Cassia's awakening did not arrive as revelation.It arrived as damage.
For days after the battle with Ariel, she could not sleep on her back. The skin there felt wrong—oversensitive, stretched too tight, as if something beneath it refused to stay still. When the wings first emerged, it was during a nightmare. She screamed herself awake as bone and muscle forced their way outward, her body rejecting the change violently before collapsing into exhaustion.
Jules said little beyond what was necessary. Awakening, he explained, was rarely clean—especially for something that had no precedent. Achilles listened more than he spoke. When Cassia finally stood again, legs shaking, wings flickering in and out of existence like a faulty memory, he simply nodded and told her to try again.
Training followed.
Not heroic. Not inspiring. Brutal and repetitive.
Cassia learned quickly that flight was not freedom—it was cost. Each manifestation drained her stamina violently, leaving her lightheaded and nauseous. She fell more often than she flew. Achilles drilled her in short bursts: controlled jumps, gliding descents, balance under stress. Jules reinforced her body when he could, adjusting spells on the fly as her physiology changed week by week.
And while Cassia struggled to adapt, the others changed too.
Achilles' strength began to exceed what muscle alone could justify. His movements carried weight, not speed—each strike compressing the air, fracturing stone even when he missed. Jules' magic deepened, shifting from reaction to anticipation, spells weaving themselves around wounds before they fully formed. Artorius' flames sharpened, no longer wild or expansive, but exact, focused into narrow, lethal arcs.
They did not speak of it openly.
But they all felt it.
They were stronger than they had ever been.
Strong enough to believe—just briefly—those six years had been enough.
They planned the assault on Vryel like professionals.
The Seventh Orthodox Divinity did not hide. His mansion was embedded into the mountain itself, a structure so vast it distorted scale. The gates alone rose like cliffs, black metal etched with ancient symbols, towering far beyond any fortification meant for men. The structure behind them stretched deep into the stone, layered and excessive, a residence built not for defense—but dominance.
The guards were irrelevant.
If Vryel noticed them, the fight would be over before it began.
So, they chose terrain. Height. Angles.
They crossed west into Alpine Duke, where the land rose violently into jagged mountains and bottomless canyons. Wind screamed through narrow passes. Snow clung to sheer cliffs. Sound vanished strangely in the open air, swallowed by altitude.
They climbed for days.
The mountain Vryel claimed stood apart from the rest, its summit exposed, clouds curling around it like something alive. Artorius volunteered to scout ahead. He moved without hesitation, flames suppressed to embers as he vanished upward.
Minutes passed.
Then more.
Achilles felt it first—the pressure. Not heat. Not sound. Presence.
They ran.
Cassia, Achilles, Jules—boots scraping stone, breath tearing from lungs as they surged toward the summit.
Hailey stopped.
It was not fear that froze her—it was understanding.
The sensation in the air was different from Ariel. Cleaner. Sharper. Final. This was not a challenge. This was something that did not need to prove itself.
She saw it clearly then: continuing meant dying without changing anything.
And so, she turned.
She ran.
Not screaming. Not panicked. She ran with clarity, with the quiet certainty that the Hailey who had stood against Ariel had already paid her price. She ran because she wanted to live—because dying here would mean nothing.
At the summit, the air bent.
Vryel stood where Artorius had been.
There was no body. No blood. Nothing to mark where Artorius had vanished.
Vryel did not look wounded. He did not look strained. He looked complete.
His form was massive, armored in overlapping black scales like a pinecone grown into flesh, each plate swallowing light. His wings were vast and dark, layered and structural, not feathers but something closer to armor. A demon refined by time rather than chaos.
Cassia moved first.
Flight cost too much—so she ran.
Her wings flickered briefly, collapsing as she closed the distance. Achilles followed immediately, weapon already in motion. Jules stayed back, weaving reinforcement spells, anchoring them against what he could already sense was overwhelming force.
Vryel vanished.
Not moved—vanished.
Jules' head struck the ground before Cassia realized Vryel had left his original position.
There was no sound. No warning. One moment Jules stood, hands raised mid-spell. The next, his body collapsed, severed cleanly at the neck.
Cassia screamed.
Rage consumed the fear entirely. Her wings erupted fully this time, tearing from her back in a burst of agony as she launched herself at Vryel without thought or plan.
Achilles hurled a dagger—not to wound, but to force motion.
They fought.
Cassia struck from above, from behind, from angles that would have overwhelmed anything mortal. Achilles pressed relentlessly, every blow carrying the weight of six years of obsession and loss. They moved together instinctively, coordination born from survival rather than training.
Vryel barely reacted.
He stepped back once.
Then he was in front of them.
The strikes came simultaneously—precision impacts to solar plexus, ribs, shoulders. Cassia felt her breath leave her body entirely as she crashed into stone, vision bleaching white. Achilles hit harder, bones screaming as he slid across the summit.
Vryel's gaze settled on Cassia.
On her horns.
There was a pause.
Then his hand struck her neck—not to kill, but to silence.
Cassia went limp.
Vryel seized her and turned, dragging her toward the mansion without urgency.
Achilles forced himself still, blood pooling beneath him, breath shallow, body screaming to move while his mind refused.
"What're you doing?!" he cried when he could no longer hold it.
Vryel did not turn.
The gates closed.
Silence returned to the mountain.
Achilles lay there, staring into the sky, lungs burning, vision fading. Six years. Six years of training, loss, pursuit.
Nothing had changed.
Vryel still lived.
As his blood soaked into the stone, pain flared across his hand.
A mark.
The same as Cassia's.
And then—
Darkness.
PART 1: GENESIS
END.