The ancient city lay beyond the Blackthorn Pass.
Everyone in Zelda knew that name.
It was a place maps avoided and storytellers loved — a city swallowed by time, where stone remembered blood and magic clung like rot. No birds nested there. No wind stayed long. Even the Rich Wizards spoke of it carefully, as if the land itself listened.
They left before dawn.
Aria stood at the edge of the glade, watching the village fade behind her, rooftops still dark, chimneys cold, the life she knew sleeping peacefully, unaware of how close it was to ending.
Yllg's laughter echoed faintly in her memory.
I'll come back, Aria told herself.
She didn't know if it was a promise or a lie.
Darius snapped his fingers, and the air folded.
A bridge of shimmering light stretched before them — not solid or illusion, but something in between. Aria hesitated only a second before stepping onto it. The surface felt warm under her boots, like living stone.
"First lesson," Darius said calmly, walking beside her. "Magic isn't about control. It's about agreement. The world lets you walk because it finds you interesting."
Aria shot him a look. "And when it stops?"
Darius smiled thinly. "Then you fall."
The land changed as they crossed.
Trees thinned. Colors dulled. The sky bruised into deep purples and grays. Aria felt it then — a pull in her chest, subtle but insistent, like a memory tugging at her ribs.
Lady Mira noticed.
"The land recognizes you," she said softly. "The ancient city was built by Tragajah blood."
She already accepted she's a tragajah since when the journey begins. She didn't want to argue with them, so she just let it be.
Aria's steps faltered. "So this place… it knows what I am?"
"Yes," Mira replied. "And it will test you." they walked meters before they reached the ruins by nightfall.
The city rose from the earth like a corpse refusing burial — broken towers, collapsed arches, streets cracked open like old wounds. Runes glowed faintly along the stones, pulsing in time with Aria's heartbeat.
Thane slammed his staff into the ground.
"We're not alone."
A howl answered him — distant, mocking.
Kaelos's flames ignited instinctively, bathing the ruins in red light. "Tsumiki scouts. They're watching."
Aria swallowed. Her skin prickled. The whispers returned — faint, seductive.
Blood remembers. Stone remembers. You belong here.
She clenched her fists.
"No," she whispered. "I choose."
Suddenly, the ground beneath them split deliberately.
The street opened like a mouth, revealing a stairway spiraling downward, carved with symbols Aria somehow understood without knowing how.
At the bottom, something pulsed. It was golden and Violet.
The Crystal of Tragajah.
But before they could move, shadows detached themselves from the ruins.
Dozens of them.
Tsumiki warriors emerged — eyes glowing, bodies shifting between forms — wolves with human hands, humans with too many teeth.
And from behind them stepped a familiar figure.
The Shadow Pack Lord.
Clapping slowly.
"Well done," he said, voice smooth as poison. "You brought her straight to it."
Aria's heart dropped.
Kaelos turned sharply. "Aria—"
But it was too late.
The Crystal reacted.
Light exploded outward — violent, blinding — and Aria screamed as power tore through her, ancient and furious. The ruins shook. The sky split with thunder.
In that moment, the Crystal didn't choose Wizards.
It didn't choose Tsumiki.
It chose blood.
And the ancient city began to wake up.