"He who survives slaughter is not spared. He is chosen." — Orontai Proverb, recorded in exile
They stepped over the dead. Altan led the way—bare chest streaked with dried blood, ribs rising with shallow breath. The fading lines of war sigils shimmered along his back, heat-scorched and flaking, barely visible beneath a crust of ash and sweat. His blade hung loose in one hand, the edge dulled, the tip dragging along the stone like a funeral bell. Beside him, Chaghan walked without helm. Ash streaked his face. Blood caked the armor across his shoulders. Of the Stormguard, only four remained. They did not speak. None had for some time.
The sanctum gates had shattered on impact. The last bastion of the Phoenix Court lay open. Inside: polished stone, untouched by war. Incense still burned in sunken braziers. Gold-veined columns climbed to vaulted heights, but beneath the sweetness of burned herbs, the scent of blood clung—iron-heavy and sharp. At the dais, beneath the canopy of red silk and lacquered dragons, sat the last sovereigns of Zhong: the Emperor of Ten Thousand Years and the Empress Eternal Flame. They wore robes reserved for coronation—untouched, gleaming white and scarlet. They had not run. Had not fought. They waited.
The Emperor sat upright, one hand resting on the dragon-etched arm of his throne. His face was lined, older than his portraits, but his gaze was steady. The Empress sat beside him, veil drawn, hands still. "You've come far," the Emperor said. No fear. Just observation. "And spilled much blood."
Altan stopped ten paces from the dais. He said nothing. The Emperor's gaze moved to the sabers, the corpses just beyond the hall. "Was it vengeance, then?"
Altan didn't move. The Stormguard spread along the walls, weapons drawn but lowered. Chaghan remained near the steps, shield still raised, watching for sudden hands. At last, Altan spoke.
"Not vengeance," he said. "Judgment."
The word settled like ash.
"The dynasty fell the day you signed the hunts. You sent riders across the southern steppes to erase the Orontai. Sent your phalanx, and your dogs in allied colors. Burned our hearths. Salted the earth so nothing would grow but silence. Buried our names beneath false histories." His voice darkened. "I am the last of the Orontai. And I will be your judgment."
Chaghan froze. His gaze flicked toward Altan. Orontai. The name was a ghost—spoken only in old lament songs and forbidden war stories, always ending the same way: a people who never bowed, who fought until the last rider fell beneath imperial iron. They were myth, not memory. Yet here Altan stood, speaking the name like an oath. In all their years, through siege and salt, fire and frost, Altan had never once spoken his tribe. Not until now. And Chaghan understood: the silence Altan carried was not stoicism. It was burial.
Across the dais, the Empress stirred. Her fingers curled faintly beneath her sleeves, and her voice cracked not from fear, but from remembrance. "They said he died in the camps."
But her mind reached further back, to a boy limping across the steppe with blood in his teeth and arrows in his legs. She had seen the report, read the hunter's account: a child of fifteen leaping into the Kharan Chasm, pursued west until no ground remained. A wound in the world, that place. Forbidden. Final. The young officers had laughed. "He's dead. No one survives the fall." No body was ever found.
Seven years later, the chasm had opened its mouth and returned something changed.
Altan's knuckles whitened around his saber hilt. The Empress lifted her head and spoke again, low and clear. "Then do what you came for. Kill us here. End it with steel. The victors will write the names."
Altan's breath came slow, steady. "No."
The Emperor blinked. "No?" he asked.
"I won't give you martyrdom," Altan said. "Your blood would raise another banner. Another reason for your ghosts to rise again."
Silence coiled, thick as smoke.
"Then what?" the Emperor asked. "You'd parade us? Humiliate us for the court to see?"
"No court remains."
"Then exile?" the Empress asked.
Altan nodded once. "You'll walk through the West Gate. You'll take your remaining retinue. No blades will touch you. A ship waits."
"And if we return?" the Emperor asked.
Altan looked up. And something colder than hatred lived behind his eyes.
"Then it's your death."
There was no anger in his tone. No threat. Just weight.
The Emperor stood. The guards near the exit tensed, but Altan raised a hand. The Stormguard did not move. The Emperor reached for his brow, unfastened the gold circlet, and let it fall. It struck stone. The sound echoed like a tolling bell.
The Empress stood beside him. Her veil dropped.
They descended the steps together.
At the base, she paused, eyes landing on Chaghan. "What will you become now?" she asked.
Chaghan did not blink. "Whatever is needed."
They passed into the ruin without escort.
Behind them, the throne stood empty. No one stepped forward to claim it. No banners rose. No cries of victory. Only the cracked stone and the smell of blood and incense. Outside, the clouds began to break. Inside, no crown rose. No name spoken. Just silence.
And the end of fake dragon blood.
The next age would be written in ash.
Let me know if you want to follow this immediately with a grimdark epilogue, or if you'd like me to compile this version into a manuscript file.