She Remembers Him

Ren Zian landed hard—this time not in mist, not in divine silence, but in the middle of a storm.

The wind howled like wolves around a battlefield strewn with blood-soaked banners. The sky flashed red every few seconds, like the gods were blinking in warning.

He stood. Or tried to.

His knees buckled.

Not from the fall—but from the pressure in his chest.

This place… he knew it.

It was the battlefield where he first saw Sariel fight.

Back then, he'd only been a pawn—chained to another god's bidding, rage in his heart and iron around his neck. She'd looked at him like he was more. Like there was still a man underneath the monster.

She didn't flinch when he raised his sword that day.

She touched it with her bare hand.

That was the first time he felt seen.

Now the battlefield was empty, except for one thing—

A figure.

Kneeling in the mud, her cloak torn, arms shaking.

Sariel.

But this Sariel was different. Younger. Her eyes hadn't hardened yet. Her heart hadn't broken yet.

And she was whispering something into the ground. Over and over.

Ren stepped closer.

She didn't look up.

"Don't forget me," she whispered.

"I never did," he murmured.

Her head snapped up.

And for the first time, she saw him—not the god-touched Emperor, not the chosen of divine pacts. Just Ren.

"Why are you here?" she asked, voice hoarse. "You weren't supposed to see this."

"I think this trial wants me to."

He knelt beside her.

She didn't speak.

Her fingers dug into the mud, trembling.

Ren reached for her hand—but his passed through.

This wasn't the real Sariel. This was her memory.

Her pain, crystallized.

The battlefield melted around them, and now they were in a stone corridor—moonlight streaming through broken windows. He recognized this place, too.

The night she'd waited for him. The night he never showed up.

She had dressed in gold that evening. Not for a war, but for him.

She waited hours.

And when he didn't come, she burned the letter she had written to confess her love.

Ren saw it now—lying at her feet. Half-scorched. The ink blurred, but legible.

"Even if you choose someone else, I needed you to know. I only ever fought beside you because I loved you."

His heart shattered.

"I didn't know," he whispered.

"You didn't want to know," the memory answered.

Another shift. Now they stood beneath the Temple of Binding, on the day he made his pact with Lyra. Sariel had stood in the shadows, watching.

She had smiled for him.

But her hand gripped the hilt of her blade so tight, her knuckles turned white.

"You thought I didn't see you," Ren said.

"I didn't want you to," she replied.

Then everything froze.

The wind stopped.

The lights stilled.

And Ren stood alone before a burning altar.

On it—his bond with Sariel. A glowing thread of silver and violet.

The Goddess of Final Binds stood behind it. Silent. Waiting.

This was the second trial.

And the choice?

Forgiveness… or finality.

Ren stepped forward. "What happens if I ask to keep this bond?"

"You owe her truth," the boy's voice echoed, "but you never gave it."

"And if I cut it?"

"She'll be free… but never yours again."

Ren's hands shook.

He wasn't afraid of losing power. Or love.

He was afraid of hurting her again.

So he whispered, "Then let her go."

The altar flared.

The bond unspooled—gracefully, not with violence.

And for the first time, Ren felt the absence of her tether not as loss, but as honor.

He had loved her once.

She had saved him a thousand times.

But her story would now be hers alone.

When he opened his eyes again, the storm was gone.

So was Sariel.

Only a single feather remained in his hand.

He closed his fist around it.

Not to keep it.

To remember.