The Varaksha’s Curse

Malrik stood in the heart of Duskholde Keep, his fingers curled around the jagged edges of the Obsidian Altar. The air around him was thick with shadows, the energy of the Void pulsing through the chamber like a second heartbeat.

He had felt it.

The moment Kiran had turned the hunt against the Night Reapers.

The whispers of the void that had once promised his victory had gone silent, recoiling from something unexpected.

Kiran had survived.

No—he had done more than that.

He had tapped into something deeper.

Something Malrik had not foreseen.

The shadows coiled tighter around him as Lyssara entered the chamber, her crimson robes billowing with each step. She did not bow this time. She knew he was angry.

"They failed," Malrik said, his voice sharp as a blade.

Lyssara exhaled, but her gaze remained steady. "He did not just survive. He fought them as if he knew their nature. As if the Void itself had responded to him."

Malrik's jaw clenched. "That should not be possible."

The Night Reapers were not mere assassins. They were manifestations of the Void's will, creatures that broke the minds of those they hunted, unraveling them piece by piece.

But Kiran had turned the Void against them.

That meant…

Malrik's fingers tightened against the altar, dark energy crackling at his touch. "He is evolving too quickly."

Lyssara hesitated before speaking. "Shall I send another force?"

Malrik shook his head. "No. That would be playing into his hands. He is already growing suspicious."

He turned to the Voidgate at the far end of the chamber, the swirling darkness reflecting his own calculating gaze.

"This changes everything."

The Path of Control

For years, Malrik had been weaving the strands of Kiran's fate, guiding him toward a moment of inevitable submission.

The Night Reapers were meant to weaken him, to strip away his will, to break him before offering the only path forward—the path Malrik had prepared.

But now, Kiran had proven something dangerous.

He was not just fighting the Void.

He was learning from it.

"He is not ready to break," the last surviving Reaper had whispered before vanishing.

Malrik ground his teeth.

That meant one thing—Kiran was ready to resist.

Unacceptable.

Malrik turned back to Lyssara, his mind racing. "We must act before he grows beyond our reach."

Her gaze sharpened. "What would you have me do?"

Malrik exhaled, his fury controlled but seething beneath the surface.

"If we cannot break him from the outside," he said, "we will shatter him from within."

Lyssara's lips curled into a knowing smirk. "You mean…?"

Malrik nodded.

"It is time to unleash the Hollow Wraiths."

A New Kind of Threat

Unlike the Night Reapers, the Hollow Wraiths were not hunters.

They were corruption incarnate.

They did not attack their prey.

They became them.

Kiran might have survived the hunt, but could he withstand the slow, insidious poisoning of his own soul?

Malrik's fingers brushed the Voidgate, and the darkness rippled in response.

From its depths, a shape began to form.

Lyssara watched with quiet fascination. "This will not be quick."

Malrik smiled coldly. "No. But it will be inevitable."

He had given Kiran the chance to crumble under force.

Now, he would make him crumble under doubt.

And when the time came…

Kiran would walk into the darkness willingly.

To Be Continued…