree like a walking stick.

Atop its shoulder stood a boy.

Barefoot.

Grinning.

His skin was earthen-brown, streaked with stone dust. His hair was short, wild, and dark, wind-whipped like grass over desert hills. Around his arms wound bands of floating rock, orbiting his wrists like playful moons.

He waved.

"Hey!" he shouted down. "You guys lost or just dramatic?"

Vaern stepped in front of Kyoko and Apya instinctively.

"Who the hell are you?"

The boy leapt off the golem's shoulder, freefalling twenty meters—then landing with a soft crunch as the earth rose beneath him to catch his feet like a mother's hand.

"Name's Ruun," he said, slapping dust from his legs. "I make rocks do stuff. This one's Gral."

The golem raised a massive hand and waved.

Apya blinked. "Your golem… waved."

"Yeah, he's got manners," Ruun said proudly. "Built him myself. Took five years and six volcano hearts."

Kyoko finally spoke.

"You didn't build that. You called it."

Ruun's eyes gleamed. "Caught that, huh?"

Without warning, he whistled.

The ground rumbled.

Then—from the earth—six smaller golems erupted around him. Each was unique: one shaped like a hound, another like a knight, a third like a spider with blades for legs.

They circled him in perfect silence.

Ruun folded his arms. "I don't build golems. I speak to them. There are voices under the ground, you know. Leftovers. They listen to me."

Vaern grunted. "Elementalist?"

Ruun shrugged. "Used to be. Until the stone started talking back."

Kyoko stared at the largest golem—Gral.

Then at the boy.

"You're not ordinary."

"Neither are you," Ruun said, grinning. "You've got that old power stink on you. Like gravity wants to bow when you walk."

He looked to Apya.

"And she's glowing like a forgotten sun."

Then to Vaern.

"...You're just scary."

"Thanks," Vaern muttered.

Apya stepped forward. "Why are you here?"

Ruun turned serious.

"I felt a pulse. Two nights ago. Like something cracked in the world's spine. I figured something bad was waking up. So I started walking toward it."

He pointed at Kyoko.

"Turns out it was you."

They camped beneath a broken arch of stone, where Ruun shaped a circular shelter from rock without touching anything.

That night, by firelight, Kyoko asked:

"Why follow us?"

Ruun tossed a rock into the fire. It hissed but didn't crack.

"You're not the only ones who remember," he said softly. "I've seen flashes. A battlefield of gods. A boy on a throne. A girl with ears like wings."

Apya froze.

Ruun continued. "I remember the name N'Aseru. I didn't read it. I heard it. In the stone. Screaming."

He looked up.

"If that thing's coming back…You'll need more than Balance.You'll need a wall of stone behind you."

Kyoko nodded once.

"Then stand with us."

Ruun grinned.

"I was already here, wasn't I?"

Far below, in the deepest fractures of the world's crust, ancient stones stirred. Forgotten golems blinked awake. Dust brushed from old runes.

Because the earth remembered Balance.

And now, it would rise for it.