The land was wrong.
Asvard felt it the moment his foot met the cracked soil. It breathed. Like it lived. But not the kind of life anyone would wish for.
Hell was quiet here. Too quiet. Not the silence of solace, but the silence that came after death. The kind that pressed on your chest, whispering warnings you didn't quite understand.
Asvard narrowed his eyes. The Maw was behind him now, closed like a mouth that had taken its fill. He didn't look back. Whatever had happened inside… it changed him. He couldn't explain how. He only knew that he didn't feel human anymore.
His hands felt stronger. His breath colder. His heart, was no longer his. A black shard beat inside his chest now, steady, slow… ancient.
The place ahead was called Whispering Hollows. Krelith had said it in passing, like a warning.
"The Hollows don't forget," he'd muttered, eyes distant. "And they don't forgive."
No map. No signs. Only bones underfoot and twisted trees that emit smoke.
Asvard walked.
The deeper he went, the more he felt it.
Voices.
Not loud. Just… there. At the edges of hearing. Some cried. Some laughed. Some screamed.
He stopped at a dead tree split down the middle like lightning had kissed it.
A name was carved into the bark.
"ASHAR. KEEPER OF FOUR."
He didn't know what it meant. But the moment his eyes landed on the words, the wind howled like a beast awakened.
The ground shook.
Then, silence again.
"What the hell is this place…" he muttered.
But it wasn't the tree, or the name, or even the voices that unnerved him most.
It was the feeling.
The feeling of being watched.
Not hunted. Not stalked.
Watched.
Judged.
A presence hung in the air like smoke, ancient and massive. It felt familiar… but not like a face. More like a memory too far gone to recall clearly.
He kept walking.
And then came the whispers.
Not around him. Inside him.
"The shard lives…"
"He carries it still…"
"Abyssborn…"
He gritted his teeth. "Shut up."
The whispers laughed.
They didn't obey.
Up ahead, the sky broke open in veins of red. Ash fell like snow, and a strange battlefield unfolded.
Thousands of weapons stood buried into the scorched land. No bodies. Just tools of war left behind like graves.
The whispers stopped.
Even they feared this place.
Asvard stepped forward, weaving between spears, swords, broken staves.
A black banner lay torn across a cracked shield. The symbol on it was unseen. Three interlocking horns spiraling inward. It almost pulsed when his eyes met it.
He bent down and picked it up.
Nothing happened.
But he felt something stir deep inside.
Not his own thought.
A memory.
Not his.
A throne room. Burning.
A voice. Screaming.
And the same banner. Drenched in blood.
He dropped it.
"Don't touch what's buried" came a voice.
Asvard turned sharply.
A creature stood at the edge of the weapon field. Cloaked in rusted armor, face hidden, eyes burning infernal blue.
"Who are you?" Asvard asked.
The thing didn't answer. Instead, it slowly lifted a hand and pointed at him.
"You've changed," it said finally. "You've no place here anymore. Not among the damned. Not among the kings."
"Kings?"
The creature tilted its head. "You walk Hell's path. But you don't understand it. You will."
A spear came thrusting. Almost piercing through Asvard. He wasn't the same when he fell. He dodged the charging spear.
And with that, it vanished.
Like smoke.
Asvard stood in silence.
He clenched his fists.
His blood felt hot. Too hot. Like something inside him was boiling.
That shard…
That damned shard…
Was doing something.
No.
Becoming something.
He stepped forward again, through the graveyard of blades, and out the other side.
And there, rising from the land, was a tower of bone.
Twisted. Tall. Screaming.
No door. No path. Just presence.
He stared at it.
It stared back.
The shard in his chest pulsed hard.
Just once.
And he turned away.
Further ahead, the terrain shifted. From ash to obsidian. From whispers to silence.
He finally saw it, an old ruin, half-sunken into the black sand.
It wasn't large, but it was… wrong. Like it shouldn't exist. Like it didn't want to be remembered.
Inside, faint flickers of light moved.
Asvard entered.
Nothing inside moved.
But something had been here. Recently.
And on the wall, written in blood:
"When the Ninth breathes, Hell stirs."
His breath caught in his throat.
He didn't know what that meant. Not fully.
But something deep inside him did.
Something ancient.
The whispers didn't speak anymore.
Because now, they listened.
He was no longer a guest in Hell.
He was becoming part of it.
He walked out of the ruin, stepping into the cold dark again.
And far off in the distance, unseen by him, a hundred eyes turned to look.
Something had awoken.
Something not meant to.
And its name was Asvard.
The land no longer whispered.
It howled.
Asvard walked, his breath shallow, the echoes around him shifting with every step. The shard inside his chest pulsed faintly, syncing with a rhythm that didn't belong to him.
Then he stepped past a certain ridge, and the world shifted again.
Not in power. Not in weight.
But in intent.
Everything grew quiet. Not silent...calculated.
But unknowingly, Asvard had walked into the Whispering Hollows. The farthest edge of a legion that Hell itself hesitated to speak of.
The Unleashed Legion of Blades.
And if fate had written paths, this....this was the one path he should have never stepped onto.
Not now. Not yet.
Sword cried.
Pain shot through him.
A severed arm fell, trailing blood onto the scorched stones.
Asvard swayed, wide-eyed.
A voice echoed from the shadows, calm and cold.
"You don't belong here."
Asvard looked at his left.
He knew he couldn't win against whatever it
was.
He looked at it, in its eyes.
"You don't tell me if I belong here or not." He shouted.
Asvard charged at it, clenching his only arm.
It charged at him
Asvard caved his left fist in it's face. Shattering it's helm.
Shattered steel rained down like ash.
(To be continued...)