Blood Hounds

Kael's vision blurred as the ruins vanished.

No stone walls. No flickering symbols. No Black Hounds.

Just emptiness.

Then—a memory.

The scent of damp earth. The distant echo of swords clashing. A sky painted in shades of twilight, neither day nor night.

And standing in the middle of it all—himself.

But not as he was now.

Younger. Unbroken.

Drenched in blood that wasn't his own.

Kael staggered, his breath sharp. The air here was wrong—too heavy, pressing into his lungs like a weight he couldn't shake.

Then, a voice.

"It always comes back to this, doesn't it?"

Kael's heart clenched.

He knew that voice.

Slowly, he turned.

Elias.

But not the Elias from the ruins.

Not the hollow-eyed specter.

This was the Elias he remembered.

Alive. Breathing. Watching him with the same quiet intensity as he always had.

Kael swallowed hard. "This isn't real."

Elias tilted his head. "Isn't it?"

The distant clashing of swords grew louder. Kael turned his head toward the sound, but the moment he did—

Pain.

A sharp, searing ache in his chest. A wound he had long forgotten.

His breath hitched.

No.

Not forgotten.

Buried.

The battlefield around him pulsed, shifting like a half-formed thought. The sounds, the smells, the weight of his sword—it was all too familiar.

He had been here before.

He had lived this.

And he had failed.

"Why do you keep running from it?" Elias's voice was soft, almost sad.

Kael clenched his fists. "Because I can't change it."

Elias stepped forward. "That's not why."

Kael turned back to face him—

But Elias was gone.

In his place, the shadowed figure stood, its burning eyes locked onto him.

"Do you remember now?" it whispered.

Kael's breath came fast. His chest ached—not from fear, but from something deeper.

Something that had been waiting.

And then, the battlefield collapsed, and the ruins came rushing back.

Kael gasped, stumbling forward as reality snapped into place. The cold stone beneath him, the flickering lights, the weight of his sword—he was back.

But something was different.

The shadowed figure still stood before him. Watching. Waiting.

And this time, Kael did remember.

At least enough to know one thing.

This wasn't the first time he had faced it.

And it wouldn't be the last.