I'm an Extra, so What?

Coliseum of the Earthborn – Present Moment

The throne loomed like a mountain carved from regret.

Atop it sat King Mourntide, unmoving, ageless, half-formed of earth and soul. His chest rose and fell with the rhythm of a mountain breathing once per year. He did not blink.

He simply existed.

Luka stepped into the center of the arena.

Snow hovered beside him, eyes wide.

Serene and Gregor waited near the gate, uncertain whether to pray or draw steel.

Vaelrith knelt—metal claws folded across his chest in silence.

Mourntide's voice came not from his mouth, but from the stone itself. A low, grinding thunder that shook Luka's bones:

"You carry the Flame."

"You walk on the bones of the forgotten."

"And you ask for what? Mercy? Alliance? Forgiveness?"

Luka stood tall. "I ask to make it right."

A long silence followed.

Then the king spoke again:

"The last time a bearer of flame stood here, he demanded obedience.""And when he did not get it… he called dragons to burn our halls.""He named us 'mistakes.'"

"What makes you different, Luka Flamebearer?"

The Test Begins

The coliseum's floor split—revealing a deep well of shifting stone, lightless and hungry. Echoes poured from it—voices screaming, whispering, begging. The memories of the First Flame War.

Mourntide pointed one massive finger.

"Step in."

"If you carry truth, it will hold you.""If you carry lies…""You will be buried with the rest."

Snow panicked. "Luka—"

Luka walked forward and leapt into the well.

Vision: What the Flame Tried to Bury

Darkness swallowed him.

But it wasn't death.

It was memory.

He saw the first dragons, arrogant and righteous, twisting the leylines to their will.

He saw the earthborn, Mourntide's people, born of stone and soul, trying to stabilize the mana flows the dragons had broken.

He saw the dragons call them aberrations. Dangerous. Unnatural.

He saw fire fall from the sky as whole cities of stone were turned to glass.

And he saw one Flamebearer—marked like Luka—stand at the gates of Mourntide's city…

And order its cleansing.

A genocide sealed beneath history.

The world never remembered.

But Mourntide never forgot.

Return to the Arena

Luka slammed back into reality, chest heaving, eyes wide with horror.

The ground beneath him was solid.

The test had not swallowed him.

Snow hovered at his side. "You saw it."

Luka nodded slowly. "All of it."

Mourntide's stone eyes locked onto him.

"Now… tell me, Flamebearer.""Why do you deserve to live, when the last one with your mark commanded the skies to fall?"

Luka didn't shout. He didn't beg.

He simply said:

"I didn't choose the Flame. But I choose what I do with it."

"I won't rewrite what happened. I won't pretend it didn't. I will remember. I will carry it."

"And if the world burns again—it will not be by my hand."

The Verdict

The ground trembled.

All around them, the stone-forged sentinels stood silent.

Mourntide slowly… stood.

The entire arena groaned as the throne cracked and shattered behind him.

The King of Stone stepped down—each footstep a continent shifting.

Then, he did the unthinkable.

He bowed.

"Then remember us.""Carry the shame of flame, and the sorrow of stone.""You are not forgiven.""But you are understood."

He reached out, placing one massive finger against Luka's forehead.

The stone glowed.

"Take this Mark of Mourning. So all will know where you've walked."

Luka felt a symbol burn into his skin—cold, not hot. A spiral. Heavy with weight.

"Now go. Beyond this city lies the Hollow Root—the source of what stirs.""We cannot go with you.""But… we will not stop you."

Later – At the Edge of the Hollow Root

They departed with silence.

No fanfare.

Only the wind over stone.

Luka bore the Mark.

Snow was quiet.

Even Vaelrith seemed subdued.

Serene finally asked, "What happened in there?"

Luka didn't answer immediately.

Then he said, softly:

"…The dragons weren't always right."

Gregor stared into the mouth of the Hollow Root—a spiral tunnel deeper than anything they'd seen yet. "And whatever's at the bottom?"

Luka looked into the dark.

"It's older than dragons."

"Older than kings."

"And we're going to wake it up."

Hollow Root – Descent Into Silence

There was no sky.

Only roots.

They spiraled around the path like petrified veins of a dead god, wrapped around molten stone and memory. The deeper Luka and the others went, the more the world forgot sound. Even Snow's wings barely made a whisper.

Time itself seemed to falter.

Torches burned slow.

Words echoed twice.

Gregor muttered, "Feels like the whole place is watching."

"No," Serene said softly, voice wary. "It's remembering."

The Hollow Mark

The spiral tattoo Mourntide had left on Luka's skin began to throb the further they walked. Not with pain—but resonance.

Snow perched on his shoulder, tense and quiet.

"It's reacting. The Hollow Root's made to recognize those who remember the war."

"It doesn't care if you're innocent."

"Only if you forgot."

They passed murals etched into the walls: strange, impossible beasts—creatures with too many eyes, mouths where their hands should've been, wings made of writing. Some looked like dragons—but melted, twisted, warped.

"Did… dragons make these?" Serene asked.

Snow's voice was hollow.

"No. These are before dragons."

"Before memory. Before the Flame."

"This is the place that history itself fears."

They Reached the Gate

At the bottom of the spiral path, there stood a door made not of stone, but flesh turned to crystal—like the petrified shell of something that had once lived.

It pulsed.

As if still dreaming.

Luka approached, heart hammering.

The moment he touched it, the Mark of Mourning glowed.

The gate cracked.

Light poured through—

Not warm, not cold.

Just… eternal.

They stepped inside.

The Chamber of the First Memory

The chamber was vast, spherical, and impossibly still.

At its center floated a massive, crystalline heart—beating slowly, once every ten seconds. Around it circled fragments of light and echo: scenes, people, words spoken eons ago.

It was a memory.

But not a memory.

The memory.

The First Memory.

Snow whispered:

"This is what the dragons tried to copy when they made the Obelisks.""What the Forged tried to guard.""What Mourntide buried."

"This… is the mind of the world."

And then a voice spoke.

Not aloud.

But in all of them.

The Voice of the Memory

"You carry the Flame. You carry the Stone. You carry the Seed."

"Why?"

"Why do you awaken me?"

Luka stepped forward. "Because the void has returned. Because the Eater was only a first wave. Because something woke up when the Obelisks cracked."

"I know."

"I felt it."

"That was my other half."

"You broke the seal."

The heart pulsed faster.

The memory fragments began spinning in jagged loops.

Serene shouted, "It's destabilizing!"

Snow tried to calm it—but it was too late.

One fragment flared, then crashed into Luka's chest.

And the world shattered.

Luka's Trial: The Unwritten Truth

He stood in a field of stars.

A void not of evil—but of before.

Before light.

Before thought.

And in front of him stood a man.

Tall. Robed. His face flickering between dragon, elf, human, something else entirely.

He smiled without lips.

"You're the last one."

"The last bearer. The last chance."

"Do you know who I am?"

Luka shook his head.

The figure nodded.

"I am the First Flame, sir."

"But I was not made."

"I was remembered into being."

"By this."

He pointed to Luka's chest.

"The Flame isn't power. It's remembrance."

"And now you've seen too much."

"So I must ask—"

"Do you want to know the truth?"

Luka's Choice

He stood silent.

Snow's voice whispered from far away, through the veil of reality.

"Luka…?"

But Luka stared at the figure, this impossible being born of thought and fire, and said:

"Yes."

The stars convulsed.

The void breathed.

And suddenly—Luka knew.

The Truth Revealed

The dragons didn't create the Obelisks.

They stole them—fragments of the First Memory, planted to anchor reality.

The "void" was not evil—it was what was left behind when memory was ripped from time.

Every war. Every catastrophe. Every "corruption" was reality trying to heal.

The Eater wasn't a destroyer.

It was a collector.

Trying to bring the lost fragments home.

And the Obelisks?

They were lies dressed as tools.

And someone had just reactivated the last one.

Back in the Chamber

Luka fell backward into his body, gasping.

Serene caught him.

Gregor's eyes were wide.

Vaelrith had dropped to one knee—sparking, groaning.

Snow was pale with realization.

"It wasn't just magic."

"The world is cracking."

"And he knows where the final anchor is."

Luka looked to the glowing memory core—and felt it flicker.

The final anchor wasn't just a place.

It was a person.

Far away.

Alive.

And already in motion.

Far Away – Prison Vault of Quiet Flame

Arthur stood in his cell.

Unshackled.

A figure cloaked in gray stood before him, whispering.

And Arthur…

smiled.

"You said I was never chosen."

"Turns out I was just chosen last... It seems..."