Chapter 5 – The First Flame

The world around Leo was a graveyard of trees.

Gnarled trunks rose like twisted bones. Fog clung to the ground in serpent coils. The sky above was gone — swallowed by black branches and a silence that roared in his ears. He was alone.

His body ached — every nerve raw from the teleportation surge, every muscle screaming in rebellion. His limbs felt like lead. His breath, shallow and scattered.

Rily was nowhere to be seen.

Lera was gone.

And Leo’s heart… cracked wide open.

Pain.

Hollow, sharp pain.

The kind that makes the world lose its color. The kind that turns grief into rage.

His thoughts spiraled — his sister’s final words, her smile through the flame, her sacrifice, the King’s voice like thunder.

The image burned in his mind.

> "Avenge her.

Find Rily.

Don’t die here."

But his legs wouldn’t move.

And then — a sound.

Low. Wet. Hungry.

A growl cut through the air like a blade.

Leo’s eyes widened as he twisted, barely sitting upright by bracing against a jagged stone. The trees shifted ahead, and from the shadows stepped a creature that looked born of nightmare and war.

Not quite a wolf, not quite a hellhound.

Too large, easily twice Leo’s size. Its body pulsed with veins of glowing blue fire against skin blacker than ash. Its fangs curved like daggers. Its breath steamed in the cold. Saliva dripped from its maw like venom.

Its eyes locked with his.

And Leo froze.

He had nothing — no sword, no shield, no strength. Only a kitchen knife in his pack, and a heart shattered by loss.

His whole life he had been small. A servant. A child.

Not strong enough. Not brave enough. Not enough.

And yet—

In that moment, staring down death in burning blue eyes—

Something stirred.

A flower of courage bloomed from the blood-soaked earth of his soul.

He remembered Lera’s voice.

He remembered Rily’s hand.

He remembered his duty.

The beast snarled, its muscles coiling.

Leo whispered, “I’m not ready to die.”

The hellbeast lunged.

Its fangs sought his throat — but Leo, with all the strength his tiny body could muster, rolled to the side. The monster crashed into the rock behind him, stone cracking beneath its weight.

The beast howled in pain, blood spilling from its shoulder — a jagged wound from the stone’s edge.

Leo rose — unsteady, shaking, but standing.

He gritted his teeth, pulled out the dull kitchen blade, and limped toward the creature. It growled again, limping, fury in its fire-lit eyes.

He was afraid. Terrified.

But fear no longer ruled him.

> "This is for her," he whispered.

"This is for me."

With trembling hands, he drove the knife into the beast’s wound.

It screamed — a sound like fire burning flesh.

But it wasn't enough.

Leo — crying, shaking, roaring — threw his whole body onto the blade, plunging it deeper.

The creature spasmed. Its breath grew ragged. Its fire dimmed.

And then — silence.

Leo collapsed beside it, chest heaving, blood mixing with soil on his hands.

His first kill.

Not out of hatred.

But out of refusal to die powerless.

He stared at his trembling hands. Bloodied. Scarred. But for the first time, they were his own.

> Not the hands of a servant.

Not the hands of a child.

But the hands of someone who had chosen to fight.

And then… as his vision blurred… footsteps.

Measured. Confident. Heavy with something ancient.

A figure approached — shadowed, tall, cloaked in smoke.

Leo, barely conscious, saw only legs first. Not human. Not beast. A demon. Of origin. Old and pure.

A voice followed — deep, amused, echoing with restrained power.

> “Not too bad, little flame.

Not bad at all.”

Then darkness took him.

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Stay tuned.

For fire, once awakened, can never return to ash.