NOVEL NEXT Chapter 34: Scars
Albion's boots pounded a barren wasteland where the soft crunch of dead grass had long yielded to shattered, unyielding earth. The twin moons of Avalon—dim, ghostlike sentinels amid a sky scorched by a relentless sun—offered no comfort. Far from the reclaimed ruins of Charlevoix, vibrant forests had faded into a distant, hazy memory, replaced by cracked terrain pulsing with an eerie, almost sentient energy. Deep in his bones, Albion felt that ceaseless buzzing—a hungry, malevolent force stirring in the very air.
Every step toward the Veil of Sirocco—a boundary where reality frayed, and nature's laws twisted into grotesque parodies—etched a dread that seeped into his marrow. The earth throbbed like the wounded heart of an ancient beast, and Albion clung to whispered legends. He knew little of Celeste's ruthless invasion except for the secrets Adele carried. Leaning close amid the swirling chaos, she murmured in a low, urgent tone, "When Winston and I were imprisoned in the dungeons of Camelot, he told me about the Vanguards—the first scouts dispatched by the Empire to test Avalon's purity, to decide if this realm could be cleansed. He warned me that the danger wasn't confined to them, that sometimes the dark chaos of the Empire would manifest in unpredictable forms."
Her words struck him like a shard of ice— ominous, half-veiled, and laced with undeniable truth.
Albion swallowed hard, his grip on the hilt of his sword tightening as he followed her lead into the unknown.
Ahead, the Veil emerged like a rippling mirage—a shifting curtain of silver and shadow where reality itself buckled and reformed. The sun's brilliance dimmed beneath a malignant gloom, and time stretched into a nightmarish tapestry. "Just pass through, right?" Albion muttered, voice edged with disbelief. "In, out, and nothing more."
"In theory," Adele replied with a soft, ironic laugh that carried both defiance and dread. For a fleeting second, a tremor of suppressed fear flickered in her eyes—a silent admission of past encounters that haunted her. "But the Veil twists everything—time, space, even our senses. It's not a simple stroll."
At the threshold, the familiar world dissolved into surreal visions. Silver sands writhed as though possessed; the horizon blurred with feverish, ghostly hues, and reality shuddered under the weight of forbidden magic. Albion hesitated, his mind reeling at the thought that even his trusted steel might falter in such madness. He watched as Adele inhaled deeply and strode forward, her form melting into the silver mist.
The air thickened around him, an oppressive static vibrating through his skin like wet silk before a raging storm. Every step was a battle against uncertain gravity, each breath a struggle against an unseen force. His pulse hammered like a warning drum, echoing through the restless void of the Veil.
"Are you all right?" Adele's distant voice merged with the uncanny hum, barely audible amid the chaos.
"Yeah… just disoriented," Albion managed, blinking against the swirling, fractured light. "This place… it's twisted beyond reason."
"Focus, Albion," she urged softly, her tone steady yet tinged with the weight of memory—a reminder of encounters past that still quickened her heart. "The Veil is almost alive in its chaos. Anchor your mind to something real, or it will twist your thoughts until you're lost in its labyrinth."
Albion pressed his trembling hand to the ancient runes etched along his forearm—a tangible tether to reality even as those symbols pulsed with ghostly energy. Overhead, the sky churned in unsettling hues; the sun and twin moons cast long, distorted shadows over the restless sands, blurring the edges of his vision into oblivion.
Then, without warning, the ground shuddered violently. His grip tightened until his knuckles burned. Scanning the horizon through swirling dust and warped light, he searched for the source of the tremor. All he saw was a maelstrom of undulating sand and the malevolent glow of the Veil.
"Adele…" he began, voice quivering with alarm.
"I feel it too," she replied, eyes narrowing as she peered into the chaotic distance. "Something's coming… something that shouldn't be."
A chill raced down Albion's spine as memories of Winston's grim warnings—tales of enemies born of dark ambition—flickered in his mind. They had battled aberrations of wild magic before, but this felt deliberate, as though the Veil itself had summoned a guardian from its deepest shadows.
Answering that dread, the sand began to twist with purposeful, eerie motion. Vague shapes coalesced—an undulating lump here, a fleeting shadow there—until a figure emerged, towering and malformed. Its body was a shifting mass of coarse, swirling sand, and from within, two faint blue orbs burned with a cold, calculating light.
Albion's breath caught. He drew his sword—a blade heavy with ancient power—and its runes flickered defiantly in the chaotic glow. The metallic edge sang a resolute note in the oppressive silence. Before he could bring the blade to bear, Adele moved like a whisper. She raised her hand, and a bolt of searing arcane energy lashed out, striking the creature squarely in the chest. For a heart-stopping moment, it convulsed, disintegrating into a cascade of shimmering sand that danced in the air before reforming again.
"Great," Albion cursed bitterly, frustration and disbelief mingling in his voice. "It refuses to die."
Adele's eyes narrowed with steely resolve. "This isn't an ordinary enemy," she intoned, her voice low and unwavering. "It births these abominations, these sentinels, as defenses—echoes of the threshold twisted into monstrosities. They aren't meant to be destroyed by steel alone. We must break the binding spell—find the core and shatter it."
"Find the core?" Albion echoed, dread pooling in his gut. "How?"
"Every construct has a nucleus—a singular focus of the magic that birthed it. Look for that one distortion, the flicker that defies the rest," she replied, brooking no argument.
The creature surged forward, its movements fluid and deliberate, as if dancing to a rhythm older than time. Albion swung his sword in a wide, desperate arc, yet his blade passed through the ephemeral haze as though it were mist. Frustration warred with fear as the creature advanced, its form rippling with the untamed power.
Then, in a burst of concentrated magic, Adele unleashed another incantation. Her energy pulsed low and sure, aimed directly at the creature's midsection. For a heartbeat, its form convulsed, and Albion saw it—a pulsing, distorted core flickering like a dying ember deep within the swirling mass. The sight was both mesmerizing and horrific, a shard of ancient life twisted by corrupt magic.
"There!" Albion roared, voice slicing through the chaos. "That's its core!"
Driven by raw adrenaline, he lunged forward. His sword cleaved through the slithering sand, striking the glowing nucleus with brutal precision. A soundless, anguished cry tore from the creature as its dark magic shattered like brittle glass. The abomination collapsed into a trembling heap of quivering sand. In the heavy silence that followed, as the particles settled, Albion swore he saw a tortured face—a fleeting whisper murmuring, "You are not ready…"—before the vision dissolved into the ether.
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For a long, breathless moment, it held its own, as if straining under the chaos. Then, from the swirling mists of the distorted horizon, a new presence emerged—a dark figure coalescing with the inevitability of an ancient curse come to life.
Adele's breath caught—sharp and sudden, a blade drawn across old scars. For a heartbeat, Albion thought she might say something, some name heavy with sorrow, but she only stared at the figure with a grief too raw to be fresh and too deep to be new.
"Adele…" Albion's voice came out raw with trepidation as he raised his sword, eyes straining against the wavering gloom.
Adele's gaze sharpened, and with a single, weighted word laden with warning and familiarity, "Leyva," she whispered—a name buried in curses and war scrolls.
Albion's eyes widened in disbelief. He could barely choke out, "You've got to be shitting me—what are the odds? You mention the Vanguards, and then one shows up? What the hell…" His voice was a raw blend of shock, frustration, and dark humor amid the carnage.
The name shattered the silence—a forbidden word steeped in the grim legacy of the Church's ordained scouts, whose dark mission had been to purify Avalon. Winston recounted how they were destined to lead the Imperial armies under the Pope's iron command, warning that dangers could manifest from that shadowed past. Now, that murmur of prophecy took form before them.
Draped in a tattered cloak that billowed like the wings of a fallen angel, the dark figure emerged from the spiraling sands. His face lay hidden beneath a mantle of impenetrable shadow, yet his hands—blackened, withered, and stained by the ravages of ancient, forbidden magic—made Albion's heart seize with dread. Each twitch of his skeletal fingers corroded the very earth, turning stone into dust.
For a fractured moment, time itself seemed to splinter. The Veil pulsed with malignant energy as Leyva stood waiting. Then, in a voice that carried both menace and a strange echo of that earlier dying cry with his hand raised and head tilting unnaturally, he spoke: "You are not ready…"
His words, a chilling mirror to the creature's final lament, confirmed that the past had come to claim its due.
In that charged silence, the crown he never claimed, ancient curses, and forbidden magic pressed down upon them as it continued its restless, surreal dance around the trio—a final, grim reminder that in Avalon, every step forward carried the echoes of a haunted past.
He'd spent a lifetime running from readiness. The sword. The scars. None of it felt real.
The figure stood motionless amid the shifting sands—a gaping wound in the fabric of Magic. Around him, the air twisted in unnatural spirals, and wherever his blackened fingers brushed the earth, the sand dissolved into nothingness, leaving behind hollow, empty space. Albion felt it deep in his bones—the profound wrongness of this man. This magic wasn't merely alive; it was violent, hungry, and beyond anything he'd ever confronted.
Adele remained frozen, her face pale and lips slightly parted as she stared at the intruder. In her eyes, Albion caught a spark of recognition—a subtle, unspoken memory that went deeper than fear. Whatever or whoever this was, she knew him too well.
Albion's grip on his sword tightened as he fought to steady his racing heart. Manuel Leyva… Vanguard Twelve. The name itself is a harbinger, he thought bitterly. He recalled his mentor's cryptic warnings—stories of elite enforcers twisted by power. Yet the man before him had always been spoken of in hushed, grim tones, a phantom of ancient might and unyielding ambition. I never imagined facing him—this living nightmare incarnate, Albion mused, his thoughts heavy with dread and reluctant curiosity.
The name sent a shiver down Albion's spine. A man consumed by his own power… more dangerous than any mortal could be, he reflected, his thoughts clouded by memories of lost comrades and whispered curses.
Before Albion could press further, the figure moved—a motion so unnatural it seemed as if reality itself had momentarily betrayed its laws. One moment he was still; the next, he advanced silently, magic coiling around him like a living tempest. His head tilted as if studying them, his hollow eyes fixed on the pair.
"Why… are you… here?" His voice emerged as a rough, broken rasp, as though unused in years. He stepped closer, disfigured hand reaching out, and instinctively, Albion staggered back.
Adele held her ground. Her eyes were locked on Manuel, steely with a resolve born of long familiarity with this cursed name. There was no room for negotiation here—Manuel had been lost beneath layers of corrupted power long ago. The chaotic magic around him seemed to tear at his very being.
"We're passing through," Adele said, her tone calm but firm. "We mean you no harm."
"Passing… through…?" Manuel's voice cracked, the word hanging in the air like a bitter question. For a moment, the world slowed. Albion could almost trace the invisible lines of magic coiling around the man, ready to strike at any false movement.
In that silence, Albion's inner voice whispered, This is no ordinary foe. His power is raw, unhinged—a shattered mirror of what we've already witnessed. The dread settled slowly over him, a suffocating certainty that they were teetering on the edge of something far worse than mere hostility.
Adele's mouth opened—and for half a breath, she hesitated. Just a flicker. Her hands curled tighter at her sides, a silent battle against a memory Albion couldn't see, and Albion, blinking through the storm, caught the hesitation—the first crack he'd ever seen in her armor."
Adele continued, eyes never straying. "Yes. We have no quarrel with you, Manny. Let us pass, and we'll be gone."
Manuel's head jerked, as if pulled by unseen strings. His raspy tone came out, "Gone… like… before?" The question was a ghostly echo, a lament for things lost—lives, hopes, or perhaps even remnants of humanity.
For a moment, Albion's heart pounded not just with fear, but with an aching sorrow for all that had been consumed by this relentless force. What does he truly want? Is he a guardian of an ancient curse, or merely a relic of a forgotten era? The questions churned silently in his mind, heavy as the oppressive magic around them.
Before any further words could pass, Manuel's body convulsed with sudden, violent motion. "NO!" he bellowed, his voice shattering the tense silence like a whip. The sands around him exploded into violent spirals, and a wave of cold, destructive magic surged through the ground. His hand shot out, and the very air split apart as if reality had been torn open.
"Get back!" Adele shouted, hurling a shield of shimmering light just as the earth beneath them crumbled into dust. Albion was forced to retreat, stumbling as the pull of dark magic threatened to claim him. He outstretched his arm and the protect spell carved a wall in front of him. He could only watch, heart hammering, as the battle line between order and chaos was drawn in that shattered space.
Once he found his footing, Albion's inner monologue roiled: This isn't just about power—this is about an uncontrollable force. Every instinct screams that he is beyond the realm of conflict. Yet if he reaches Adele… The thought nearly broke him. His sword, once a symbol of certainty, now felt like an extension of his desperate will to protect.
Adele's voice cut through his swirling thoughts. "We have to keep him away from the center of the Veil! His power is feeding off it!" she commanded, eyes burning with determination.
"How do we stop him?" Albion asked, his voice a mix of steel and uncertainty.
"Disrupt his magic—find the core," she replied tersely. "But be careful. His power is unstable."
Unstable… Albion murmured under his breath, almost to himself. It's a familiar refrain, yet this feels different—a chaotic storm with no center, except for that elusive core hidden within his being.
Leyva surged forward again, his form flickering like a broken image in a storm of sand and magic. Albion moved on instinct—sidestepping the disintegrating hand that lashed out with reckless force. His sword slashed through the air, seeking that momentary vulnerability. For an instant, his eyes caught a faint, pulsing light in its chest—a core, barely visible beneath the tempest of corrupted magic.
"There!" Albion shouted, pointing with a trembling hand. "The core!"
"It shifts like a heartbeat out of sync," Adele's eyes flashed with grim resolve. "I see it."
Without waiting, Adele surged forward, her hands glowing with a light that wove through the charged air. Her strike met the core directly. For a brief heartbeat, the chaotic magic stuttered, and time seemed to still. Then he let out a soundless scream—an agony that shattered the silence. The ground erupted in a cloud of black sand, and Albion was thrown backward by the sheer force of it.
Gasping for breath, he scrambled to his feet as the dust began to settle. His form reassembled, flickering again as he closed in on Adele. Panic and determination warred in Albion's mind; he could not allow him to harm her.
Gripping his sword with renewed resolve, Albion charged forward. He ducked beneath a wild swipe of magic and swung his blade in a wide, desperate arc aimed at the vulnerable core. The impact resonated through him—time held its breath as the core shattered with a harsh, crystalline crack.
For a fleeting moment, silence reigned. Albion's mind raced with thoughts of inevitability—this is but a temporary victory; the cursed Leyva is bound to return. As its disfigured hand reached out in a final, futile gesture, his body began to crumble into a swirling mass of black sand.
The withered hand stretched toward Adele—not to strike—reaching for her, pleading, as if remembering.
When the storm of magic finally subsided, he was gone—dissolved into the dust and echoes of a power too ancient to be undone.
Adele stood a few feet away, her eyes fixed on the spot where the dark figure had been. The residual magic still shimmered faintly around her hands. "He'll reform eventually," she murmured. "His power is tethered to this place. As long as this magic endures, so will he."
Albion exhaled slowly, the gravity of her words sinking in. We've only delayed the inevitable, he thought bitterly. And now, the Veil itself feels alive—aware, watching us, waiting.
In the heavy silence that followed, as they resumed their cautious advance, Albion couldn't shake the haunting inner monologue that troubled him. Manuel Leyva isn't just a fallen Vanguard—he's a harbinger of something far darker lurking within these shifting sands. What does his return portend for Avalon? And what of the magic that binds us all in this forsaken place? The questions, unanswered and unsettling, pressed upon him as the landscape around them seemed to pulse with a quiet, ominous intent.
There was a grief in Adele's silence that didn't belong to this battlefield.
Every step further into the Veil left Albion with the bitter taste of foreboding—a reminder that in this realm, every confrontation was a descent into the unknown, and every victory was temporary against the ceaseless, ancient hunger that watched from the shadows.