Primordial Fury: "Klaus Aetherion's Reckoning"

Darkness. Cold, infinite darkness.

Then pain.

Not the sharp sting of blade or flame—but the kind of agony that lived in bone and marrow. The kind of pain that felt eternal. Klaus Aetherion's body spasmed, convulsing as violet sparks flickered from his ruined skin.

He screamed.

It wasn't human. It was guttural, broken. Blood gushed from his mouth, spattering the pale marble beneath him. His body twisted, muscles seizing with every breath he couldn't fully draw.

He didn't know where he was. Only that he was alive—and that fact alone felt like punishment.

Around him, wind howled.

Not natural wind—this wind was sentient. Heavy, alive. It didn't brush against him; it tore through him. It lifted him, suspended him midair like a crucified ghost as tendrils of gale force coiled around his limbs.

The space was vast—an ancient temple, or something older. The ceiling was endless sky, storm-wrapped and swirling. The ground bore glowing glyphs etched in languages long lost. Pillars of air spiraled skyward like twisting tornadoes frozen in motion.

A voice broke through the maelstrom.

"He bleeds as a man… but this fury… is not human."

It wasn't Klaus speaking.

The voice echoed from nowhere and everywhere. Male and female. Old and young. It carried the weight of epochs.

Klaus writhed, more blood pouring from his mouth. He tried to speak—but only a croak came.

"You should be dead," the voice said. "Your body is a fractured vessel. Your soul—on fire. And yet, here you cling to breath, as if defying fate itself."

Lightning flickered across his back. He arched with a violent seizure.

"Who…" he managed through clenched teeth. "Who the fuck… are you?"

Silence.

Then the wind shifted. Slowed.

And something stepped forward. Not a person, not quite. A shape made of compressed air and light. A silhouette of shimmering motion—formless and regal.

"I am the Echo of the First Wind," it said. "I am the whisper before storm. The breath of gods long buried. I have waited for you, Klaus Aetherion."

His eyes widened. His vision blurred. He couldn't move. Every nerve in his body was either seared or dead.

"You… waited?"

"You awakened me when you tore the sky apart."

The wind-being circled him slowly. With every pass, the air grew thinner.

"Your body is broken because you forced power through it. Lightning, raw and untamed. The very heavens bent around your scream."

Klaus groaned, arms shaking violently, teeth red with blood.

"The cost…" he muttered. "I wasn't strong enough."

"No," the entity said, pausing before him. "You were. But strength comes at price. And you paid in full."

Klaus's head slumped. He felt death creeping in again. But the wind wouldn't let him fall.

"You are not done. You have touched the storm. But you have yet to command it."

His lips barely moved. "Why… me?"

"Because your hatred is pure. Your purpose—unchained."

The temple's floor lit up suddenly, glyphs blazing as air whirled faster.

"But even hatred must be wielded. Or it will destroy the wielder."

The winds tightened around Klaus's body, slicing into his skin. Torn flesh flayed like paper. More screams. His bones groaned under pressure. His eyes rolled back—then locked forward again with willpower alone.

"Let it break you, Klaus," the wind said. "Only then can you be reforged."

The agony surged, threatening to pull him into oblivion. But through the noise, through the chaos and violence of the storm, a voice cut through—familiar, beloved.

Klaus…

His breath hitched. His eyes flickered. He wasn't sure if he was hallucinating. But there it was again.

Sofie…

The memory of her voice, so gentle, so full of warmth, reached into the heart of his agony. His name, the way she'd spoken it, calling him in a moment of tenderness amidst the violence. It broke through the suffocating winds. It cut through the searing pain.

His body seized again, the winds tightening their grip, but in the haze, he could almost feel her hand on his arm, her presence beside him.

Sofie…

The winds pushed him harder, but now, something new stirred within him—something deeper, a connection stronger than just hatred, stronger than just the storm.

"I..." His voice was raw, broken. "I won't break."

The entity paused, and for a moment, the wind stilled.

"Good," it said, its voice almost softer than before. "You are more than fury. You are the tempest itself."

The winds vanished—instantly.

Klaus fell.

He crashed to the marble floor with a sickening thud, coughing blood, twitching. He was alone now. The temple quiet.

But something had changed.

His heartbeat slowed. His breathing calmed. And in the stillness… his hand twitched—and air responded. The wind curled gently around his fingers, obeying.

And far, far above, thunder murmured.

The voice of Sofie lingered in his mind like a ghost—a reminder of who he was beneath the fury, beneath the storm. He had felt her loss, felt the way the battle had stolen so much from him. But now, as the winds circled him, he realized something.

It wasn't just vengeance that fueled him.

It was everything he had lost, and everything he had yet to protect.

The storm rumbled.