~ Start of Book 3 ~

This is the second time in the last few days… or maybe weeks that I've woken up in a room I didn't recognize.

Days or weeks since I didn't actually know where I was, and even worse, I didn't know when this was.

Well, I guess it makes sense that I'm a little confused since I quite literally only just woke up. And it took a few seconds for the memories from before I fell unconscious to come flowing back to me.

We flew to the Dark Continent, as I'm now dubbing it, and were promptly greeted by—I don't know—millions of Vamps? There were too many to tell. The situation looked a little bleak, but with special use of the V word and a rail gun from Seiha, we managed to make it past them.

I'm definitely still shocked by the existence of a rail gun. Well, I know it's not actually called that, but the fact something like that even exists is crazy to me. There's still so much about this world and cultivation as a whole that I don't understand.

Anyway, with that, we were able to enter the continent, and after some scouting, we found a city hidden deep within a massive valley.

Which is where everything all went down.

We concocted what we thought was a good plan and entered the valley with all the vigor in the world. Ready and willing to stop the sacrifice of the core no matter what.

But we quite literally ran into a brick wall.

One that we weren't prepared for.

That I wasn't prepared for.

Looking back, I really was awfully optimistic that just having the V word in my back pocket would cause everything to work out as intended. I won't beat myself up over it though—it was my first war, and if I'm to believe Elder Zal's words about there being more conflict in my future, then I need to make sure I learn from this experience.

Especially when it came to what happened next. For a few moments there, my life and the lives of people I cared about were placed into the hands of another.

If he wanted to kill me and everyone in that valley, he could've done it within seconds—maybe even less than that.

But I guess it was a blessing that he perfectly played the role of a cliché villain and began giving me a speech about how disappointed he was in my abilities as a Patriarch. It would be easy to believe in his disappointment right up until he killed Jarken and I finally displayed those abilities he oh-so wished for.

Then he became a coward.

I was angry.

Wrathful, even.

Then the being spoke to me.

Just like when I first learned the V word, it spoke to me once more… the Azh'Kharel. He told me to bring it forth, but what I don't know is if that's the being or not. And there's the new word I learned to invoke in that moment.

Unauthorized use: this story is on Amazon without permission from the author. Report any sightings.

The D word.

That brought forth a level of power that even the planet itself had to bow down to. And I knew immediately that even I was unqualified to use it. My level of strength could not contain it for long, but for the time it did…

It was more than enough to deal with the Vamp if I used it properly. Plus the whole armor and spear thing.

"Harden."

…

"Spear."

…

As I thought… it was only something I could do in that state. No matter how much I willed my flames to form that sick armor, or to create a spear, it was not happening. And it wasn't like my flames were disobeying or anything.

The problem was myself. I didn't possess the necessary mastery or power from which the flames could draw to accomplish something like that.

I'm sure I could shape my flames into armor, and shape it into a spear, but it wouldn't be the same thing at all. Just my flames in a different shape.

Moving on, I went down to the core, we fought, and I managed to unleash a devastating Black Lance on him that seemed to also cause some type of crazy spatial tears in the atmosphere. Then… I felt sleepy.

And now here I am.

Sitting in a room with no windows, one door, and the bed I was laying on. The walls seemed different somehow though—definitely not made out of wood or any type of concrete I was familiar with… maybe it was somewhat metallic?

Apart from that, nothing else in the room seemed weird or out of the ordinary, except for maybe the engraving of a spear in the door I was looking at.

Actually… am I slow? This is not a regular door. It doesn't have hinges.

Am I on Elder Zal's ship, I wonder?

Honestly, after what happened last time I woke up in a different room, I fully expected someone to show up right then and there with perfect timing, but nothing like that happened.

I leaned up and got off the bed slowly.

Dressed myself in one of the outfits Elder Zal gave me and headed to the door.

Before I could reach my hand to try and open it, the door slid open all on its own. I left and was met with a large hallway heading to the left and to the right.

I turned around as the door of the room I just left closed behind me. The spear was engraved on this side too.

Just as I was getting ready to pick a random direction, I heard the voice of a woman in my mind.

But it wasn't Elder Zal's, Greja's, or anyone I knew for that matter.

'Go to the right.'

I thought about it for a moment, but I saw no reason to refuse the voice and followed instructions.

From there, I was led down many different corridors and walked past more than a few different closed doors before I was finally led to one particularly large door.

The walls and even the floor I walked on all carried the same metallic look of the room I was in. Everything was pristine, and equally as silent.

And the door I was just told to enter was the only one—apart from the one I left—that also had a spear engraved in it.

I walked up to the door and it opened automatically, and what greeted me on the other side was a simple office. A large wooden desk, a larger chair behind it, a wooden shelf to the left, and a massive, yet beautiful spear resting on the wall behind the chair.

Those were the only things in the room.

Well, the only inanimate things.

"It is nice to see you awake, little brother."

I raised my eyebrow at the words the woman who was standing next to the bookshelf said.

A massive woman at that. She was easily at least seven feet in height, and her muscles practically ripped through the armor she wore. Yet despite all of that, it wasn't an unattractive build.

Is this what people referred to as a muscle mommy?

Ahem.

"Little brother?"

"That is what I said."

She placed the book in her hands back onto the shelf and turned to face me.

"I don't understand. Why would you refer to me as a little brother? I don't remember my parents having any other children."

She smiled for a second and started laughing.

"Hahaha!!"

It was the type of laugh that almost made you want to join in.

"Your mortal parents likely didn't have any other children. The energy it took to give birth to you would have stopped both of them from ever producing children again.

"But it is not through them in which we share a connection, little brother. As sons and daughters of the Azh'Kharel, we are without a doubt family.

"Don't you feel it? Your flames will never lie to you, little brother."

If you find any errors ( broken links, non-standard content, etc.. ), Please let us know < report chapter > so we can fix it as soon as possible.