Subsection: "Whispers in the Dark"
The wind howled through the ruins long after nightfall, but Hatku couldn't sleep. Tashina lay curled beside the fire, blade at her side, breath slow and steady. She looked peaceful in sleep—a fragile illusion that didn't match the killer she had become or the horrors they had both endured.
Hatku stood and stepped outside. The stars above shimmered like distant scars across the night sky. Somewhere in those stars, the gods watched. Amused. Bored. Waiting.
He clenched his fists.
Kill the Ultimate Being. Free your mother.
The words rang louder in the stillness of night. No one knew who the Ultimate Being was. Not even the ones chosen to hunt. And he wasn't ready to tell Tashina. Not yet.
He walked to the old oak stump. Placed a hand on the scorched bark. The faint warmth still there made his stomach churn. Their mother had been here. Recently. The beast she had become—he could almost feel it. Smell it in the air.
He stared into the woods. "Are you still watching us?" he whispered. "Or hiding from what you've become?"
Behind him, Tashina's voice broke the silence. "I saw the claw marks near the well."
Hatku turned.
"You didn't say anything," he replied.
"I didn't need to," she said, stepping closer. "You already knew."
He nodded slowly.
"She's alive. Twisted, yes. But not gone."
Tashina knelt beside the stump. "I used to dream about her... still human. Smiling. Now I wake up hearing growls."
Hatku didn't speak. His silence said enough.
After a long pause, she asked, "Do you think there's still a way to bring her back?"
Hatku hesitated. "There's always a way. The question is what it will cost."
She studied him, as if hearing something deeper in his voice. But she didn't press.
Not yet.
Subsection: "The Sealed Memory"
They left the next morning, following a hidden path deep into the Whispering Expanse—a forest so dense even light struggled to get through. Hatku remembered it vaguely from childhood. Tashina said there was something buried there. Something their father once told her to find if everything ever went wrong.
They moved in silence, blades at the ready. Every crack of a branch sounded like a warning. Every shadow a threat.
It took hours, but eventually, they reached a clearing swallowed by ivy and root. At its center was a stone altar, cracked down the middle, and a broken seal carved with their family crest.
"Father called it the Memory Vault," Tashina said, stepping forward. "He said it would only open if both of us stood here."
Hatku joined her, laying a hand on the seal. The moment he did, the air shifted.
A pulse of energy shot through the clearing. The altar rumbled.
Then opened.
Inside, wrapped in dark cloth and bound with glowing runes, was a journal.
Tashina reached for it slowly. "It's in his handwriting…"
She opened it. The first page bore only one line:
"If the gods turn against you, find the truth beneath the lies."
They flipped through pages filled with war strategies, notes on ancient relics, and mentions of the Universal Gods. Diagrams of power origins. Drawings of a symbol Hatku didn't recognize—until it glowed faintly under his touch.
"I've seen this before," he said, tracing it. "In one of the arenas. Behind the altar of judgment."
Tashina's eyes widened. "It's a crest. But not of the gods."
Hatku nodded. "It's something older."
He felt it then—that same uneasy pull he'd felt since losing his power. As if the journal itself had weight, and the more he touched it, the closer he came to something… forbidden.
The truth was unraveling.
And it didn't belong to the gods.
Subsection: "Echoes of What's to Come"
By dusk, they camped again, hidden under an overhang of roots and stone.
Tashina read quietly while Hatku sharpened his blade. The journal sat between them like a ghost come home.
"Do you ever wonder what life would've been like… if none of this happened?" she asked suddenly.
Hatku paused. "All the time."
"I think I would've become a healer," she said with a tired smile. "Or a baker."
He chuckled softly. "You burn tea."
"Exactly. What a disaster I would've been."
They both laughed—soft, broken sounds—but real.
Then silence.
Hatku looked up at the stars once more. Somewhere out there, the Ultimate Being existed. And he knew—when the time came—he'd have to choose between freeing his mother and protecting the only family he had left.
But not yet.
Tonight, they still had each other.
And the fire still burned.