AshesFallintoLight

In a land fractured by elemental extremes and ancient grudges, five kingdoms stand divided — each shaped by its climate, customs, and uneasy relationship with the monstrous frontier known only as the Wasteland.

For generations, the kingdoms of Solkar, Thal, Nordr, Virellia, and Alzhan have fought among themselves — over borders, trade, and pride — while the Wasteland's creeping horrors press ever closer. From this cursed land come the Oldspawn — beasts of myth and nightmare, whose hearts, when consumed, fuse with one’s own, birthing magic at a terrible cost. Power, after all, is never without sacrifice.

Evelyn — an orphan from a border outpost — is quiet, clever, and far more dangerous than she knows. When she survives a raid on her village and consumes a fractured core-heart, she becomes something new: a bearer of wild magic not bound to any kingdom's laws or customs. Her abilities are raw and unstable, and she draws the attention of those who would shape her into a weapon.
At her side is Torren, her childhood friend — steadfast, brave, and unknowingly the source of her first love. But while Evelyn’s path leads her deeper into the politics and power of the Five Realms, Torren’s takes him elsewhere: to duty, to transformation, and ultimately, to love beyond their bond.

Guiding Evelyn is the enigmatic scholar Vareth, a rogue archivist exiled from Alzhan’s great think-towers. Vareth believes Evelyn’s magic may be the key to ending the Wasteland’s expansion — or the cause of its rebirth. He teaches her the truth of the Oldspawn, of core-magic, and the First Fire, a forgotten power lost to time.

But in the depths of the Wasteland stirs something older than monsters. Once a god-emperor of a fallen sixth kingdom, now corrupted by centuries of core-consumption, the being known as The Hollow King has begun to move again. His twisted children — the Echoed, part-human, part-beast — are spreading across the borderlands.

And he wants Evelyn.

To survive, the kingdoms must unite. But can old enemies find common ground — when power is bonded in blood, bone, and the heartfire of beasts?

Heartfire of the Wastes

Not gradually—not like dusk softening the day—but as if a breath had been sucked in by something vast and voiceless. Evelyn stopped mid-step. Even the birds, scarce as they were, fell silent.

Torren noticed it too. He unslung his blade, eyes narrowed toward the crooked birch line ahead.

"No," Evelyn said, the air burning faintly around her shoulders, "they're here."

From the fogged tree line, shadows unfurled like spilled ink.

First one. Then another. Then many.

The Hollowbound emerged in utter silence—half-shaped beings, stitched from smoke and bone and sorrow. Their eyes glowed like wet coals, their movements fluid and jerky all at once, like memories being played back wrong.

Evelyn stepped forward, the Crucible sigil pulsing against her chest.

One of the Hollowbound tilted its head.

A thin, rasping sound—melodic and broken. As if made by lungs long lost and cords too frayed to hold pitch. It was not one voice. It was many, layered and disjointed. The chorus of the forgotten.

"Mama, the fire's too close!"

"Tell them I didn't mean to—please—!"

"I'll hold the gate, run! RUN—!"

"It's burning inside me—take it out—"

"They locked us in. The wards held for them. Not for us."

She was drowning in a sea of ash-bound voices.

"You are not theirs."

Evelyn's eyes snapped open, silver light burning through the tears. The Crucible sigil on her chest flared, searing into the air with a shriek of flame and memory. The Hollowbound recoiled—not in pain, but recognition.

"You remember," Evelyn whispered.

She was smaller than the others. Still mostly human. Her face was cracked with light—fractured skin over a core that flickered like a dying star.

"I feel you," Evelyn said. "But I won't carry you like this."

The girl shook her head. "We don't want saving. We want truth. Memory binds us. But the world forgets. And the Hollow collects."

The Ash-Bound Chorus—all of them—spoke together then.

"Tell the fire to listen."

Torren had his blade drawn, barely holding position. When Evelyn finally stood, hair drifting like ash in windless air, the Hollowbound had stepped back. They watched her—not as a foe. As… kin?

Evelyn nodded. "They're not just broken. They're echoes. Trapped memories. Some too painful to hold. Others too old to fade."

Torren exhaled hard. "And now they sing?"

"They've always sung," she whispered. "We just never listened."

That night, they made camp in the hollow of a burned-out stone shelter, warded with iron glyphs from a salvaged Guild post. Evelyn sat cross-legged, firelight reflected in her silver eyes.

She carved symbols into the dirt with her fingertip.

"Flame remembers. Flame binds. Flame redeems."

Torren studied the marks. "You've never seen those before. But you're writing them."

"I'm not writing," she said. "I'm remembering."

Far away, in a forgotten chamber beneath the Scarred Cathedral, a mirror cracked.

A priest of the Hollow coughed ash from his lungs and whispered, "The Flamebearer sings."

And from the deep dark, the Hollow smiled.