Chapter 8: The Thirteenth Flame
The warhost moved before the Codex could protest.
The flame still burned in the trench, but its rhythm shifted—no longer calling for judgment, but watching for loyalty.
Kael stood at the edge of the Black Pyre, eyes locked on the broken node that whispered coordinates through static. Verdance Rift. Morrowseed. Silence.
The Riftwings lifted first. Korynth and Vaeryn took to the air, scouting ahead. Thal'khaar cavalry emerged from the lower trench gate, Gravemaws armored and snorting, Varka at the lead. The First Talons formed a flanking wall, silent and fast, with Rythis already marking kill vectors.
Maelith approached Kael.
"You're sending us into the roots, not into glory."
"Then let them know we carry both," Kael replied.
Serrin handed him the Codex shard receiver, tuned to Morrowseed identifiers. Its glow pulsed erratically—heartbeat, then flat.
"You think we'll be too late?" she asked.
"I think we won't be the first to bleed," Kael said.
Operation Vergefall: Deployment
Twelve squads. Five vanguard lines. No central command post.
Kael refused to lead from above. He walked with the Talons, shoulder to shoulder with VyrmClaw, as the terrain shifted from carved trench to soft moss and Codex-riddled flora. Verdance Rift was alive. Overgrown. Listening.
The Codex here didn't chime. It pulsed with something older.
Crate of the Forgebinders deployed sigil-bursts to stabilize the passage. Grix and Vexle followed behind, carrying terrain-splicing beacons.
Whisper-Vow appeared from behind a fungal ridge.
*"Something moves beneath. Not Wardens. Worse."
Kael looked at Serrin.
"Echo Beasts?"
"Or something left behind when JIRUUN tore the sky open."
First Contact
The first scream wasn't from a hybrid.
It was from the roots themselves.
A wave of tendrils erupted ahead, lashing out in spiraled motion—biomass not entirely alive, not fully dead. The air shimmered with memory distortion.
"Codex spill," Marren called out, shielding Kessh with a projected glyph array.
The Ashwings struck from above, coordinated sweeps by Yaveth and Ardyn slicing the infected nodes. Below, Salak'ra Venn charged through root clusters, glaive hooked and dripping with acidic residue.
VyrmClaw roared.
"Hold the flank! Talons, break the vein!"
Kael ignited a Codex pulse from his palm, tearing a clear path through a knot of writhing bark.
Then he saw it.
Half-buried in biomass. A banner. Green. Split.
"We found them."
Morrowseed
They had survived.
But only barely.
Of the 7,650 who had come to answer the Pyre's call, only 3,200 now stood—bloodied, broken, and defiant. The rest were scattered or slaughtered. The ridge trails were lined with the ruins of hybrid domes, scorched Codex roots, and bones that pulsed with fractured memory.
Elaras Greenfold stood at the heart of a makeshift dome grown from her own Codex-binding ability, keeping a seedling of memory-flame burning.
Her eyes were hollow.
Behind her, Bennoth Clayfang held a splintered anchorstaff. Thaeva Mistseed was unconscious, wrapped in healing lichen. Around them, Morrowseed kin helped bury the dead with ritual composting.
Elaras looked at Kael.
*"You came."
"You're the Thirteenth. I won't let that number die."
The Codex glowed. Not chime. Not pulse. Something softer.
A seed taking root.
Kael turned to the warhost.
"Prepare to move. We walk them home."
Next: Chapter 9 - Embers of Unity