Despite the suffocation he always felt under the looming spires of the cathedral, Mattheos threw himself into the ring of golden sand with a desperate need to prove himself. The shame of failure, the weight of his family’s expectations, and the persistent echo of his terror from the arena clung to him like a second skin. He had imagined that joining the training unit would be a way to rebuild his confidence, to wield his sword with purpose once more but the sharpened edge of disciple proved far more merciless than any imagined test.

  He stood in the cramped space, wrapping fresh bandages around his bruised arm with precision. His eyes were devoid of any light, a dull garnet, and his mind was a whirlpool of everything he could think of.

  His family had demanded him to win, but what would he have received if he won the Trials?

  If he had managed to defeat Sol, would he have faced that abyssal-wraith that wept beneath the arena?

  Would he have won… or—

  Mattheos shook his head trying to erase the coming thoughts. A futile attempt after everything he had tried to distract himself.

  In the room trudged the old Sir Kael, a broad-shouldered veteran with a weathered face that held faint scars from battles Mattheos couldn’t yet imagine. One slice down his eye, the other across his cheek, but he remained driven to destroy even at his age.

  Mattheos had known this man since he had been a child, vividly recalling how he looked up to him. The man who swung his massive blade rather casually but with great accuracy (as if it was one with him), the kind of ease that came only from years of facing true horrors and endless amounts of training.

  Further away he could spot Sir Ameryn, an ash-haired veteran known for both his cold gaze and his dry humor, kept an eye on the rookies, offering terse instructions and occasional sharp corrections. Another veteran, Lady Nanna, moved with a grace, her twin, curving blades were the length of her arms, glinting under the light.

  "Mattheos," Kael’s voice was softer than the young knight expected, gravelly but with a hint of warmth. The kind of warmth he wished he could receive from his family. Mattheos frowned to himself.

  "You’re wound too tight. I can hear your heart from here." Kael continued with a smile.

  It's not that… He could say; he thought of saying.

  "I… I’m just—making sure I’m ready." Mattheos blinked, startled, his grip tightening on his arm. He joined them as soon as he was discharged from the medical wards.

  His efficiency now allowed him to join a better unit than the rookies he had been with. The Trials had benefited his status, despite him not winning.

  "Ready?" Kael chuckled low in his chest, a sound that reminded Mattheos of the hearth fires back home rather than the battlefield. "No one is ever ready their first time, but you’ve no need to be afraid for the Sun will light your path."

  Mattheos nodded quickly, though his throat was tight.

  "I… I’ll do my best, sir."

  "There’s no need to be so formal, child." Kael sent him a fatherly smile, with a pat on his shoulder. "I understand you worry with your family’s expectations and all, but trust me, don’t let the weight drag you down. Trust your brothers, trust your training, and trust the Sun. The rest will come."

  "I... I am just afraid of holding everyone back, slowing everyone down, with my indecisiveness..."

  "You won't hold anyone back, just as you never did," Kael said easily. "And if you do, we will slow down with you. That's how it works, afterall." That's how family works.

  His words were kind, making the boy's heart ache at the kindness that had become so unfamiliar, and before Mattheos could respond to it, a sharp voice rang out. It was a command over the murmurs in the room.

  "We’ve been summoned!" Loras, the youngest of the squires, called, pointing toward the cathedral walls. "Abyssal wraiths have breached the barrier by the outskirts, near the docks."

  "Form up! We know what waits in the shadows. Keep your line, and follow your training!" Sir Kael’s voice boomed over the clamor, then he turned to Mattheos with a nod one last time.

  The boy responded with fire in his eyes, and stood up immediately alongside the rest. Mattheos felt the surge of adrenaline mix with his fear creating a chaotic rhythm in his chest. He watched as the knights fell into formation, showing a sewed patchwork of experience and some inexperience. Armors clanged with quick movements, white robes fluttered, golden crests gleamed and hooves struck the stone in unison as they rode towards the darkened alleys behind the cathedral walls. There the whispers of wraiths promised death and corruption, and beaconed them closer.

  As they neared the barrier at the edge of Solthar, the air grew colder, as if the night itself was pressing down onto them. Mattheos was unsure if it was the weather or maybe, his fear, but the abyss could smell their fear. That thought sent a shudder down his spine.

  Shadows twisted unnaturally along the walls of deserted buildings, and the first signs of the abyssal threat loomed ahead. The rookie knights gripped the reigns tighter, and some held their weapons higher. Mattheos tightened his grip on the great-sword, glancing at his companions as some were pale with fear, others grim and silent. All bound by duty to protect.

  Kael’s robes fluttered in the night wind as he lead them forward, ready to take down what was ahead of them.

  Loras’ eyes widened at the first wraiths’ shapes, and the veterans’ calm masks barely concealed their readiness. Sir Kael yelled an order, and the unit surged forward, armor and weapons catching the faint moonlight, blades aimed at the darkness that waited hungrily for them.

  Mattheos rushed forward alongside them with his heart pounding against his ribs, knowing that tonight, survival alone would be the measure of strength with his fear taking over his mind. He told himself he was only doing his duty. That was a white lie. He wanted to prove, to himself, to anyone, that he wasn’t afraid.

  Afraid of what he had seen in that arena.

  But the air was tonight tonight, pulled against something unspoken, and his breathe constricted.

  Not again. Not again.

  Memories came unbidden of the towering abyssal wraith that had torn through the arena that day. He had been frozen, useless, watching as his sword hung heavy in his hands. He had been paralyzed then, as he met the abyssal creature that could easily control every person present in that airship hangar.

  But that boy fought it all alone. A proof of his undying flames that Mattheos was ordered to put out. Was slaying Sol in the Trials truly declared by the Sun?

  In the clash of tendrils and blades, the shadow of the smaller wraith slipped through knights, and lurched forward and right at him. It rushed towards the stench of fear. And tar limbs shot forward, Mattheos stumbled back immediately, clutching his great-sword, but his fingers cramped up, he nearly dropped it.

  His mind screamed at him to run. To hide.

  The shadow’s head split open into a vertical grin as it tasted the air, teeth like nails hammered into rotting wood. A voice scraped into his skull, overlapping whispers that knew him better than he wanted to admit:

  "You remember the last time? How you lost to a weakling? So why lift your blade now?"

  His breath came ragged, chest heaving. The sword felt impossibly heavy. He could see it again. the towering abyssal beast, the moment he had faltered, the way his legs had refused to move. The stench of burning flesh. The chant across the arena.

  "Stop it…" Gripping his temple, Mattheos begged to the abyss. But the abyss was not kind, and the shadow lunged.

  Instinct roared louder than fear in that moment as Mattheos swung his blade up in a desperate arc. The gleaming steel screamed against tar as it caught the rushing darkness, splitting it like cloth. The creature shrieked at the slice of the blessed blade, and scurried back.

  Mattheos saw his own face reflected in its glinting surface beneath the moonlight that slipped through the clouds.

  He raised the sword high, the memory of his terror still clawing at his chest. And the entity lunged again, vertical jaw unhinging wider than its body. Mattheos didn't waste a breath as he brought the blade down in a single, perfect cut.

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  The shadow convulsed, folding inward on itself as though dragged into an unseen pit converging with the bigger body that loomed behind smaller wraiths. Its scream echoed inside his skull long after it had gone silent.

  Mattheos stood panting, sword still raised, the edge now gleaming with nothing but moonlight. His fear had not left. It still trembled in his bones, rattled behind his teeth, but he had struck it anyway. Slowly, he lowered the blade, wiping cold sweat from his brow, but the battle was not over. And so, he dashed into the fray again.

  Mattheos swung, the steel of his blade ripping against the intangible, writhing shadows. Each strike met resistance and then nothingness, the limbs tore like snapping threads one after another.

  The abyss wraith that loomed behind, raised its many limbs, each thicker than an arm and they leaped everywhere.

  A scream tore through the night. One of his companions, a boy not much older than Mattheos, was swallowed whole. Black tendrils wrapped around him, pulling him to the ground. Mattheos could only watch as the light left his eyes and his body charred, rotting in place as if the earth itself had rejected him from existing within. The abyss had consumed the man he once knew only to leave behind nothingness, growing stronger as it took more of their companions down, consuming them as well.

  He hadn’t expected his first dispatch to be so horrifying.

  Did this always happen every time they dispatched?

  "Is this always this… strong?" He gasped under his breath, voice a crackling fire. Mattheos swung his blade slashing each tendril that came for him, ripping through the chill air.

  "No!" Sir Ameryn yelled back, cutting down a shadow that aimed for him. His face was pale beneath the sudden blood-smeared light. "They shouldn’t be this strong! Fall back!"

  Nanna slashed clean through another apparition, her twin blades humming with sun's light. She spared only a heartbeat to speak. "The wards were supposed to hold them at bay, and the barrier should have weakened them since it was clearly unable to stop them... Something’s driving them to be stronger than before. How odd is that."

  "Help!" Another voice cried.

  Mattheos turned just in time to see a man he’d trained alongside collapse, convulsing, smoke rising from his chest as he tried to scream. The ground beneath them was slick with ash and black ichor. Mattheos stumbled, barely keeping his footing. The shadows were everywhere now, closer than before, whispering what would weaken him from within.

  "You will fail… just as you did before…"

  "Hold the line!" one of the veteran knights barked as Sir Kael ripped through all the tendrils, taking down a bigger beast of night with his flaming blade. His form was seamless, not a single strike wasted, and Mattheos watched in awe as the cloak fluttered in the wind. The man had not faltered, showing the drive of a leader in dire times. He swung his gleaming blade with perfect precision, wasting no move.

  Mattheos' gaze then feel upon the bodies of his companions strewn across the battlefield, half-rotted and still smoking, their faces twisted in fear and agony. Every instinct screamed at him to run, to drop his sword, to give in, but he couldn’t.

  He was the last line, and even if he died, he had to hold on. That was the duty of a knight, but this?

  This was slaughter beneath moonlight.

  "Stay firm, boy! The Sun still shines on our path!"

  There was no sun.

  "Then why does it feel like we’re losing!?" Mattheos angrily asked as he weakly parried the next strike. The frustration surged through him, replacing fear he had felt moments ago, just for a moment.

  Kael’s smile flickered, before he turned his gaze on the writhing tide. "…Because we are. This isn’t a breach, it’s a hunt and we are prey."

  Mattheos faltered, staggered a step as his arms gave under the weight of his sword. In that heartbeat, a tendril, so jagged and slick with scorching abyssal flames, lunged straight for him. He was seconds late to parry, dodge, or even slice it away.

  The sharpened edge dove to his heart. In that moment, his armor felt useless as the heat of abyssal energy surged through his body for they were here within the heart of it all. The tip of his boot dipped into abyssal tar. There was no ground beneath him.

  Memories surged through his mind, and this was his first and last dispatch. He accepted it in his heart.

  But Kael was there first, blade glimmering with flames as if a Sun itself had descended on earth.

  The shadow-limb tore through his body, bursting from his back in a spray of blood with a wet squelch, and the man winced. The scarlet of fresh, warmth dripped onto Mattheos white armor, his cloak, and his skin.

  "NO!" Mattheos’ raw and desperate scream ripped from his throat. His sword almost slipped from his fingers, ready to clatter uselessly onto the stone, but he gripped it, eyes flaming. He stepped besides the man, slicing the tendril than had pierced Kael.

  Shadows rippled everywhere, and the wraith howled in anger.

  With his free arm, Kael raised his own blade and bellowed a wordless cry. Light burst from him, searing and orange. The mark of the Sun flared across his chest, burning back the abyss. The apparition shrieked as Kael’s swing cleaved through its hide, reducing the writhing darkness to ribbons of ash that scattered on the air.

  Nanna's twin blades, and Ameryn's spear struck the core of the abyss with equal fierceness, incinerating it to ashes.

  The battlefield paused around them in stunned silence. Then Kael staggered as the corruption spread across his chest like wildfire, veins blackening beneath the skin around his neck.

  Mattheos caught him as he fell to one knee, clutching desperately at his mentor’s bloodied frame. "No, no, no, you can’t— Sir Kael, stay with me! Please, stay with me!"

  Kael’s hand, heavy and trembling, found the boy’s cheek. His voice rasped, but he smiled through the blood. "I am… alright."

  The lie was gentle, meant only for Mattheos.

  Nanna knelt beside him, examining the wound with sharp eyes and a hint of worry. A line of priests swept in from behind, in unison with their torches spitting the holy flame to banish corruption. One knelt immediately beside Kael, brandishing a relic of the Sun, its glow staving off the corruption just enough to halt its march.

  "May the Sun’s flame preserve him," the priest intoned, pressing the relic to Kael’s chest.

  Kael exhaled, his smile faint but steady as he looked once more at Mattheos. "See, boy? The Sun keeps its promise."

  The night stretched long, and yet, amid the horror, the veteran knights broke through, and they emerged with something barely considered a victory.

  "The abyss alone could not do this… something else is seeding the corruption." One of the younger priests whispered as he helped the wounded.

  Sir Ameryn snapped his gaze towards him, "Quiet. Not here."

  Mattheos watched as the people took Sir Kael to seek medical aid, and his eyes gaze towards the dense clouds parting to reveal the crescent moon. He took that time to stay and ponder.

  If this is what awaits me, how can I take the oath? But the wind could not answer to him, so he remained rooted, lost and confused.

  An unfamiliar voice broke the silence.

  "So," drawled a hooded figure, stepping out from where the abandoned building blocked the light, his robes swaying in the night breeze. His expression was unreadable, but his eyes glittered with the sharpness of a hawk beneath the white hood. "You finally decided to lift that sword instead of stare at it."

  Mattheos stiffened, shame heating his cheeks. He hadn’t even realized someone was watching.

  "I—"

  "You are summoned to the Cathedral," the man stated, and the boy blinked in realization. His uncle must've asked for him, he hadn't met him since he lost the Trials that day. Busying himself with fighting alongside other knights, and slaying wraith— or abyssfilths as they called them.

  "Lord Veranth," the Sun's disciple spoke of a familiar name that belonged to Mattheos uncle, clearing all his doubts, "has requested you there. For, it is… time you face what you have avoided. Your training, your duty, and perhaps… yourself."

  Those words repeated in his head as Mattheos’ boots clattered over the wide stone steps leading to the Cathedral. The streets leading to the Cathedral were alive with the murmurs of the festival, though the voices seemed distant to Mattheos, swallowed by the weight in his chest. Lanterns hung from iron hooks, swinging slightly in the summer breeze, casting wavering pools of gold onto the cobblestones. The night air gave way to cold marble of the building.

  Priests in ceremonial robes moved with deliberate steps, chanting in low, sonorous tones that threaded through the night air like a thread of silk tightening around the city’s heart. Each motion was precise, every word of the chants carefully measured to sustain the balance between divine power and mortal control. The air was thick with incense and a subtle charge, as if the atmosphere itself was responding to the invisible pull of something paranormal.

  He hesitated at the threshold where the hallway ended, the weight of his thoughts burdening his shoulders, ceasing his movements.

  A deep voice echoed from afar, "Mattheos." like a hammer striking stone upon judgment that was cast and he froze.

  Draped in the ceremonial robes in his study was Lord Veranth with eyes like gleaming, hardened steel. His posture was rigid, hands clasped behind his back, every movement perfected, trained by years of practice, and none that would give away any hidden meanings.

  "Uncle…" Mattheos began, unsure whether to bow silently or speak. He chose to speak.

  "Rise," the man commanded. "You stand before me not just as my nephew, but as the heir to your family’s honor. It demands action, discipline, and service to the order of Knights."

  Mattheos attempted to form an excuse but he was immediately stopped.

  "You have delayed enough, boy. First, you lose to that heretic, then you flee your duties."

  Mattheos swallowed hard at the words.

  "Strength is forged in battles, victories, not coddled in fear."

  Mattheos flinched, shame and anger clashing in his chest. "I… I’m not…" He reasoned.

  "You will not shame this family." The lord’s voice cut through the hall, echoing off marble and shadowy corners. "You will take your place among the Knights. You will learn to fight, to lead, and to bear what others cannot." You will take the oath. Was unspoken.

  Mattheos lowered his gaze, heart hammering. Every instinct screamed against it, from the memories of fallen comrades, the abyssal wraiths, the fear that had nearly killed him, but the weight of expectation pressed heavier than it had before. So, he swallowed again, voice barely a whisper as he answered, "Yes… Lord Veranth."

  He fell beneath the weight of the orders.

  But below the marble floors, in the air was different. Here, hidden from the eyes of the city, the Church’s most devoted and fearless moved with careful reverence. An energy pulsed faintly in the dim light beneath the Hall of Silence. Only a select few had permission to enter; every step through the tunnels carried the preserved history of the centuries of observation and countless warnings to remain vary and quite. Silent.

  A low murmur of prayers and incantations echoed through the chamber as the priests circled a scarlet orb, offering small chants to stabilize, to purify the corruption.

  Mattheos could feel the tension even from the upper levels despite not hearing anything that could arise suspicion in him.

  The Cathedral’s bells tolled the late hour. It's sudden resonance vibrating through his chest. He knew, without ever seeing or hearing it, that somewhere beneath the foundation of the Cathedral, a power slept, something that could twist reality itself in the shadows beneath the city he called home.