The air in the Coronet Highlands was thin and freezing. It's frost burned my lungs with every stride, stinging my exposed skin.
The world had narrowed down to two things: the ragged gasping of my own breathing, and the deafening, high-velocity shrieking of the air behind me.
I blinked away the frozen tears blurring my vision.
I didn't need to look back.
Because I knew it was there.
BOOM
Every few seconds, a jagged fin tore into the rock faces around me, splintering the boulders like glass and sending a violent hail of shrapnel spraying across my back.
A sharp piece of stone struck my shoulder.
The impact sent me staggering forward and I nearly went down, my boots skidding on loose gravel, but I forced my weight over my toes and kept moving.
Run.
But it hurts so much… A voice whispered in the back of my mind.
"Just keep moving forward," I growled back at my own fear.
Up ahead, a narrow crevice split the mountain face. I threw myself into the gap, squeezing through the tight space to reach the gray light on the other side.
The rough granite walls ripped at my clothes and scraped my bare arms like sandpaper, the penetrating cold of the deep stone stealing away what little warmth I had left.
I stumbled out of the darkness and into the open air, gasping for breath. The wind caught my body, blowing against the raw flesh, making me wince.
I gripped a nearby boulder for support. My palms were slick with fresh crimson trails leaking from a dozen new scrapes.
Coughing, I choked down a sob as I cast another glance across the forest of jagged rocks. The thin mountain air was dead still. The entire wilderness was silent, as if every wild creature on the peak had frozen in fear, terrified of making a single sound.
For a heartbeat, the silence stretched and I thought I'd lost the dragon. Blood continued to drip onto the dirt, staining the pale earth a dark, lethal red.
Then the wind screamed. A roar shattered the sky, sending violent tremors rippling straight through the earth beneath my boots.
The Garchomp had resumed the hunt, its heavy, crushing strides gaining ground.
It was getting faster.
Closing the distance.
And suddenly, my path vanished.
I skidded to a halt at the edge of a sheer drop, nothing but a wall of ashen rock and churning mist below. A dead end.
My heart slammed against my ribs as I spun around.
From across the ridge, the Garchomp landed.The mountain groaned under its massive weight as the earth fractured, stone shattering as dust and debris burst outward in a violent ring.
A pair of draconian, crimson eyes locked onto my form. Its golden irises and black pupils narrowed into slits, focusing entirely on my scrawny form. The dragon's jaws parted and a breath of violet flames bled from between its serrated teeth.
Then, the air completely stilled.
Neither of us moved. The Garchomp stood massive on the opposite side of the edge, blocking me off from the rest of the mountain, its silhouette towering over the stone peaks as its chest heavily heaved.
I stayed pinned right at the very brink of the cliff, a tiny dot against the open sky, the churning mist of the abyss swirling just inches behind my heels.
Across the wide expanse of dead air, we simply stared at one another. A monster, and a human who had run out of mountain to run.
For two agonizing heartbeats, the predator watched me from across the ridge, its cold, calculating gaze locked onto my frame. It didn't rush, simply because it didn't need to.
It knew the drop behind me meant certain death, and across that freezing distance, the violet fire dancing around its open jaws looked like a quiet countdown to my death.
The world seemed to hold its breath—
—and then reality cracked.
A jagged rift of violet light tore open the space between us, splitting the very air. Mist and ash swirled as a terrifying distortion swallowed the light and earth, twisting everything into something wrong and unnatural.
I flinched at the cryptic sound, shifting back before stumbling as my foot found the edge of the cliff.
The dome of entropy expanded, and the moment the shadowy veil touched the surrounding boulders, the stone disappeared, vanishing instantly, as if spirited away.
Seeing this, I no longer hesitated. Driven by a desperate yearning for survival, I forced my legs to move, my feet tearing into the rocky dirt as I charged straight toward the storming rift.
The cliff behind me was certain death. But the distortion ahead was a chance at life.
And a chance was enough.
I ran because my life depended on it. My foot slipped on loose gravel, but I threw my body forward into the unknown of the reality-warping void. The air pressure shifted instantly, clawing at my clothes and my skin as if the universe itself were trying to tear me apart.
My fingertips touched the inky veil of the void, passing through as the opaque shadows swallowed them.
The Garchomp shrieked, a sound that rattled my very soul, as its wings snapped shut and its massive body dropped low to the earth. It dug its thick, taloned toes deep into the mountain stone, muscles bunching under navy scales as it braced itself like a runner at a starting block.
Then, it launched.
The ground behind it literally exploded from the sheer, violent force of the takeoff. Stone shattered into dust, a concussive shockwave blasting outward as the dragon tore across the gap in a blur of pure scales and malice to intercept my path.
It didn't care about the distortion, it only cared about its fleeting prey.
Me.
It was overwhelmingly fast. The distance between us collapsed in an instant.
In one moment the dragon was a hundred meters away. And suddenly—it was right in front of me.
Time slowed as I watched the monster tower over the dome, its glowing crimson eyes locked onto me before it dived for my throat.
I froze, my brain overloaded as I failed to comprehend its speed. My eyes burned every detail of the dragon's maw into memory, from the serrated edges of its teeth to the primal hunger in its pupils. Shadows stretched and enveloped my body.
The scalding heat of its breath framed my face as the Garchomp's fangs enclosed my head.
Its jaws snapped shut.
And bit into empty space, as the distortion swallowed me whole.
— — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — —
"Ugh!"
I hit the ground hard. Mud splashed up around me as the impact tore the air from my lungs. For a moment, I couldn't breathe, wheezing as my stomach hurled the last of its contents onto the moist soil.
My hands flew up to clutch at my head and neck, making sure that they were still attached to my body. A pathetic whine attempted to escape my chest but died instantly as life-giving oxygen refused to enter my collapsed lungs.
Then instinct dragged me upright. I staggered to my feet, ignoring my legs' cries of pain, coughing and gasping at the harsh air as my eyes darted wildly at the strange environment.
The world was… wrong.
The sky was an eerily beautiful kaleidoscope of inky void and fractured rainbow, streaks of color bleeding through like cracks in reality.
At the top of the dome's veil, jagged serpents of white lightning flickered soundlessly across the void above, striking and leaving small craters in the earth. The air reeked of ozone and something worse.
Desperation driving my limbs, I staggered and stumbled toward the edge of the shifting colors. The border of the dome shimmered like a wall of inky glass.
Panting, I reached out a trembling hand, desperate to find a seam, an exit, anything.
The moment my fingertips brushed the veil, a violent jolt of white lightning erupted from the barrier.
The shock threw me backward into the mud, my arm going completely numb as the smell of burnt fabric filled the air.
A crippling sob caught in my throat at the surge of pain. Searing agony flared to life as feeling rushed back into my limb. I cradled my right arm against my chest, teeth grinding so hard they nearly cracked.
Lichtenberg patterns, angry, red branching burns, spurred across my palm and wrapped tightly around my wrist. The pain was blinding. I choked down a scream, hot tears welling in my eyes, forcing myself to swallow the noise.
My breath came in ragged gasps as I clutched my hand, speeding up into shallow gasps as the terrifying truth settled in.
There was nothing here, and likely no way out. The edge of the distortion loomed like a solid barrier, trapping me inside this shifting, unnatural place.
I would die here, forgotten and alone.
The soundless lightning struck closer, a silent countdown to my own erasure. Darkness began to tunnel my vision. My chest tightened until I couldn't draw oxygen, completely spinning me into a helpless, suffocating panic.
Then, in the corners of my vision, a piercing metallic flash sliced right through the fractured darkness.
My lungs froze. The spiraling terror instantly snapped, halted by a sudden, jarring shift in the environment.
I didn't move.
Because I saw it.
A small distance away, its steel half-buried in cracked earth, was the only thing inside this space, hidden away from the world, that felt somewhat real.
A blade held perfectly still, completely untouched by the warping physics around it.
A sword.
A katana, to be exact, worn and unremarkable upon observation. There was no mystical glow, no divine aura like the ones that accompanied the heroes of the stories told by my dad.
It was just a simple, dull grey sword with a hilt wrapped in frayed blue cloth, its body entombed in a pitch-black sheath.
It lay there forgotten, like a weapon used up after war. Abandoned.
Or maybe waiting for someone to wield it once again?
My legs trembled violently as I dragged myself forward. Soundless lightning flashed all around me, the ground erupting and shifting with each pulse of energy that struck the mud. Searing pain flared up my burned arm, but my gaze never left the hilt.
The closer I got, the more a strange, unexplainable familiarity tugged at the back of my mind. It was a magnetic pull, cutting straight through my panic.
Fate?
"Heh... then what a sorry fate I have," I muttered, stifling a manic giggle that bubbled up from my throat. The sheer absurdity of it all was overwhelming. I was a dying kid running out of time, and my only objective was a piece of buried metal.
The sword was a single step away.
I stopped before it, my breathing shallow. Now up close, I could see the intricate patterns forged into the pitch black of the obsidian scabbard. My right hand reached forward, intending to grip the sword, the raw, blistered skin of my palm hovering just above the frayed blue cloth of the hilt.
Fear.
A sudden surge of it crippled me. Fear of death and the unknown forced my palm to remain open, hovering over the hilt. For a moment, I stood there, simply watching until the world around me became silent. Dried blood stained my open palm.
"But what more could I lose?" I asked myself, asked my fear. If I did nothing, I would die all the same.
With a helpless smile I reached out, and closed my fingers around the handle, sealing my grip tightly to the sword.
A small stream of fresh blood oozed from under my fingers, softly flowing downwards until it pooled on the katana's guard. The crimson liquid overflowed, a single drop of blood staining the crystalline blue jewel embedded in the blade.
Freeing the sword from its earthen prison, I stumbled, hissing in pain upon fully bearing the katana's weight with my injured right arm.
I quickly moved to support my right arm by sharing the burden of the sword's weight with my left, holding it horizontally, one hand on each end of the blade.
Slowly, in one smooth motion, I drew the rusted blade from its obsidian scabbard. The sharp gleam of the katana's razor edge flickered across my vision.
A pure white steel.
And a pitch black edge.
The blade itself was as pure as the light of the moon on fresh winter snow while the glimmering edge was an ebony black that seemed to devour the light around it.
Despite time's wear and tear of the sword's ancient scabbard and its flayed ornamental cloth, the steel of the katana itself looked as if it was regularly polished, repaired and cared for.
As I continued to inspect the craftsmanship, dusting off the long tassel of dried mud and grime, a single blue eye suddenly "opened" on the crossguard.
A black spectral pupil manifested onto the pristine crystal gem and with a slow and heavy gaze. It blinked once, like something stirring from a long, timeless sleep. Then it stilled, realizing that it was in someone's possession.
With attentive eyes, I watched as the singular blue jewel met my gaze. We sat in total silence, watching each other.
"A Honedge." I recognized the creature resting heavily in my arms. It was my dad's favorite Pokémon, told to me through the various stories of mythical heroes and powerful rulers.
As a Ginkgo Guild merchant, he traveled across the world, sailing across the vast ocean and exploring the countless mysteries of the many regions.
When he returned, he would bring me the stories he collected throughout his adventures—tales of valiant heroes that save everyone in the end and legends of all powerful gods that protect this world.
We would sit down at the dinner table and I would ask him if he had new stories to tell, just for him to pretend to have none. And then I would get sad and cry, causing Mom to yell at him and scold him with a frying pan.
A hint of a smile crept up my lips as the fond memories rushed through my mind. A rare warmth flickered through my chest as I remembered the sound of my father's laughter as he was being scolded.
After we ate, he would perform all sorts of exaggerated hand motions and gestures to accompany his storytelling, creating the strangest sounds to give life to his legends.
My smile grew wider. He would spend hours just talking and I sat right beside him, listening, while Mom would be in the kitchen cleaning up, watching Dad's antics with a gentle smile on her face and—
…
…
…
And then… then…
My vision blurred. The pristine white steel of the Honedge in my arms warped into watery, distorted shapes.
A single, hot drop of moisture splashed onto the obsidian scabbard, rolling down the dark, glassy metal.
Oh. I'm crying.
The stinging behind my eyes hit before I could even process what was happening. It was that hot, sudden prickle that meant my chest was about to give out.
No. Not here.
I clamped my jaw shut, catching the side of my tongue between my molars. I bit down hard—hard enough that the sharp, metallic flash of pain shocked my system and forced the air out of my nose in a quiet huff.
I looked down, blinking at my mud-stained feet, my throat tightening until it felt like swallowing glass as I watched another teardrop fall and soak into the cracked earth.
With another breath, I gave another hard squeeze on my tongue. The physical pain acted like an anchor, pulling me back from the edge of a sob. I took a long, shaky breath through my nose, smoothed out my face, and forced my eyes wide until the tears dried up.
I returned my attention to the living weapon in my grasp, tracing the bizarre, beautiful craftsmanship of its crossguard.
I knew of its lineage. My dad had detailed it a hundred times. Honedge, the pre-evolved form of Doublade, which in turn evolved into Aegislash.
Aegislash. The sword that chooses legends.
I stared down at the black spectral pupil watching me, remembering how my dad's voice would drop to a whisper during that part of the tale.
It was a Pokémon that possessed the terrifying ability to detect qualities of greatness, talent, and leadership. Those recognized by it were destined to become kings and heroes.
But the metal resting on my lap felt cold, heavy, and threatening. My dad's stories never sugarcoated the truth.
It was also a sword that devoured the life force and souls of the unworthy.
I remembered that part of the legend. How could I not? The story of a grand kingdom that fell from grace, turning to ash as an Aegislash quietly devoured the soul of its unworthy king.
Suddenly, a phantom friction against my skin snapped me out of my memories.
I watched as the worn, mud-stained cloth tassel of the Honedge slithered across my right hand. The rough fabric coiled past my blistered wrist and traveled up my flesh, its length slowly extending as it reached the middle of my forearm.
It's going to drain my life force.
The fear and panic crept in once again, violent and suffocating. I began to flinch, my left arm positioning to rip the cloth tassel off my skin and shatter the weakened Honedge in half under my boot.
The Pokémon was severely drained by its long sleep, up to the point where a human, even a wounded one like myself, could kill it.
I was sure of it.
But, do I have anything to live for anyways?
The festering thought wormed through my head and I froze, my left arm positioned to claw the slithering cloth from my right forearm.
My family is gone, my friends are gone, my life is gone. If I kill it and escape…
Then what?
I paused. Slowly looking around at the empty space, then down at the dirt around my feet. My breathing slowed to a steady, quiet rhythm.
Oh.
I would simply wither away in this place, slowly succumbing to hunger or thirst.
The slight, rhythmic friction on my arm caught my attention again.
But this Pokémon… this Pokémon can live.
The faded blue cloth continued to travel up my arm, its speed lethargic, akin to a snail's crawl. I glanced down at the sword and observed it for a long while without expression, before my eyes softened and my lips parted into a sad smile.
Its pupil focused onto my face, the sudden change in its expression instilling a flicker of curiosity in its lens.
"Hey Honedge, do you have a name?" I asked the blade, slowly shifting my weight downward to sit. My body screamed in pain at every little movement as I crossed my legs, gently settling the heavy steel into my lap.
I knew the lore. Some Honedge were said to be ancient human, their souls trapped in a blade.I dug through the deepest, fragmented parts of my memory, trying to recall the behavior of it's lineage as the sword tilted towards me.
"Hone—Honedge," its wispy voice replied. The sound was an echoing, ethereal whisper, its eye faintly glowing brighter with each syllable spoken.
Perhaps due to pure survival instinct, or some strange, unexplainable connection between humans and these creatures, I could subtly understand the underlying meaning behind its words. It didn't have a name. It was just repeating what it was.
"I see." I glanced up at the inky dome blotting out the sky. Misty clouds released destructive bolts of white lightning while an iridescent, oily spectrum swirled in the veil above.
The mysterious sight distracted my mind, slightly dulling the sharp, pulsing pain of my aching muscles.
"Have you ever seen the world past this place?" I continued, my eyes never leaving the sky. I felt the rough fabric of Honedge's cloth travel past my forearms, beginning its path up my upper arm.
Its tassel suddenly paused against my skin.
"…Hone?" its voice pitched up in a questioning tone. A confused, squinting gleam appeared in its eye as I lowered my gaze to meet it.
I took a shallow breath, a stabbing pain worming its way out from my bruised ribs as I forced myself to speak.
"Beyond this infinite storm and inky sky—there is a beautiful, vast world that exists outside these walls."
"Outside, when you look up during a cloudless night, you can see the sea of stars. Sometimes if you're lucky, you can see them get tired and fall from the midnight canvas toward earth, only to be devoured by the sky dragon."
I paused in my storytelling, clearing my blurring vision with the fabric of a tattered sleeve. The Honedge's tassel resumed its ascent, though its pace had subtly slowed, as if it was listening to my words.
So I continued.
"On other nights, you can see the moon goddess fully spread her wings and form the radiance of the full moon." I ignored the sharp crack of a thunderbolt striking the ground somewhere behind me. "Seldom, when she is infuriated and enraged at the sun god, she will glow a crimson red and become the blood moon."
A weak chuckle escaped my lips. The speed of the tassel's movements slowed even further as it closed the remaining distance toward my shoulder.
"During the coldest winters, like those of the Alabaster Icelands, if you wait long enough out on the icy snow, you might see the legendary Beast of the North as it runs across the frozen waters. Its long, flowing mane catches the falling snowflakes as it runs, weaving the frost crystals into shimmering auroras that line the sky.
"And when the earth god and the sea god awaken…"
…
…
…
I faded away. Detaching my mind from the agony of my body, I rambled on and on, drifting through one story after another. How much time did I spend simply talking to the sword in my arms? I didn't know.
When my awareness finally dragged itself back to reality, I realized that somewhere during my monologue, the Honedge had reached my shoulder. Its cool cloth was coiled securely around my right arm, and the Pokémon's bright eye was focused deeply on my face.
"Hone~" It let out a small, quiet call. It was waiting for me.
"Thank you," I replied, a larger smile appearing on my face despite the dirt and blood. I held the Pokémon up to eye level. Its constriction around my arm tightened slightly as I shifted my weight to get a better position.
"I've never actually seen any of the things I've just described," I admitted softly. The blade's pupil flickered in sudden disbelief, granting me a brief sliver of amusement.
"But someday, I will." My voice rose, a desperate spark of defiance burning a little brighter in my chest as I looked back up at the twisting void above. "Someday, I will dream hard enough. And the desire to see the world beyond this mountain will grant me the courage to see those dreams through."
The internal spark grew, threatening to turn into a full blaze, and a sudden, audible laugh erupted straight from my core.
But the physical effort of the laughter instantly betrayed me.
"Ugh!" A sharp, blinding agony flared across my chest as my bruised ribs shifted violently. I choked on the breath, the air whistling between my teeth as the laughter cut off into a painful wheeze.
At the same time, the spiraling patterns running from my palm to my forearm burned white-hot, a deep, pulsing heat that made my fingers twitch and go entirely numb.
The brief illusion of strength vanished. My fire was forcefully snuffed.
My eyelids grew impossibly heavy, like small weights had been tied to the lashes. My left arm gave out, forcing me to lean back heavily against my hand just to stay upright. My grip on the hilt completely slackened, the obsidian scabbard tipping uselessly against my crossed leg.
"Hey... Honedge..." My words came out thin, frayed, and barely audible over the distortion's hum. I looked down at the blade, my vision beginning to tunnel. "What is your dream?"
"Honedge?" The sword seemed taken aback at the question, or perhaps at the very thought of a creature like itself having something like a dream.
"Hone~" it replied curtly. "Honedge."
"Nothing, huh?"
"Then... could I give you mine?" I coughed, swallowing the distinct taste of blood and dust. "I don't think I'm going to make it out of this place. Everything hurts."
"If you're going to take my life force anyway... then take this dream with you. Go see the stars for me. The real ones. Not the false lights inside this dome. See the auroras. Watch the sky dragon. See the world my dad used to talk about."
The tassel slid higher, past my shoulder, the cool fabric brushing the side of my neck. I closed my eyes and simply waited. I braced myself for the cold, agonizing pull of my soul being drained away, welcoming the warm relief that death would bring.
But it never came.
Instead, the movement of the cloth slowed to an absolute stop. It settled gently against the center of my back, right between my shoulder blades, and gave a small, deliberate pat.
Once.
A heavy pause.Then again, gentler.
My weighted eyes shot open, my vision scattering wildly until it focused on the silhouette of the sword wrapped around me.
Slow, deliberate pats continued to cascade down against my spine.
On the crossguard, the azure gem radiated a soft, calming light, pulsing periodically as if it were trying to tell me I wasn't alone in the dark.
A weak, broken sound of surprise escaped my throat, a fragile mix between a laugh and a sob.
"Huh? Are you comforting me?" I asked, incredulous. My shoulders slumped, the absurdity of the scene snapping me out of my mental fog. "Hah! A human being comforted by a sword."
"Kuk kuk kuk~" A strange, echoing chime sounded in the cold air, a vibrating ring that startled me. I tilted my chin down to look at the crossguard.
"Are you… are you laughing?"
Honedge's eye squinted, the azure gem flashing brighter as its shrill version of a laugh spilled out into the open space—high, reedy, and metallic, the singing steel cutting through the dead air.
I blinked, and then my mouth split wide as a short, cracked laugh escaped me, too. The sound was ugly and thin, but once it started, I couldn't stop it.
Honedge kept making that keening noise, its cloth tassel giving another small, rhythmic pat against my back as if it were entirely in on the joke.
We sat there in the mud, a half-dead kid and a rusty old sword, laughing at nothing and everything until the sounds slowly faded into quiet, shaky breaths.
A smile lingered as my voice dropped to a whisper.
"Hey. If you're not going to devour my soul…"
I reached out to Honedge with my hand, my palm outstretched and expectant.
"Then do you want to see the stories of this vast world with me instead?"
"Hone~?"
Unnerving silence stretched between us. Occasionally the faint crackle of the distant unending storm interrupted the distortion's ambient hum.
My outstretched hand began to feel heavy, trembling slightly in the cold air. As the seconds ticked by without a movement from the blade, a sudden, cold wave of embarrassment washed over my chest, momentarily dulling the pain of my ribs.
God, I sound completely ridiculous, I thought, my smile faltering at the edges. I was a dying, blood-soaked human offering a grand, delusional partnership to a literal weapon.
It was a ghost inhabiting a steel sword. Most likely, it simply wanted to be left alone in the dirt, and here I was, rambling to it like a madman.
I started to curl my fingers back, ready to drop my arm in defeat and apologize to the empty air.
Then, a tattered tassel wormed its way across the mud and slid into my open palm.
The fabric clasped around my fingers, coiling tight and firm, not with a suffocating squeeze, but with the clumsy, awkward grip of a creature trying to mimic a human handshake
I watched with stunned, tired eyes as the Pokémon's pupil curved into a joyous arc. As it lightly shook my arm up and down, a short, resolute cry rose from the blade.
"Honedge."
The word carried a definitive weight, echoing through the cold air like a contract being signed in blood.
It was an acceptance of our shared future.
I managed a weak sigh of relief, my muscles turning to lead as my eyes sealed shut so I wouldn't cry. A spark of life returned to my fading senses as a genuine smile broke through the dirt on my face.
But the peace didn't last. A sharp tug jerked my wrist, and I opened one eye to find Honedge aggressively flailing my limp arm up and down like a pump handle.
It was entirely dead-weight, completely at the mercy of the floating blade.
My shoulder joint popped uncomfortably as Honedge yanked my wrist up and down with the aggressive enthusiasm of an excited puppy, totally oblivious to the fact that my bones felt like they were made of glass.
"Stop that." I muttered, my voice cracking and dying in the back of my dry throat.
The shaking paused instantly. The tassel went limp for a fraction of a second, as if the sword were processing my complaint.
Then, with an aggressive twist of its blade, it resumed, only this time, it began spinning my entire forearm in tight, dizzying circles like a windmill.
"Hey!" I snapped, a sharp hiss twisting my face as the movement pulled painfully at the burns on my wrist.
A high-pitched, ghastly snickering echoed in my mind, a reedy sound like metal scraping against stone, as the tassel finally uncoiled and released my arm. Left without support, my hand fell heavily back into the mud with a dull splash.
A weak, exhausted snort escaped my nose, cutting off abruptly into a heavy, dragging silence. The ambient hum of the distortion seemed to drop an octave, leaving just the two of us sitting in the dark.
I looked down at the sword resting across my lap, watching the way its solitary eye tracked the shallow, ragged movement of my chest.
"Kishin," I croaked amidst the quiet.
The sword tilted slightly on its axis, its blue pupil narrowing into a sharp, focused slit.
"Hone~?"
"Your name," I continued, my fingers twitching against the dirt as I forced my eyes to stay locked onto its gaze. No longer was it just another creature. It had an identity now. There was only one of it in the entire world.
"Your name is Kishin."
The sword stilled, its eye widening slightly as each syllable of the word seemed to settle over its rusted steel. The silence continued, stretching on for several heartbeats.
Then, the crystal gem on its crossguard flared with a brilliant, pulsing light.
Kishin let out a soft, melodious chime, a beautiful, resonant ring like a silver bell struck in an empty cathedral.
The vibration traveled straight down its hilt, thrumming warmly against my blood-stained palm and sending a wave of soothing, physical heat through my entire numb arm.
That was its declaration.
I leaned back slightly, a faint, genuine grin finally breaking through the dirt and blood on my face. "Alright then… together."
"We'll see the world."
But the moment the pact was sealed, the last remaining embers of my fire fizzled out.
"Argh!" I groaned at the growing pain surging from my wounds.
My breathing grew shallower, catching in my throat as the brief rush of survival adrenaline completely vanished. The true, agonizing weight of my ruptured ribs and torn flesh rushed back in a violent wave to claim my body.
I stumbled over my own legs, my knees instantly turning to water as the world tilted violently, and I began to tip backward.
For a moment, nothing changed. Then, the space around us shuddered.
The walls of the shifting, iridescent dome began to dissolve, the inky glass peeling away into the atmosphere like smoke caught in a gale. The heavy, suffocating pressure in my ears popped violently, causing me to wince.
The sickening stench of ozone vanished in an instant, replaced by a sudden, rushing wave of crisp, freezing mountain air that filled my burning lungs.
I forced my eyes open one last time. The false, distorted world was gone.
And time seemed to slow.
Above us stretched a night sky so vast and impossibly deep that it made my aching chest tighten. It was a flawless black canvas, an infinite, velvety void completely unblemished by the chaotic storms of the distortion.
It felt clean. Pure. Millions of brilliant, icy stars were scattered across the expanse like crushed diamonds, burning cold and bright against the darkness.
Some flickered in quiet, steady rhythms, while others blazed with fierce intensity.
Then, the midnight canvas shifted. A few brilliant sparks broke free from their cosmic anchors, streaking slowly across the open sky in elegant, silent trails. They painted long, shimmering lines of silver across the dark, burning out in brief, breathtaking flashes of radiant light.
Falling stars.
It was exactly what my dad had promised was out here—a world where the sky dragon chased the dying lights of the cosmos. The sight completely stole what little breath I had left.
I stared up at them, my mouth slightly open, my eyes wide, drinking in the sight until the brilliant points of light began to blur and warp together. My balance completely failed and I fell.
A panicked, high-pitched shriek tore from Kishin's steel.
The blade lunged through the air. Its tattered blue tassel whipped outward, desperately wrapping around my collar in a frantic attempt to halt my fall.
But the sword was far too weak.
The sudden, heavy dead-weight of my collapsing body snapped the cloth taut, dragging the helpless blade straight down into the mud right alongside me.
My head slammed into the damp earth with a dull thud.
Darkness began to tunnel my vision, wiping away the stars. I lay there, completely paralyzed by exhaustion, unable to even close my fingers around Kishin's hilt.
The only thing I could feel was the sword's cloth tassel, trembling violently against my chest as it let out weak, worried whimpers.
The world was slipping away.
Then, through the heavy fog of my fading consciousness, the dead silence of the mountain cracked.
Crunch. Crunch.
The distinct, heavy sound of thick leather boots stamping through the wet gravel echoed nearby.
Metal clinked sharply—the unmistakable rattle of iron armor plates and heavy security gear.
"Hold!" A voice boomed. It was deep, commanding, and rough as gravel. "Form a perimeter. The strange storm has passed, but look for remnants, survivors or hostiles."
More footsteps rushed forward. A heavy, armored shadow stepped into my collapsing field of vision, blocking out the last of the starlight. I couldn't make out a face, only the massive, broad silhouette of a man towering over me.
Kishin gave a sharp, defensive hiss, its tassel tightening weakly over my chest.
The massive shadow paused. The man shifted his weight, the steel of his armor groaning under his bulk as he leaned downward, a heavy hand reaching for the hilt of a sword at his hip.
"Huh?" the gruff voice muttered, the commander's harsh tone fracturing into pure, startled disbelief.
"A... a kid?"
The darkness swallowed the rest.