/> Lore Fragment – The Eradication War,
Volume III – Archivist Delnar
"At the height of the war, the heavens wept blood. The demons, outnumbered and desperate, unleashed the Curse of Undying Hunger—what we now call vampirism. The angels, in their divine fury, wiped them all out. Or so the world believed…"
-Recorded 49 years ago, from the halls of Kirelmon Library
---
The Forest of Beasts didn't welcome visitors.
Its trees were older than Dust Hill, older than the cities beyond. They loomed overhead like watchful sentinels, their roots thick enough to trip carriages and swallow wolves whole. Fog never left the underbrush. Even the wind moved slower here.
Kael felt it immediately: the pressure, like he was walking into a deep ocean. Every step pressed into the earth like it mattered.
The poachers didn't notice. They stomped through the leaves with the arrogance of men who had done this a hundred times. They laughed. They joked. They spit.
Kael watched them, silently memorizing their movements.
They didn't offer him a name.
So he didn't give his either.
He carried the satchel tightly across his chest, clutching the Memoirs of a Forgotten Blade as if it were armor. The stolen dagger stayed in his sleeve, its rusted handle itching against his skin.
---
"Tell me something, runt," one of the men asked, his voice thick with boredom. "Why'd you really follow us?"
Kael didn't look up. "To become an adventurer."
The man scoffed. "There's a dozen better ways to die."
"I don't want to just fight beasts. I want to be the next name people remember. Like him." Kael tapped the book through his satchel.
The poacher snorted. "The Nameless Hero? That bastard's just a bedtime story."
Kael didn't argue. He'd learned when to stay quiet. He just watched the fog shift through the trees and noticed something strange.
For a moment, he swore he saw shapes moving inside it. Not beasts. Not bandits.
Eyes.
Watching.
---
The group reached an old overgrown shrine by dusk. Moss crept up the stone walls. Carvings of forest gods long forgotten were cracked and bleeding with lichen. The dungeon was hidden beneath it marked by a broken circular plate etched with a serpent eating its tail.
One of the poachers kicked it aside, revealing stone steps leading into blackness.
"We'll do a fast sweep," said the hawk-nosed leader. "Runt, stay at the back. If you fall behind, we leave you."
Kael nodded once.
He'd heard worse threats in the orphanage.
---
The dungeon stank of wet stone and stale blood. It was shallow, maybe only three or four chambers deep, but traps lay everywhere rune-sealed walls, pressure stones, hidden pits. It was meant to be a tomb, not a home.
But things lived here now.
In the second chamber, they encountered a nest of chitin-bats, shrieking abominations with bone-like wings and dagger tongues. The poachers cut them down quickly. One latched onto Kael's arm he stabbed it through the eye, barely suppressing a scream as its blood hissed against his skin.
It burned like acid.
The hawk-nosed leader raised a brow. "Didn't expect you to last this long."
Kael grunted. "Neither did I."
He couldn't explain why, but something felt right. Like his body was sharpening itself bones lighter, eyes clearer. The dungeon's darkness didn't feel so dark anymore.
---
They camped at the shrine's edge after a successful run. Pouches of monster parts and glimmering shards clinked around the fire. Kael sat on a root near the trees, book in lap, rereading the same passage over and over.
One of the younger poachers noticed. "Why are you so obsessed with that hero?"
Kael didn't answer immediately.
Then, softly: "Because he didn't belong anywhere. And yet he changed everything."
A pause.
"I don't even know who my parents were," he admitted. "Sometimes I think maybe... I came from something important. Maybe that's why I can't let go of this."
He didn't realize how honest that sounded until it left his lips.
The poacher shrugged. "You'll probably die before it matters."
Then he laughed and tossed a bone into the fire.
---
That night, Kael dreamt of blood.
He stood at the foot of a mountain of corpses angels and demons alike. Above him, a shadow with his face sat on a throne of ribs. It smiled.
"Find me," it said.
Kael woke in cold sweat.
And realized he wasn't breathing.
---
End of Chapter 2