The blizzard beyond the tunnels was a white wall of screaming wind. Leo and Elara moved through the waist-deep snow, their silhouettes flickering like dying embers against the vast, frozen dark. Leo was no longer just walking; he was a walking furnace, the snow melting in a ten-foot radius around him, creating a path of mud and steam.
"Leo, wait," Elara gasped, her lungs burning from the thin, freezing air.
Leo stopped. He looked at his hands. The amber glow in his veins was spreading to his neck, tracing patterns like cooling lava. "I can't slow down, Elara. The more I resist the 'Protocol of Ash,' the more the fire wants to prove the King right. It wants to destroy everything."
The Man in the Gold Lines
"Then perhaps you should stop resisting."
The wind didn't die down, but the sound did. Everything became muffled, as if they had stepped into a room made of velvet. Standing atop a jagged pillar of ice was Malakor. He looked exactly as he had in the capital—calm, regal, and terrifyingly still.
Leo's grimoire pulsed a bruised purple. "Malakor."
"I am not here to fight you, Leo," Malakor said, stepping off the pillar and drifting to the ground. "I am here to offer you the one thing the King denied you: The Truth."
The Forbidden Lineage
Malakor waved a hand, and the steam from Leo's body condensed into a shimmering screen of water. Images began to form within it—scenes from five hundred years ago.
"The history books say Lucifero was a monster who tried to burn the world," Malakor whispered. "But the books were written by the winners. Lucifero wasn't a monster. He was the first Commoner King. He discovered that magic wasn't a gift from the heavens meant only for the nobles—it was a force of nature meant to level the playing field."
The images showed a man with hair like Leo's, standing before a line of terrified nobles.
"The Hellfire isn't a curse, Leo. It's a Reset Button. Your ancestors were the guardians of the balance. Whenever the nobles grew too greedy, whenever the 'Order' became a 'Tyranny,' the Ash-Bringer would rise to burn the old world away so something new could grow."
The Third Seal
Leo shook his head, his teeth clenched. "No. It's destruction. I've felt it. It's hate."
"It is hate because you have been taught to hate yourself!" Malakor's voice boomed, finally showing a flash of passion. "The Magic King didn't seal your power to protect the world. He sealed it to protect his throne. He knew that if a boy from Hage Village mastered the Hellfire, the age of Kings would be over."
Malakor stepped closer, ignoring the heat. He pointed to the "Protocol of Ash" scroll in Elara's hand. "He was going to kill you because you are the only thing he cannot control. Join me, Leo. Not as a subordinate, but as the King you were born to be. Let us finish what Lucifero started."
The Refusal
Leo looked at Elara, then back at Malakor. He saw the same hunger in Malakor's eyes that he saw in the Magic King's. One wanted to use him as a shield; the other wanted to use him as a torch.
"You're wrong," Leo said, his voice low and steady. "My grandfather told me magic is a mirror. You and the King... you're both looking at the same mirror. You just like different parts of the reflection."
Leo raised his hand. The black-red flame didn't explode; it hummed. "I won't be your reset button. And I won't be his weapon. I'll be the thing that stands between both of you."
The Declaration of War
Malakor's expression shifted from fascination to a cold, clinical disappointment. "A pity. You chose the path of the martyr. But you forget, Leo... the world doesn't care about your intentions. It only sees the smoke."
Malakor vanished into a swirl of golden lines, his voice lingering in the wind. "The Capital is already burning, Leo. Not by my hand, but by their fear. If you want to save your precious city, you'd better hurry. The 'Protocol of Ash' has already been authorized. They aren't waiting for the war to end anymore."
Leo looked toward the southern horizon. A faint, violet glow was rising into the sky—the Necrotic Towers were being activated by the Council, not to fight Malakor, but as a "final defense" that would sacrifice the entire Outer District.
"We have to go," Leo said, grabbing Elara's hand.
"Leo, your body..." Elara looked at his glowing veins.
"It doesn't matter," Leo said, his eyes turning into a solid, brilliant gold. "If I'm going to burn, I'm going to choose what I light on fire."