The walls whispered in mournful breaths.
Stone once sacred now dripped black mist, curling like fingers around forgotten paths. And deep within the Maze of Veilthorn—beneath maps, beneath laws—Kael of the Hollow Rune walked alone.
He did not mourn aloud.He had mourned too much already.
Once, Kael was a scholar—gentle, patient, a glyphsmith of renown. His hands etched memory into stone, deciphered ancient walls, and drew meaning from silence. His life was quiet and full. He had a wife, Rheva, strong-willed and bright, and a daughter, Lina, born beneath a maze miracle during a rare eclipse.
They were his reason for walking the Maze.
Until truth became his crime.
Kael had uncovered records—sacred glyphs buried beneath the eastern towers—revealing that Warden-Chief Va'teer had once sacrificed N'zaari clansmen to the Maze God, in exchange for ageless life. It wasn't myth. It wasn't allegory. It was recorded in blood-glyphs, sealed under ten layers of runic deception.
He brought it to the council.
And they called it treason.
The elders moved fast. Before Kael could speak to more scholars, they summoned a public hearing. With cold voices and twisted smiles, they painted him not as a truth-seeker, but a traitor. They claimed he forged the glyphs—used the ancient tongue of the rival Esari clan to deceive the people. They accused him of secretly serving foreign interests.
"He wishes to break us from within," said Elder Hrom."He seeks to shatter trust and faith in our leaders," added Va'teer, calmly."He is not of us," said the last elder, spitting Kael's name like poison.
Rumors spread like wildfire. His neighbors turned away. The children whispered that he ate secrets and cursed walls. His fellow glyphsmiths denied they ever studied with him.
And then came the sentence.
The council did not jail him. They didn't need to.
They let the clan pass judgment.
His home was burned.His wife and daughter—sealed inside by the enforcers—had no chance.The flames devoured their names.
They called it justice.
He called it the end.
His hands were no longer made for carving stories. They trembled with rage. With loss. And so, Kael walked the deeper veins of the Maze, far past where his clan dared to look. Past forgotten halls, failed trials, places the Tower itself no longer remembered.
And there…He found the Well.
It wasn't shaped by the N'zaari. It wasn't part of any known trial or shrine. The runes around it were foreign—crooked, alive, resisting translation. The mist around it curled differently, almost intelligent, like it knew his pain.
It whispered.
"Yes… this pain. It is beautiful."
A form rose. Shadows woven with flame.Eyes like twin furnaces.A grin sharp enough to split the sky.
Sareth.
A demon of forgotten rank.Banished not for weakness, but for ambition.Not for destroying worlds, but for corrupting hearts.
He did not roar. He whispered.
"You seek revenge. You burn inside, don't you?""But the maze won't help you. Your clan won't save you.""You want justice? No. You want them to suffer."
Kael said nothing. His eyes, bloodshot, stayed on the flame.
"Then kneel," Sareth said. "Pledge your soul. I will make you not a warrior… but a harbinger.""You will be the first messenger of demons in the Tower."
Kael's heart faltered.
"You will carry our flame. You will learn the tongues of ruin, command glyphs of blood, summon the Infernal Word."
"You will found a Church. Not for gods. For us.""No longer will the Tower kneel to divine order. It will fear the voices of hell."
"And the cost?" Kael whispered.
Sareth smiled. "Your soul. And a promise.""That you will spread belief in demons. Convert the desperate. Raise temples in our name.""Do this, and you will have more than revenge. You will have worship."
Kael lowered his head. "I accept."
The pact ignited.
Runes seared into his spine—a clawed eye, wide and watching.His voice twisted. His mind sharpened.He saw visions—black spires rising across realms, crimson-lit sermons, broken souls chanting his name.
[SYSTEM ALERT: DEMONIC CONTRACT FORMED]
[NEW ENTITY: KAEL, FIRST MESSENGER OF THE CHURCH OF FLAME]
[Demonic Magic Unlocked: Whisper Brands, Soulbinding Glyphs, Blood Channeling]
Sareth laughed.
"Your first task," he purred, "is to find the hidden chapel beneath Veilthorn. Corrupt it. Make it the first altar."
Kael rose.
Not a man.
But something else.
A harbinger.
[SCENE SHIFT – N'ZAARI SHRINE]
Far above the forgotten well, in the heart of the clan's sacred sanctum, Warden-Chief Va'teer stood in solemn silence. The shrine was blind to the outer world—sealed by living stone, guarded by glyphs that only answered blood.
Before him loomed the ancient altar of the Maze God.
Not a statue. Not a symbol.
A mirror of veined obsidian that shimmered like a breathing labyrinth.
Va'teer knelt.
"Divine One," he said, voice calm but tight. "He lives."
The mirror darkened.
Flames danced in its reflection—crimson, curling, unnatural. A low sound stirred, neither word nor growl, but somewhere in between.
Va'teer continued. "Kael did not break as we intended. He was found near the Veilthorn's cursed heart… near the forbidden well."
A ripple echoed across the surface.
"He has formed a pact," Va'teer admitted. "Demonic. A Church is beginning to rise. We sense movement. Whispers. Glyphs that do not belong to us."
The mirror pulsed, and the shrine trembled faintly.
Va'teer bowed deeper.
"I acted as you commanded. I twisted the truth, crushed his reputation, and gave the people a traitor to hate. It was clean."
"But now…"
His voice faltered for the first time.
"…he has become something worse. Something that walks outside the bounds of both clan and Tower."
The Divine One finally spoke—not in language, but in sensation. Cold stone. Endless paths. Shifting walls.
"Let him build.""Fire must rise before it can be extinguished.""This Church… will burn. And so too shall those who follow it."
Va'teer exhaled in silent reverence.
"As you will, my master."
He rose slowly, eyes gleaming with newfound resolve.
From the shadows behind him, a silent figure stepped forward—draped in shrinekeeper robes, mask carved in spiral lines.
"Our God started making movements also, Everything is a matter of time," the masked acolyte replied, "until Everything is ready, the floor must not be cleared, and we must recruit the most talented individuals"