The Glitched Mage

The wind shifted as they crossed the southern ridge, cold and dry, brushing over the obsidian crests of the kingdom's outermost watchtowers. Behind them, the lights of the Shadow Kingdom shimmered like scattered embers, flickering against the deep blue of night. Ahead, the land dropped steeply into a jagged scar of blackened stone, soot-streaked cliffs, and silent ridges—Emberwatch Pass.

It was not a place spoken of fondly.

Emberwatch had once been the heart of a fanatical fire-bound cult, a sect so consumed by flame that even their prayers were said to scorch the air. Whatever cataclysm had ended them—whether divine retribution or their own hubris—no record remained to name it. Only the land remembered. Charred trees curled like blackened fingers toward a sky that never softened. The hills were cracked and bleeding with veins of volcanic glass, the earth beneath them warm, restless. The terrain was treacherous, shifting, half-buried beneath ash and mist. Few maps charted it fully. Fewer still dared to return.

Over time, what was once frenzy had dulled into myth. And from those ashes, a splintered, subdued branch of the original faith had been absorbed quietly into the Danu Empire—its rites reformed, its worship reinterpreted. Fire, now seen not as punishment, but as purification.

But Emberwatch itself had been left behind. Abandoned.

Untouched.

Perfect, Riven thought, for something forgotten to sleep.

They dismounted where the path ended and the broken wilds began. Their mounts would go no farther—too skittish. Riven adjusted the straps of his cloak and stepped forward into the uneven dark, Nyx beside him like a whisper, Krux trailing with his sword slung across his back, boots crunching stone. The priest moved silently, eyes half-closed, feeling for something beneath the surface.

"Anything?" Riven asked.

The priest lifted his staff and slowly pressed its butt into the scorched ground. The air vibrated faintly. He turned his head, listening.

"There is residue here," he said. "But no resonance yet. The anchor, if it's near, is deeper. Beneath the crust. Beneath memory."

"Then we dig," Krux muttered, cracking his knuckles. "Tear through the rock, break whatever's in the way. We've done worse."

"No," Riven said, his voice low but firm. "We search. We listen."

Krux tilted his head. "We're standing in a wasteland of ash and scorched stone. Not much left to listen to."

"There is," Riven replied, lowering himself to one knee. His fingers brushed across the soot-covered earth, pausing where the ground vibrated ever so faintly. "This place is holding its breath. You just don't hear it yet."

Nyx stepped up beside them, crouching with a quiet hum. "He's right. There's something underneath. Not loud… more like a memory that refuses to die."

Krux grunted but didn't argue further. His hand settled on the hilt of his sword, his stance shifting from ready to patient.

The priest stepped forward again, his voice soft. "We're close. I can guide us deeper—but we must go on foot. The terrain ahead was warped by something… unusual."

Riven rose.

"Then let's go."

They descended into Emberwatch's heart, where the cliffs grew jagged and the air shimmered faintly with latent heat. Night deepened around them, broken only by the glow of Krux's conjured flame and the slow shimmer of the priest's staff.

Somewhere ahead, buried beneath the soot and silence, the skybound anchor waited.

And with it—the key to lifting an entire future into the air.

—x—

The deeper they traveled into Emberwatch, the stranger the land became.

The earth no longer felt like earth—it hissed with warmth just beneath the surface, and the very rocks seemed warped by time and something older still. Jagged outcrops jutted from the slopes like broken ribs. In some places, the ash lay knee-deep, forcing them to wade through it like snow, their boots leaving no lasting prints. Nothing lived here. No insects. No birdsong. Not even the wind.

It was as if the pass itself had been sealed from life.

Krux broke the silence first, his voice rough with unease. "Feels like the Abyss threw up here."

The air was thick—scorched and metallic, with a scent like burnt stone and blood. Heat shimmered off the glass-veined rocks, casting warped reflections that twitched like mirages.

Nyx's reply came barely above a whisper, carried on the wind like smoke. "It might have," she said. "But this place isn't empty. Something's watching. Listening."

Her eyes swept the jagged ridges, narrowing at shadows that seemed too still. The mist here didn't drift—it lingered, clung to the edges of stone like it knew what waited beneath.

Riven didn't speak. He could feel it too.

A weight beneath the earth, vast and unmoving—like lungs that hadn't drawn breath in centuries. The pressure was no longer subtle. It wrapped around them, tightening with every step they took. Whatever lay buried here had not forgotten itself.

And it was not asleep.

The priest stopped suddenly at a split in the ridge, his eyes flicking toward the leftmost path. It was narrower, curling between two charred ridgelines and into a sharp descent that vanished into smoke. He tilted his head.

"There," he said. "The mana shifts."

"Show us," Riven replied.

They descended further—slow, deliberate—until the trail gave way to a hollow carved into the cliffs themselves. At first, it looked like a collapsed lava tube, its edges jagged and blackened, the ceiling marked with ancient burns. But as Nyx stepped forward and lit the space with flickering violet flame, patterns emerged across the walls.

Symbols.

Not carved—but branded.

The markings pulsed faintly beneath centuries of soot, runes scorched directly into the stone. Each one echoed with a strange rhythm—not alive, but not inert either. Protective. Bound.

The priest inhaled slowly. "This was a sanctum."

Riven's voice was low. "For the anchor?"

The priest nodded. "Or to keep others from reaching it."

Krux ran a gauntleted hand over the sigils. "Whatever it was meant to hold, it wasn't meant to be touched."

Riven stepped deeper into the passage. The runes flared faintly beneath his presence, as if recognizing the mana coiled in his veins.

"Too late for that," he said.

They followed the tunnel inward, its walls tightening like a throat of stone. Heat pulsed from every surface, the air thick with ash and iron. Sweat clung to their skin, but the deeper they went, the colder the silence became. A waiting stillness.

At last, the passage opened into a vast subterranean chamber. The air shimmered with residual heat, and the walls glowed faintly—lined with blackened obsidian veins etched by ancient fire. At the center, half-buried in molten-cracked stone, stood a towering, jagged pillar. Not grown. Not shaped. Driven down, as if hurled from the heavens.

It pulsed—not with light, but with breath.

A rhythmic thrum echoed through the cavern like a heartbeat sunk deep in the rock. Runes twisted across the anchor's surface, etched in a script none of them recognized. As they stared, the glyphs squirmed like living things, refusing to be remembered.

Nyx stopped short, her voice barely a whisper. "Is that…?"

She didn't finish.

Riven moved past her in silence, drawn forward by something heavier than curiosity. Heat rippled around the structure—no longer just warmth, but a presence. He stepped closer, eyes tracing the jagged shape rising from the fractured stone.

The nail looked like a spine driven from the heavens themselves—vertebrae of fused metal and scorched stone, each segment wrapped in shifting glyphs that glowed like dying embers. It wasn't straight; it arched slightly, as if resisting the world that tried to bury it. Ridges curled along its surface like ancient armor, and the ground around it bore the marks of centuries—not decay, but reverence.

As Riven approached the base of the anchor, the runes along its length flared—first a dull red, then bright as molten glass. A low hum rumbled through the chamber, vibrating up through the soles of their boots. The glyphs began to spiral, twisting faster, forming a circle of fire beneath them.

The priest inhaled sharply. "It's responding."

"To what?" Krux asked, already shifting his stance.

"To us," the priest said. "To our presence, our intent. This isn't just a relic—it's a threshold. A gate."

The heat surged, rising in waves. Around the room, the branded walls ignited—runes bursting to life with flame that pulsed in rhythm with the anchor.

Nyx narrowed her eyes. "You said it was warded."

"I did," the priest murmured, voice tense. "Not to keep intruders out—but to test those who would use it. This site once belonged to the fire cult. They built their sanctum around the nail and wove trials into the warding—rites of purification, forged in illusion and flame. They believed only the worthy could command fire without being consumed by it."

Riven's eyes didn't leave the spiraling glyphs. "And now those trials are waking."

The runes snapped together in a single burst of light.

Then the ground tore itself away.

Flame erupted in every direction—blinding, searing, alive. The air ignited with a roar like a thousand screams, and the stone beneath their feet disintegrated into ash and fire. Heat surged like a tidal wave, swallowing vision, sound, breath.

The cavern didn't just vanish—it shattered.

Light consumed everything.

And then—

Silence.

Total, unnatural silence.

As if the world had exhaled its last breath, leaving behind only the echo of absence.