The System Reincarnator: From Zero to Shadow King

The sky turned amber as the last rays of sunlight vanished beyond the jagged horizon. A deep, eerie silence settled over the forest of burned pines. Where the wind had once murmured, there was only quiet—a hush so oppressive that it felt as if the world itself had stopped breathing.

Kaelen stood at the ravine's brink, the obsidian ring searing cold on his finger. His heart raced against his ribs, ringing in his ears louder than the silence around him. The scroll in his grasp rattled, the ink shifting like living shadows beneath the ancient glyphs.

He wasn't prepared.

However, Kaelen no longer had the luxury of being ready.

Behind him, the others watched from the treeline—Lira with her twin daggers drawn and her eyes sharp with warning; Dren, his warhammer resting against his shoulder, brow furrowed with unease; and Solen, the only one kneeling, whispering silent prayers to a god who never answered.

Kaelen took a slow breath. For centuries, the ritual had been forbidden, hidden in the cryptic texts of the Shadow binders, a sect exiled from history for meddling in domains not meant for mortal hands. Yet the sign burnt into his palm—the Mark of Null—had linked his fate to the road they'd feared.

He unfurled the scroll.

The words writhed, coiling and uncoiling like serpents as he pronounced them aloud in a voice other than his own.

"Veythra'kul… Shadai… An'khorath…"

The temperature plummeted. Frost webbed across the stones beneath his feet, crackling softly in the oppressive silence. Darkness did not fall; it soared. From the shadows beneath the rocks, the crevices in the ground, and within Kaelen himself. It gathered at his feet, creating a whirling pool of liquid night that pulsed with his own heartbeat.

Only Lira's loud intake of breath could be heard as the first shadow tendrils unfolded, lashing lightly across the windless air.

Kaelen felt it: a tug deep within his spirit, a sensation of sinking and floating all at once. The domain was awakening.

"Shadai… ven'torak… shur'azal."

The shadows responded by rising higher and swirling around him in a steady spiral. They did not consume. They waited.

A whisper passed through his mind—not a voice, but a presence. Ageless. Vast. Cold.

Who awakens the dormant darkness?

Kaelen's mouth opened, and words flowed without thought.

"I'm Kaelen of the Broken Bloodline..." "I claim the right of passage."

The blackness pulsated once.

You're bound. You are claimed. You will pay the price.

A lance of burning anguish pierced his arm and crawled into his chest like ice-laced fire. He collapsed to his knees, his breath taken away by the agony. His veins flared black beneath his skin, leaving shadows that marked and rewrote him.

However, he did not yell.

When Kaelen lifted his head, the world had changed.

The woodland was gone.

In its place extended an unending expanse of midnight glass, reflecting a starless sky. Monoliths of bone and shadow pierced the horizon, while rivers of ink ran slowly between them. In the silent air, voices echoed—not of the living or the dead, but of everything in between.

This was the shadow domain.

And it was alive.

A shape rose from the horizon's cloud, with no face, only a crown of twisting nothingness and twin abysses for eyes. The Keeper of the Veil.

The whispers became louder.

Behind him, Kaelen felt Lira's fingers grab his shoulder.

He turned, but she wasn't there.

Neither was Dren. Nor Solen.

He stood alone.

The Shadow Domain demanded a fee. The first step was to isolate. The next... is yet to come.

Kaelen clutched his fists. The mark on his palm flared, casting a faint deep violet glow.

He spoke into the darkness.

"I'm not afraid."

The shadows shifted—he couldn't tell if it was approval or amusement. But they cleared a route for him.

And Kaelen, his heart pounding, made the first step into the unknown.