There it was. That old emptiness. Barely took three days. Just stepping on the same ground seemed to drain him. Like the soil itself was alive, bleeding his soul from the bottom of his feet.


    The morning light was golden along the horizon, the wind’s howl replaced by the distant cries of a hawk. He shrugged the weight of Phaos higher along his shoulders, his right hand locked around the hilt.


    The fields that’d been full of wheat had been replaced by rows of saplings. The young of trees felled months prior. Bark and wooden shards lay scattered across the dark soil, the natural forest line standing tall on the far edge. Towering like a wooden wall. Left to watch their own be grown and felled every few years. Verac clenched his jaws, glancing to the side.


    He stopped. There, atop the nearest hill, stood a lone creature amidst swaying stalks of grass. Its black fur rippled in the breeze, golden eyes fixed on Verac. As if it had been waiting for him to notice. It was strange seeing a wolf all alone, especially one that size.


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    It almost looks like…


    His spine pulsed. He shook his head, and walked on. Claye was the man to believe in phantoms. And if Zorn was still alive, he would face him again. Sooner or later. He tightened his grip on the sword, teeth baring. This time, he’d make sure he stayed dead.


    But what are the chances?


    Dagny. Just the name was enough for his throat to ache. As if the memory was choking him.


    She… was killed in New Eden. Saxa vanished. The fang awoke in his spine. Then, not even a week later, he finds out about a Harbinger that’d been hiding in Whetalon for the past decade. And then…


    He glanced back at the hill, and the wolf was gone.