The wind blew slowly, like a death hymn sung by ghosts. Borreal. The kingdom was once silver because it was located in the north and covered in snow, and its knowledge made the kingdom quite advanced before its destruction erased all existing civilization, with even the remnants of its knowledge buried deep in the ground.

  And now, the kingdom had become a monument of charred stone from the remains of fire and chaos; its once-towering spires were now split and shattered, and the scent of glory that still lingered could only be smelled by wanderers who, passing through the kingdom, could only see the ruined stones and broken roads as forgotten history.

  Sora and Kaelith stood in the archway of the ruined entrance gate to the kingdom. The inscriptions carved along its frame were damaged to the point of being unreadable, some destroyed and others eroded by time and the blood that still stained the stones.

  Kaelith pulled her cloak tighter and observed the horizon, speaking more to herself after seeing the kingdom of Borreal with her own eyes.

  "So this is Borreal. The last breath of the north, with only its history remaining."

  Sora said nothing nor wrote anything about it, because the kingdom itself was a witness that had once lived in an age of glory until its current, chaotic ruin.

  However, something in Sora's posture changed, as he could feel the weight of the place had the same pressure, haunting his mind as it did in the tower of memories.

  After they passed the front gate and walked into an empty courtyard where statues had been reduced to proud but armless figures, their faces shattered as if by a powerful blow that left them standing but defaced.

  The streets of Borreal were a mix of grey and snow, like something long burnt, mixed with ash and bone that the ground had absorbed to become that color.

  Then, a sound was heard, like a whisper?

  However, it was definitely not the wind, and the sound grew clearer, slowly approaching them, sounding like the stealthy movements of someone who had been watching them since they entered Borreal.

  Kaelith had a very bad feeling about this and readied the bow she had been carrying in her hand. Sora tried to look carefully towards a dark alley beside him, and the sound was heard again, but clearer this time.

  The sound was like something being dragged, the scraping of iron on the ground, a rattling like bones moving without flesh, and it seemed there was also the sound of limbs too long for a body being dragged across the paving stones.

  "We're not alone." Kaelith said in a low, wary voice as Sora watched what was about to come from the dark and empty alley.

  Unwilling to repeat the incident in the forest, Sora drew his sword to prepare for what was coming.

  From the shadows of the alley, a horde of unknown form though certainly not human showed themselves from the darkness. The

  Varnished once human, now just hollow. Living corpses with skin like peeling bark and eyes that shone with an inner red light, like puppets controlled by someone.

  Their bone joints were clearly visible and seemed to be bent backwards, and their mouths were stitched tightly shut with thin iron wire like sewing thread.

  Five Varnished?

  No, it’s seven of them now appeared before the two.

  Kaelith quickly released an arrow, as the Varnished were monsters that couldn't be reasoned with, and one Varnished's head snapped back. But two more appeared from Sora and Kaelith's blind spot, crawling on the walls like insects and landing right behind them. Sora, startled by this, moved quickly with the sword he had already prepared.

  His sword met the decaying flesh of a Varnished, and his slash against its flesh and exposed rib cage sounded like shattering glass hit by a hard object. One Varnished was split at the chest, its insides releasing smoke and a stench not of rotting organs, but something worse than any carcass.

  Kaelith rolled to the side as one Varnished tried to attack her from behind, dodging as it tried to grab her with its claw-like nails. Kaelith then drew her hunting knife to stab the Varnished's vital point, causing it to collapse to the ground after her strike hit its weak spot.

  More were coming, from the windows of residences, from dark alleys, and from the thick fog leading towards Borreal's castle. One Varnished managed to reach Sora and clung to his back, clawing at him and biting the side of his neck with teeth like sewing needles.

  Sora reflexively slammed it to the ground with his strength, and when the Varnished was on the ground, he crushed its head with the heel of his boot. But the wound Sora received felt strange, located on his neck where he was bitten.

  Kaelith cried out in anger as her bow was now broken in two, and she fought with only her hunting knife and fists as the Varnished swarmed her directly. Kaelith held them off as best she could when the distance between them became too close, and the Varnished attacked her savagely until their attacks split her bow in half, snapping the string.

  "They just keep coming!" Kaelith said with frustration and anger because her weapon was broken.

  Sora turned towards her after slashing a Varnished that approached him, his eyes scanning the area for a place that could be their shelter from this endless threat of Varnished.

  There!

  Sora found a place filled with books, some of them burnt and worn at its outer door; it was a library with a partially collapsed building but its door was still intact and looked like it could hold back the horde of Varnished coming from all directions.

  Sora grabbed Kaelith's wrist and pulled her to escape their current situation. Kaelith was confused, and for some reason, she didn't let go of Sora's grip as he pulled her away.

  They ran quickly through the ruins, pushing past shelves, skeletons, and rubble behind them as the Varnished chased them from behind. When they reached the library, Sora closed the door as quickly as possible and barricaded it with a broken spear, then dragged a large table from beside it to block the door from being destroyed by the horde.

  Darkness enveloped the room, and the sound of the door being battered was clearly heard from the horde of Varnished trying to force their way in. Soon, the battering stopped, and their footsteps walked away in an unknown direction.

  Only their heavy, trembling breaths could be heard after running from the horde that chased them to the library. Kaelith tried to calm herself, resting her body on one of the library chairs, her hands blood-stained and her blonde hair disheveled.

  "...What the hell were those things?" Kaelith said, her breath still ragged as she tried to remain calm.

  Sora, looking exhausted after everything he did to survive the threat, could only kneel from the pain and the numbness in his legs.

  Sora felt something strange stuck in the side of his neck from the bite of the Varnished that had attacked him from behind.

  Sora found something in the bite mark and carefully pulled it out like a thread, along with fragments that were not bone, but needle-like objects with carvings like shards of stone mixed with glass.

  "Someone made them, which means someone is controlling that horde of Varnished." Kaelith said, watching Sora examine the fragments.

  They were now in the heart of the Borreal kingdom, and it still felt like it was beating like a heart. Outside the door, the silence after their chase from the Varnished horde presented a real and brutal threat.

  But they both knew this kingdom was not simply forgotten by people; it remembered everyone who passed through and stepped foot inside it. And Sora remained still, blood flowing from his neck, his grip on his sword hilt tightening as he realized something was wrong with what had just happened.

  This was just the beginning for them, stepping into a ruined kingdom inhabited by monsters hiding within.

  Dust filtered through cracks in the library's ceiling, shimmering like trapped, flying ash in the slowly fading sunlight.

  The two sat in silence, Sora's blood having dried on the skin of his neck. He had bandaged it with a small cloth he had, torn from his own cloak. The pain was a dull ache beneath the surface of his skin, but he did not flinch from it. Kaelith sat across from him, leaning against the library chair she occupied.

  Her eyes now looked dim, more weary than fearful. Her bow, once the form of her will, now lay broken in a corner of the room like a bird's broken wing.

  "Useless. It was the last gift from my father before he died." she murmured, more to herself, as if the bow would carry the words away.

  She opened the pouch at her hip; inside, only her hunting knife, a filled water bottle, and a stone for sharpening her arrowheads that also served as a fire-starter remained.

  There was no food and no medicine at all in her pouch. When Kaelith looked towards her bow in the corner of the library not far from her, she approached the weapon, her hand trembling as she stroked the broken wood as if mourning something very meaningful to her.

  Sora reached for his pouch when he realized what Kaelith wanted. Sora took out a piece of old jerky he had saved from yesterday's hunt in the forest. He didn't have much, barely enough for one person's portion.

  However, he wrapped it in the remaining piece of cloth he had torn earlier and placed it beside Kaelith, who was still stroking her broken bow, then walked away without disturbing her.

  Kaelith looked up with a frown and said, "You haven't eaten for two days on our journey, and what's more of that? you're bleeding more than i am like a wolf fighting in a hunter's den. And now you're giving me this last piece of jerky? What do you mean by that?"

  Sora said nothing to answer Kaelith's question. He just walked back to his spot and stood near the back doorway of the library he had found, his hand gripping the hilt of his sheathed sword.

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  When Sora looked at Kaelith, who was leaning against the back wall, he tried to speak with sign language, as if to say,

  ‘You'll need it more than I will.’

  Kaelith looked down dejectedly then took it.

  "Stubborn bastard." she said softly.

  Time passed quickly until the sun shone through the cracks in the library's partially destroyed roof. They decided to continue their journey rather than stay in the library, given their uncertain situation. As they left the partially destroyed building, the sky was slowly turning an iron-grey, and the sun was sinking until its form and light were no longer visible.

  Only the outline of jagged towers loomed overhead, like the teeth of something ancient waiting to close its mouth.

  While walking out of the library, Kaelith tied the remains of her broken bow to make a jagged staff as her current weapon, better than holding no weapon at all.

  She walked with careful steps, her eyes always watching the surroundings, especially the shadowed corners.

  As for Sora, he now walked at the very front, limping; his wound slowed him but not enough to stop him from continuing his journey, albeit slowly. Every step was an unspoken word, like an unbreakable will against any condition, even a storm.

  After they exited the library and walked out of the alley, they arrived at what used to be a market. Stalls that had long been consumed by fire were visible from the remnants of burnt cloth and rotting merchandise mixed with ash and snow.

  Dolls from a toy store, once adorned with trinkets to attract children, were now dusty, some charred by fire, and some dolls' heads had been deliberately replaced with bird skulls and rusted metal, an unclear sign of worship or warning displayed on parts of the street.

  Then—

  A sound was heard again, and this time it wasn't the same clawing sound as before. This sound was the sound of footsteps, and it was truly like the slow, distinct, and even deliberate footsteps of a real human.

  Hearing the sound, Kaelith immediately stopped and prepared her jagged staff in case a threat from the Varnished came her way.

  From the alley across from them, a single figure emerged. Its appearance was like someone wrapped in bandages around their head and bones, their face hidden behind a cracked porcelain mask.

  The figure did not speak upon meeting Sora and Kaelith, who stopped at a distance. Then, the figure extended its hand, not in peace, but as an invitation for them to follow it to a place it wanted to show them.

  After that, it turned and walked back into the darkness at the end of the alley. Kaelith, sensing a threat from the uneasy feeling she got, immediately gripped her staff tightly.

  "This is a clear trap to lure us in, especially into an area we don't know," Kaelith hissed.

  Poised as if ready to strike an enemy with the staff already near her head, looking like she wanted to crush their enemy's head in a surprise attack.

  Unlike the wary Kaelith, Sora just stood silently, observing the figure and trying to guess its intentions.

  Finally, after betting on his intuition, Sora stepped forward and began to follow it towards the dark alley.

  "You've got to be kidding, right?" Kaelith said, seeing Sora's easily readable action and assuming he had been lured by the cheap trap set by the figure.

  Sora continued to step forward to follow where the figure was leading, ignoring Kaelith's previous words of warning. Kaelith, seeing Sora's reckless action, cursed under her breath,

  "That stupid bastard, he doesn't know it's a cheap trap prepared for our graves, damn it."

  After quietly cursing Sora and her frustration at his foolish action, Kaelith reluctantly followed behind him.

  "If we die, I'll haunt you wherever you are until death takes you." Kaelith added, which sounded like an oath to Sora if his intuition was wrong and resulted in both of their deaths.

  The alley swallowed them as if they had passed through a dark cloud. What they would find beyond was not a shelter or an ambush, but the last remaining breath of the Borreal Kingdom, or what could be called its legacy that survived its destruction.

  A room buried beneath the city, hidden from time, where the last forgotten remnants still whispered secrets in the darkness above, and the precious thing needed to move forward... would begin to show its true price for the first time, never seen by anyone who had not experienced it before in their life.

  The air in that place seemed to thicken as they followed the masked figure into the shadows leading to the darkest end of the alley. The remaining light seemed to fade little by little as they went deeper into the alley, as if reluctant to let light slowly penetrate the darkness.

  Sora's boots scraped against slick cobblestones weathered over many years since the age of ruin began.

  Kaelith's breath was steady, but her tight grip around her staff showed her vigilance as she observed her surroundings for any strange movements, walking behind Sora with careful steps not out of fear, but because she lacked faith in his choice.

  The alley grew narrower until, at its end, a black stone spiral staircase appeared, leading down into a hollow resembling a drainage channel beneath the kingdom. The masked figure did not look back and continued walking down the spiral staircase.

  The two of them, with slow steps and keeping their distance from the figure, descended the spiral steps, feeling as if time was moving very slowly.

  When they reached the bottom, a room appeared before them, and the figure entered it. The room had a broken door, only half-open before them, and was vast, circular, and alive with a low hum, seemingly pulsating with a breath it still possessed.

  Pillars of ancient stone held the ceiling high, carved with sigils that writhed gently under an unseen energy.

  Faceless, crownless statues lined the walls, some damaged by the passage of time. In the room, lanterns on the walls lit up by themselves as they entered, revealing a mural painted with colors like blood and gold, telling a story of suffering and its past glory.

  Kaelith whispered to herself upon entering the room, seeing it with eyes that couldn't believe what she saw: "This... this is like a throne room hidden beneath the kingdom's surface throne."

  In the center of the room was a worn and torn rug, eaten by time, and at the far end of the room was a display case containing a bow not made of wood or metal. But of an unknown sinew, shining like starlight forged from something forgotten.

  The masked figure stepped slowly to the side and stopped right next to the bow display, pointing at Kaelith without a sound. Seeing this, Kaelith did not know what the figure meant and hesitated, gripping the staff she held in her hand.

  "You expect I will... just give it to you?" the figure said to Kaelith, pointing at her.

  Its cold, hoarse voice making Kaelith even more uncertain. There was no answer from Kaelith, only an increase in her alertness as the figure began to speak.

  Just the hum of the figure's words and Sora's calm presence beside her. The bow in the display case pulsed faintly with the memories of its previous owner stored within it.

  "You, an archer who has lost her weapon. What makes you worthy of having this bow? Does a bow mean anything to an archer?" the figure asked Kaelith, lowering the finger it had been pointing at her.

  Kaelith, hearing the question, answered in a cold tone, "I've never known. What I know is how to survive in this broken world to see the sunrise the next day, where our own lives are uncertain in a world that has forgotten the hope to live."

  Hearing Kaelith's answer, the figure briefly looked at the bow and then back at Kaelith. "Step forward, daughter of Virandel. You know what is required to possess this bow."

  Kaelith, hearing this from the figure, was startled and tightened her grip, confused and emotional, "You... how do you know that name?"

  The figure ignored Kaelith's actions and words, instead saying, "You will know when you take this bow."

  Kaelith remained in her position, looking at the figure. Then, Kaelith slowly moved forward when she knew the figure did not react after what it had said, and there were no suspicious movements from it either.

  Kaelith looked at the bow up close and tried to hold it. When her fingers touched the bow, a flashback of unknown origin entered Kaelith's mind, giving her a glimpse of what happened to the bow's previous owner.

  In Kaelith's mind, she saw a woman with hair the color of fire, releasing arrows that turned everything she aimed at into dust, as if she were the last defense, an archer on the walls of Borreal's gate.

  An unspoken promise emerged with a faint voice in Kaelith's mind as she watched the woman's actions,

  ‘This will find the hands it is meant for.’

  Kaelith, seeing all of this, was suddenly jolted and abruptly released her touch from the bow. Kaelith stepped back after seeing that, with an expression of what she had just witnessed.

  "What... what actually happened to that woman and this place?"

  The masked figure finally spoke, like the wind across a graveyard. "The owner of this bow sealed a truth never spoken or seen by anyone. This kingdom fell not because of a civil war or anything else, but because of a threat from within. Those who did it drank from a well not meant for men. They destroyed by waking what should have remained asleep. The fall of Borreal... was their penance."

  Kaelith tried to stay calm and understand the figure's words about the bow in the display case that had shown her something about its previous owner.

  Kaelith turned to Sora, who remained calm upon seeing her condition, and then looked back at the figure and asked. "And why did you bring us here?"

  The figure turned to Sora.

  "Because he is the last one untouched by lies. He was born without the words they use to shape truth from their actions; his unspoken words became an unbreakable chain of a truth many do not want to hear."

  Sora, hearing this from the figure, stepped closer to the bow display case and began to feel for something beside it without touching the bow. Sora found a hidden sigil script on the side of the display case, the script barely visible.

  When Sora touched it, the wall next to the display case slid aside, revealing a vast, barely legible map of words and images on the stone, showing long-lost territories and a mark deep underground where the sinners of Borreal still slept, waiting to be awakened.

  The masked figure whispered to them both in its hoarse tone: "You are not destined to save the world. But you can choose who will rebuild it."

  And with those words, the figure stepped back into a dark corner of the room and disappeared into the shadows.

  Kaelith looked at Sora intently. "So... no pressure, then."

  Sora only gave a faint, bitter smile upon hearing that, while looking at the stone map and a door on the wall beside it. His expression was almost invisible.

  Then, without a word, they looked at the door beside the stone map. The path to it, and the destination they never wanted but was desired by the figure, was now clearer... but the burden for their purpose was heavier. The ruined kingdom had given them a weapon and a whisper of its truth.

  What lay beyond, deeper into the land where no plants or grass grew, was no longer just about survival. It was a reckoning they had to consider before stepping forward.

  The room fell silent again after the figure disappeared. Kaelith sat near the bow display, her new bow now taken and resting in her lap.

  Its faint glow indicated the bow was now dormant until called upon to be used. The only remaining sounds were the slow, echoing drips of water from cracks in the ceiling and Sora's soft footsteps as he walked along the edge of the room to analyze the stone map before him.

  The silence between them was not empty. Kaelith watched Sora like a stranger who had silently walked through horrors and memories without uttering a single word to explain his condition. He never flinched, he never begged, and he never questioned why or for what.

  "You have seen more than most people speak of in dreams," Kaelith said to Sora, finally breaking the silence between them in the room.

  There was no reply from Sora, only the blink of his eyes meeting hers when he heard Kaelith's words.

  Not wanting it to be awkward, Kaelith reached into her pouch and took out the small piece of jerky Sora had given her earlier.

  Kaelith tossed the jerky towards Sora, and Sora caught it easily.

  "Eat, silent hero. I won't be dragging your corpse if you fall later."

  Sora only nodded slightly and ate what she had given him, even though he knew the jerky was from him originally.

  Kaelith sighed as if she didn't know what to do, looking up at the ceiling of the room.

  "This world... it used to have meaning. The Borreal kingdom... was not just a kingdom. It used to be the only kingdom that was a beacon, or more precisely, a home for its people. Then something changed when the world met its destruction, including my former home, which was destroyed by something that came from beneath the stone and earth. Suddenly, we were no longer humans living peacefully; we turned into something I cannot said and began to think only of our own safety over any close family."

  Kaelith's voice trembled slightly as she finally told a story she didn't want to tell anyone. She stood, gripping her bow tighter.

  "You don't know what it's like to scream, do you? And have no one hear you as you watch everything rot and are told to just keep smiling to get through it?"

  Kaelith turned to Sora and spoke again. "But I think... maybe you do know, and that's why you keep walking with every burden you never speak of, right?"

  Sora, hearing this, could say nothing but step closer to Kaelith. And slowly, he placed Kaelith's hand on his chest. Kaelith, surprised by this action, felt something strange from the depths of her heart.

  Sora did this not to get closer to Kaelith, but as a gesture of what he wanted to say but couldn't, a promise he made that was never heard by anyone, and without words, only a person's understanding of him.

  Kaelith just looked down at the gesture after seeing Sora's action towards her face. And for the first time, something in Kaelith's eyes saw a gentle side that Sora possessed as a human being.

  Kaelith, feeling entranced by it, immediately averted her gaze as her heart began to beat faster, and she stepped forward towards the door next to the stone map wall and said to Sora with an awkward and soft tone.

  "We're going to enter that gate after this. Are you ready? And maybe..." she said, her voice now calmer, but Kaelith paused, wanting to continue her interrupted sentence.

  They both knew it was not just a 'maybe' but a test to know the truth in detail through their own eyes, to see what was really hidden behind this door that no one wanted to talk about, a long-buried truth.