What Remains After Fire

4E 201 | Late Sun's Dusk | Eighty-Six Days Since Arrival

The dragon dissolved into bone.

Flesh became ash and golden-white energy poured into Noctis. The soul struck him like a storm, lifting dust and torn banners around the ruins. An ancient roar echoed where no living throat remained.

Tsukihana's power reacted. The marks tightened across her skin.

She closed her eyes and breathed out.

"Enough."

The aura folded inward. The black lines vanished. She dropped to one knee, shaking but conscious.

Katana checked her pupils, breathing, and memory in rapid succession.

Noctis searched the dead mages and found ritual marks carved into their flesh. The Forsworn had not intended to worship the dragon forever. They meant to bind it with old occult magic.

"Nothing good comes from people who believe a dragon is a tool," he said.

Tsukihana stood and sheathed her sword in one clean motion.

She looked at the dead.

"Since I came to this land, there has been one fight after another. Blood, curses, graves, war. Is that all Skyrim is?"

Noctis studied the mountain road.

"Violence is loud," he said. "A town surviving winter never becomes a song. A healer staying beside a sick child is not carved into a palace wall. Burn a village, kill a king, wake something buried—everyone remembers."

Tsukihana thought of Zaria's potions, Runil's blessing, Inigo's jokes, Katana sleeping beside her bed.

"Skyrim is cruel," Noctis continued. "But that is not all it is. Walk long enough."

A dying Forsworn mage coughed beneath a fallen beam.

"The wyrm was not the offering," he whispered.

His eyes fixed on Tsukihana.

"The red moon has opened. Seven masks. Seven graves. The city beneath stone."

He died after naming the sword and what slept inside her.

Noctis revealed that the masked man he followed had taken a trail deeper into the mountains.

Exhaustion argued against pursuit.

The Calamities being ahead of them argued louder.

They followed.