Chapter 1: Ash In His Veins

The boy walked alone through the slums of Yamato-dōri, his boots coated in ash from last night's furnace fire.

He didn't look back.

He never did.

Behind him, the brickwork glowed faintly with heat — a remnant of his part-time job at the forge. Ahead of him, crooked streets twisted through the maze of the city's forgotten edge.

And above it all, like a second moon, hung the palace he could never touch.

Kaen tugged his cloak tighter, hiding the long scar running from his collarbone to his jaw — a relic of some fight he no longer remembered.

His hair was black, disheveled, matted with sweat and soot. His eyes — the only part of him he never learned to hide — were unnaturally sharp, a kind of golden red that flickered like flame in the dark.

People called him cursed.

They weren't entirely wrong.

He passed beggars, drunkards, and shadowed alley merchants selling things no law would name.

No one stopped him.

Most looked away.

There was something in his walk — a quiet weight — that made even the desperate keep their distance.

Kaen paused under a collapsed shrine where an old statue of Yuna, the Moon Goddess, lay broken and half-buried in ivy.

He crouched, ran a hand across the moss-covered stone, and exhaled.

"Still watching me, huh?" he muttered.

The statue didn't reply.

It never did.

But the wind moved — just a little.

Like breath.

He pulled from his satchel a half-loaf of bread, stale and misshapen, and a small flask of river-water.

Dinner.

He ate in silence.

But his thoughts were loud.

Five more days. Just five more days and the testing begins.

If I pass…

He didn't finish the thought.

Hope was dangerous.

He had learned that lesson early.

As the sun dipped behind the black towers of central Tenryu, Kaen stood and turned toward home — if you could call it that.

A shack made of half-stolen wood and scrap metal, tucked between the edge of a drying canal and a broken wall that once marked the border of the elven quarter.

Inside, Sayari was waiting.

She sat by the hearth, her elven features ageless but tired.

A single candle flickered near her shoulder, casting her silhouette in gold and shadow.

"You're late," she said without looking.

Kaen dropped his satchel. "The forge ran hot."

Sayari turned. Her eyes — pale green, like sunlit jade — met his.

"You pushed too far again."

Kaen shrugged.

"You'll need that strength soon," she said. "And not for lifting iron."

He didn't answer.

Didn't need to.

They'd had this conversation a thousand times.

"Eat," she said, sliding him a bowl of rice and dried mushrooms.

He sat, ate, didn't complain.

Then: "Five days."

Sayari looked at him.

"You're not ready."

"I don't care."

"You should."

Kaen's hand tightened around the chopsticks. "If I pass the entrance trials, I'm in. Doesn't matter where I came from."

"Doesn't matter yet," she corrected. "But blood remembers that remembered the pain and forged the will."

He looked at her.

Hard.

"You're hiding something."

Sayari didn't blink. "I always have."

"And you're not going to stop?"

She stood, walked to the door, and looked out into the dark.

"No. I won't."

Kaen stared at her back, firelight casting her long hair in soft halos.

"I don't need the truth," he said. "Not now."

"But you will," Sayari replied. "Because the world's going to come looking for it."

Outside, the wind howled.

Somewhere in the distance, a wolf cried.

But inside their broken home, two hearts sat in silence.

One with too many secrets.

The other, with fire in his blood — and no idea what it truly meant.

The crowd outside the testing grounds was already restless by dawn.

Whispers. Stares. Shifting boots in the dust. The air smelled of metal and incense — a desperate mix of sweat and sanctity.

Kaen stood at the edge of the line, the only one not wearing clean robes.

His coat was torn at the cuff, his boots patched with wire, and his satchel still smelled faintly of coal and ash.

The others noticed.

They always did.

A boy from a noble family — smooth-faced, with polished jade cuffs — scoffed loud enough to be heard.

"Did they forget to sweep the slums this morning?"

Laughter followed.

Kaen didn't move.

Didn't flinch.

Only stared straight ahead at the obsidian archway of the Yamato Hall, where the exam would take place.

He'd spent his life being looked down on.

He didn't mind being underestimated.

It made what came next… easier.

One by one, names were called.

Candidates stepped inside.

Some came out minutes later, sweating or crying.

Others — the strong ones — returned in silence, their eyes distant, holding glowing orbs that pulsed with faint color.

Class 1. Class 2. Rarely Class 3.

But none yet higher.

"Kaen, son of Sayari."

The voice echoed.

He stepped forward.

No applause.

No hush of reverence.

Just silence.

And maybe — just maybe — a flicker of curiosity from those watching.

The guards didn't bother checking his identity.

Why would they? He wasn't worth impersonating.

Inside, the hall was colder than outside.

Ancient. Smooth. Walls lined with golden runes that shimmered under torchlight.

At the center of the chamber stood the Blood Pool — a sacred basin carved from dragonbone, its waters still and black, like liquid glass.

Behind it stood High Examiner Renshu — a man with silver eyes and a face like folded steel.

He gestured silently.

Kaen stepped forward.

Renshu handed him a dagger — ritualistic, with a curved blade and bone hilt.

"You bleed into the pool," he said. "If you lie about your name, you die. If you lack Māna, you faint. If your blood burns—"

He didn't finish.

He didn't need to.

Kaen took the blade.

Cut across his palm.

Let the blood fall.

Drip.

Then silence.

The surface of the pool shimmered.

And then it screamed.

Not a sound.

A force.

The blood ignited — not red, but white-hot like a sunbeam through a furnace.

The pool churned, then exploded upward in a pillar of flame that struck the ceiling and carved a sigil into the stone — one none had seen in over a century.

Renshu stepped back.

Eyes wide.

Then whispered: "Class… Five."

Outside, birds scattered.

Inside, the hall shook.

Kaen blinked, hand still bleeding.

The fire coiled above him — not consuming, but dancing.

Alive.

Waiting.

The runes on the wall began to hum.

And Renshu dropped to one knee.

Not in worship.

In fear.

Kaen looked at his hand.

At the blood.

It still burned white.

Ash and flame.

As if something ancient was waking up inside him.

In the courtyard, nobles gasped.

Commoners stared.

And somewhere, high in the towers of the capital, a mirror cracked.

The test was over.

And Kaen was no longer invisible.

"You cheated."

The voice was sharp, trembling, full of venom.

Kaen barely turned his head.

The noble boy from earlier — the one with jade cuffs — stood rigid, face red, fists shaking.

"You used some forbidden charm. A cursed relic. No one from the slums gets Class Five!"

Kaen didn't answer.

He just looked at him.

And that was enough.

The boy flinched, stepped back, and vanished into the crowd.

They didn't know what to do with him.

The examiners whispered. The judges argued behind closed doors. One mage fainted when they saw the burned glyph still hovering above the pool.

No one knew what his symbol meant.

Only that it hadn't appeared since the War of Shattered Thrones — two hundred years ago.

By sunset, a decision was made.

Kaen would be placed in the Academy.
The village of Tsukiba nestled between terraced rice fields and whispering bamboo groves. Vendors called out with melodic chants, selling sweet plum dumplings and lacquered charms carved from moonwood. Children danced through temple smoke, laughing beneath prayer flags.

In the Hall of Trials, students gathered for elemental rehearsals. Flames danced above palms, frost wove itself into shapes, and earthen pillars rose at the wave of a hand. Not all spells succeeded — some fizzled, others exploded — but every failure was met with stubborn resolve or muffled laughter.

One night, Kaen sat beside the reflecting pool behind the dormitories, its surface rippling with mana-touched moonlight. Silas dropped beside him without a word, tossing a pebble into the water. 'Do you think we’ll survive the Trials?' he asked. Kaen didn’t answer at first. 'We have to,' he finally said. 'Because if we don’t... someone worse will.'

The Academy was a sprawling fortress of arcane ambition. Perched high above the rest of the capital, it overlooked the city like a silent judge. Its halls were vast and cold, filled with the hum of Mana and the scent of old parchment. Towers jutted into the clouds, each one home to a different discipline—fire, wind, shadow, and thought.
Among the students, not all wielded mana like warriors. Some whispered over scrolls late into the night, while others crafted mechanical familiars or composed hymns to forgotten spirits. The academy pulsed with more than power — it breathed potential.

The lecture chamber was a domed sanctum lit by floating lanterns. Instructor Myrr recited incantations in three languages while illustrating runic patterns in the air. Kaen found himself drifting between fascination and fatigue, noting how even prodigies struggled to keep up when ancient magic whispered in unfamiliar tongues.

Examination week at the academy turned the halls into battlegrounds of nerves and determination. Kaen watched a first-year burst into tears after his spell shattered a statue instead of casting light. Lira knelt beside the boy, whispering something no one else heard. The next day, he returned—shaking, but resolute. Not all victories were loud.

Not as a student of noble blood, but as an exceptional case.

An anomaly.

They used a dozen euphemisms.

But Kaen knew what it meant.

They feared him.

When he returned to the shack that night, Sayari was waiting with a bottle of rice wine and silence.

She didn't ask what happened.

She already knew.

Kaen dropped the small token they gave him — a crystal badge etched with the words "Class Five - Validated" — onto the floor between them.

Sayari didn't pick it up.

Instead, she walked to the wooden chest by the wall and opened it.

Inside, wrapped in faded cloth, was a sword.

"I said I'd never show you this," she said.

Kaen stared.

The weapon was long, curved like a fang, its metal dark but shimmering faintly with blue and silver veins. Ancient elven script ran along the flat of the blade.

"What is it?"

"A gift," Sayari said. "From someone long gone."

She handed it to him.

[Kaen's Thought] Kaen felt the weight. It wasn't heavy — but it wasn't light either.

It felt… right.

"Is it magical?"

"Not anymore," Sayari said. "It burned its soul out a long time ago."

He stared at the blade.

And it stared back.

In the metal, he saw something.

Not his reflection.

Not exactly.

It was him — but older.

Fierce.

Burning.

Alone.

He looked up. "Why now?"

Sayari leaned against the doorway, eyes distant.

"Because you passed the threshold," she said. "And they're going to come for you."

"Who?"

"Everyone."

Kaen gripped the sword tighter.

The metal felt warm in his hand.

That night, he lay awake on the rooftop, watching the stars blink between cracks in the clouds.

His hand rested on the blade beside him.

And though the city still whispered of politics and rankings and power, Kaen heard only one thing:

They saw me now.

They couldn't unsee me.

Far above, in a high spire lit with floating lanterns, a cloaked figure watched a crystal orb pulse with Kaen's sigil.

The flame.

The dragon.

The mark of the Forbidden Line.

"So… the bloodline lived."

The gates of the Tenryu Academy of Arcane Arts were taller than any temple Kaen had ever seen.
The tavern 'Ash & Ember' glowed with warmth and soot. Old hunters told tales to wide-eyed novices, and once a week, a blind bard played a zither woven with silver flame-strands, singing of the first flameborn and the gods who envied them.

Ivory and obsidian, laced with vines of glowing sapphire.

Runes danced along the arch — alive, watching, whispering.

The kind of place built not to welcome… but to intimidate.

And it worked.

Even [Kaen's Thought] Kaen hesitated.

"Kaen of Class Five," the guard intoned as he opened the gate. "Proceed."

No fanfare.

Just the heavy groan of enchanted metal and a hundred eyes waiting behind it.

The courtyard was full.

Nobles. Heirs. Descendants of warlords and ancient clans — dressed in silk, gold, and arrogance.

He walked through them like oil through water.

Every step echoed.

Every stare pierced.

"That's him."

"From the slums?"

"I heard his blood caught fire."

"They say he's not even human."

Kaen didn't respond.

He kept walking — until he reached the center of the courtyard where the new students stood in rows.

He took his place.

A voice rang out from the balcony above.

It was old and cold and sharp as polished stone.

"Silence."

They obeyed.

A man stepped forward — tall, armored in robes of midnight and silver, with a sword-shaped scar over his left eye.

Master Hiroshi of the Moonblade.

Master Vael leaned against the obsidian column, arms folded. 'Power isn't what defines you, Kaen,' he said, voice like cracked stone. 'It's what you do when no one's watching. When the fire grows quiet. That’s when the truth of your flame shows.'

Kaen hesitated. 'But what if I lose control again?'

'Then lose it knowing why you fight. Not every blaze has to burn everything down.'

"Welcome to Tenryu. Here, we forge more than mages — we forge heirs, commanders, legends."

He let the words sink in.

"Most of you earned your place through lineage and loyalty."

Then he turned — slowly, deliberately — and looked directly at Kaen.

"And some… arrived by fire."

Silence.

Tension.

Kaen held his gaze.

And didn't blink.

"Let us hope the fire doesn't consume you," Hiroshi said.

Then turned away.

The rest of the ceremony passed in a blur of names and titles Kaen didn't care about.

But one thing stuck.

A girl, two rows behind him, whispered to another:

"Did you see how he looked at Master Hiroshi? Like he wasn't afraid."

"And?"

"Master Hiroshi served in the war against the Demon Queen. He was there… when her castle burned."

"…So?"

"He's the one who killed her."

Kaen's stomach turned.

He didn't know why.

Just that something shifted inside him.

Like a rope pulled tight across the years.

Later, in his assigned quarters — cold, stone, nothing like the rich dorms of the nobles — Kaen sat on the edge of his cot, staring at the blade Sayari gave him.

His hand hovered over it.

Still warm.

Still waiting.

A knock.

He opened the door.

And saw a boy with short silver hair, green eyes, and a smile that didn't reach his gaze.

"I'm Reijuu," the boy said, extending a hand.

Whenever flames lit the sky, Reijuu’s eyes flicked toward them with the twitch of someone who remembered fire too closely.

He had once confessed in passing that fire reminded him of the village he'd lost — and the screams that refused to fade.

Reijuu, poised and cold like steel before a duel, moved with calculated efficiency. He was tall, immaculate, with silver-trimmed robes that never bore dust. His discipline was legend, but so was the storm he kept buried under layers of honor and expectation. To him, Kaen was both a threat and a mirror he refused to accept.

"Your roommate."

Kaen said nothing.

Just stared.

Reijuu grinned wider. "Don't worry. I'm not here to make friends."

He dropped his satchel on the second cot and looked back.

"But you should know something."

Kaen raised an eyebrow.

Reijuu's voice lowered.

"You shouldn't be here. Not because of your blood. But because some of us know what it really means."

Then he turned, laid back, and closed his eyes.

As if the conversation never happened.

Kaen stood in the doorway for a long time, watching him.

Then closed the door.

And locked it.

The Garden of Whispers was not a real garden.

It was a courtyard between two towers, overgrown with ivy and perfumed by floating lanterns filled with illusionary blossoms — fake petals designed to fool commoners into thinking beauty could be bought.

But Kaen wasn't fooled.

Not anymore.

He sat on a bench near the edge of the platform, looking down at the academy walls below.

One misstep, and you'd fall into the chasm.

Sometimes he wondered if that was the point.

Behind him, footsteps.

Light. Careful.

Not afraid — but alert.

He turned.

And saw her.

She had raven-black hair tied with a silver pin shaped like a crescent moon, eyes as sharp as obsidian, and a cloak the color of frost.

Meika Setzu.

Meika sat beneath the library’s oldest tree, ink-stained hands trembling slightly as she folded a worn piece of parchment. No one knew she still wrote letters to a brother who would never answer.

‘Dear Arin,

I watched Kaen again today. He doesn’t notice how the others stare at him—not like I do. He walks like he’s carrying something heavy, and not just swords or spells. Like the world placed a hand on his shoulder and never lifted it.’

Her pen paused.

‘Sometimes I hate how curious I am. About him. About what I feel. You always said I'd fall for someone who made me angry first.’

She exhaled. The ink bled slightly into the paper as her mana pulse flickered.

‘Do you remember the fire at Eloran Gate? I still do. You dragged me out of the smoke. I wish I had your courage now. Or at least your honesty.’

A rustle of footsteps interrupted her thoughts. Kaen. He didn’t speak. Just looked at her, brow slightly raised.

“It’s nothing,” she mumbled, stuffing the letter into her coat.

He didn’t pry. Just nodded. But his eyes lingered a second too long.

After he left, Meika whispered to the breeze, ‘I’m still here, Arin. Even if no one remembers your name, I’ll carry it.’

Kaen sat in the dim library chamber, the scent of parchment and old flame thick in the air. Tomes lined the high walls, but one book lay open before him — ancient, bound in cracked leather, edges singed by time.

Master Selian, the half-blind historian of the Academy, stood beside him. ‘You search for fire in your veins, boy,’ he said, voice like paper folding. ‘But have you read the words of the First Flame?’

He pointed to a passage, faded but alive:
“Enjin, the Flame Unending, was not born — he was struck into being, like flint to stone. His breath lit the stars, his tears boiled oceans. He did not rule. He remembered.”

Kaen traced the letters, their script unlike modern runeforms. ‘Remembered?’

Selian nodded. ‘The gods were not lords. They were echoes — of emotions vast enough to shape mountains. Enjin was pain. Longing. Rebirth.’

Another page detailed the Sisters of Ash, who danced in silence around Enjin’s pyre. And another spoke of Tsurai, goddess of the Moon’s Blood, who wept into obsidian springs.

‘All myth?’ Kaen asked.

Selian closed the tome. ‘All memory. Some older than language. Some written in flame.’

Kaen looked into the hearth’s dying coals. And for a breath, the fire blinked — as if remembering him, too.

She still wore her brother’s old bracer — scratched and dulled, but polished where her fingers clutched it in silence.

Meika never mentioned her family, but in her silence there were echoes — of someone she had once sworn to protect, and couldn't.

Meika, spirited and blunt, hid her fears behind defiance. She had sunlit hair cropped short and a scowl that rarely left her lips, but behind the thorns was a loyal heart that beat fiercely for those she trusted. Quick with words and quicker with blades, she challenged everything: rules, authority, and most of all—Kaen’s walls.

Or as the nobles called her: the half-blood heir of House Setzu.

Rumor said her mother was a full-blooded noble, her father a war-captain from the borderlands.

Rumor said she never smiled.

Rumor didn't know anything.

"You're the one with the fire," she said, stopping a few paces away.

"You gonna throw a rock or a compliment?"

She didn't flinch.

Didn't blink.

Instead, she sat on the bench beside him — not too close, not too far.

"I watched your test," she said.

"Of course you did," Kaen muttered. "Everyone did."

"No. I mean I watched."

"What did you see?"

She leaned in slightly, voice lower.

"I saw a boy pretending he wasn't scared. And a flame that didn't come from him."

Kaen stiffened.

But Meika didn't press.

Instead, she leaned back and looked up at the false blossoms floating in the lanterns.

"They only bloom for those who lie," she said.

Kaen frowned. "What?"

"These flowers. They're enchanted to react to deception. You know how many bloom when the Council meets here?"

He looked around.

Dozens.

Too many.

"So why are you here?" Kaen asked.

Meika turned to him again. "Because I don't trust liars."

"Then you're in the wrong place."

She smiled — just barely. "Exactly."

Silence stretched between them.

Not awkward.

Not tense.

Just… honest.

Then Meika stood.

"If you ever want the truth about what burned in that pool — find me after midnight, near the Hall of the First Flame."

She walked away before he could answer.

Kaen watched her go.

Then looked back at the false flowers.

A single one — just one — had turned black near where she sat.

That night, in the shadows of the elite dining hall, Reijuu spoke to three others.

All wore noble rings.

All had seen Kaen's test.

And all hated what it meant.

"He's not one of us," Reijuu said, sipping wine.

"He's more dangerous than that," muttered another. "He doesn't even want to be."

They raised their glasses.

And toasted not to Kaen's success.

But to his inevitable fall.

The Academy slept.

Even the wind seemed to tread carefully between its towers, brushing against the runes like a thief afraid of waking the ghosts.

Kaen moved silently through the eastern wing, past locked doors and enchanted windows, toward the place Meika had mentioned.

The Hall of the First Flame.

A forbidden wing.

Abandoned after the war.

They said it once held a relic so powerful it burned through the minds of three archmages.

They also said the floor itself was cursed — cracked open by the last wielder of the Flameborn name.

Kaen wasn't sure what he believed anymore.

Only that something inside him kept pulling him forward.

He reached the door.

Old. Scorched. Marked with glyphs in a language older than common elvish.

It opened before he touched it.

A whisper. A sigh.

An invitation.

Inside was darkness.

Not empty darkness — but a kind that felt… aware.

And the flame that shapes as much as it scorches answered.

It wasn't light.

Not yet.

It was memory.

Suddenly, he was somewhere else.

The world was on fire.

A battlefield, ancient and blood-drenched. Ash covered the sky like snow. Black banners twisted in the wind.

And at the center…

A man.

No, not a man.

A being wreathed in flame, with eyes like molten suns and a blade carved from starlight and bone.

He moved like a god.

Cutting down demons with every breath.

Roaring, bleeding, unstoppable.

And in that instant — as Kaen watched through his own eyes and yet not his own body — he knew:

This was no dream.

This was Kaen's blood remembering.

He saw the demon queen fall.

Saw the army kneel.

Saw the traitors smile as the blade pierced the god's heart.

And he felt the final breath.

The sealing of the flame that shapes as much as it scorches.

The last whisper of a name—

"Raien…"

Kaen woke on the floor of the Hall.

Gasping.

Sweating.

The stone beneath him was scorched — shaped in the exact same symbol that burned in the pool during his test.

He stood.

And for a moment — just one — he saw her.

A shadow in the hall.

Cloaked. Tall. Watching.

Not Meika.

Not Sayari.

Something else.

Before he could speak, the figure turned.

And vanished.

In his hand, he felt heat.

Looking down, he saw his fingers were glowing faintly.

The veins under his skin pulsed like embers that remembered the pain and forged the will.

And in the silence of the night, a voice echoed in his mind.

"You are not the first."

"But you may be the last."

Kaen didn't sleep that night.

He didn't return to his room.

He walked the empty courtyard until dawn.

Sword on his back.

Fire in his blood.

And the past — not his past — burning behind his eyes.