Varyan Duskveil's legs finally gave out.
His body struck the blood‑soaked earth with a dull thud, vision collapsing into darkness. The battlefield sounds faded… replaced by a single, distant echo.
The beating of wings.
High above, the same raven perched on a broken tree branch. Its black feathers rippled in the cold wind, and its purple‑tinted eyes reflected only one thing—
Varyan's fallen form.
The surviving soldiers moved in, trembling with adrenaline and fear.
"He's down…" one whispered.
Captain Rovan raised his sword. "Finish him. Now!"
They stepped closer, weapons lifted for the killing blow.
The raven tilted its head… almost curious.
And then—
The world shifted.
A cold wind swept through the battlefield, snuffing out every torch.
Shadows stretched unnaturally long across the ground.
The temperature dropped so suddenly that the soldiers' breaths became white clouds.
One soldier shivered.
"W‑what is this…?"
Another took a step back. "Something's wrong. Something's—"
He never finished.
A shape—black as a moonless night—burst out of thin air behind him.
A whisper of movement.
A flash of claw‑like darkness.
A wet shhkk as his throat opened in a single silent cut.
Blood sprayed.
The man's body collapsed before any of them even realized he was dead.
"AMBUSH!" another soldier screamed.
But it wasn't an ambush.
It was one shadow—moving faster than thought, slipping through the soldiers like a living nightmare.
It didn't run.
It glided, tearing through bodies with silent precision.
A blade of pure darkness erupted from the ground and impaled a soldier through the chest.
Another was sliced cleanly in half, his body falling in two different directions.
A third screamed as shadow‑tendrils wrapped around him and crushed his ribcage with a sickening crack.
Panic erupted.
"RETREAT—RETREA—!"
A shadow cleaved him in two before he could finish.
Only Rovan remained, backing away, sword shaking in his hand.
Something stepped out of the darkness behind him.
Not human.
Not fully formed.
Just an outline—like a man made entirely from shadow, rippling and shifting, with glowing purple slits for eyes.
It whispered one word—
A voice colder than the grave:
"Mine."
Rovan's scream was swallowed instantly.
His body vanished into the darkness. He didn't even hit the ground.
Silence returned.
All that remained were corpses… shredded, broken, mangled beyond recognition.
Then The Shadow turned towards Varyan.
Varyan Duskveil lay completely unconscious on the cold ground.
His breathing was shallow, his body limp, his blood mixing with the dirt beneath him. He didn't hear the raven's wings beating overhead.
He didn't see the corpses scattered around him.
He didn't even feel the cold shadow crouched at his side.
But the shadow… watched him.
Its shape wavered like smoke, edges melting into the darkness. It studied Varyan's still form with something between disappointment and grim expectation—like a teacher observing a student who failed a test he should have passed.
It leaned in again, voice low and dripping with judgment:
"You are not strong enough."
But Varyan heard none of it.
He lay motionless, unaware of the death, the raven, the shadow…
or the fact that some kind of an ancient being had begun to move
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