Stellan stood on the top deck of his ship as his warfleet sailed the ink-black Northern Seas. The moon hung bright and bulbous in the night sky. As an Inheritor who had reached the Fourth Awakening, it was easy for him to gather allies to his cause. People flocked to strength in the Myriad Seas, after all, even if none of them knew the true motivation behind his actions. They couldn't. Even knowing the truth would introduce an element of unpredictability he couldn't abide by. Regardless, the Sea Witch had pointed him in the right direction, and it was his job to carry out the horrifying actions required of him. He couldn't burden anyone else with the knowledge he possessed, not least because of the possibility they would disagree with the course he had chosen and try to stop him. He couldn't allow that. He was doing the right thing.

He had to be.

His warfleet numbered seven ships in total, a sizable force by anyone's reckoning, and his flagship was the crown jewel of his collection. Forcibly liberated from an upstart pirate king, the Windrunner was a behemoth of a ship, capable of carrying over a hundred soldiers and sailors. It was his impregnable floating fortress, a weapon in itself that had won him many a battle. He heard a loud bang behind him, and turned to see the vessel's captain walking towards him from below deck, having obviously kicked the door so hard it nearly came off its hinges. Kaidal Wrensong was his second-in-command, and the strongest Inheritor of his forces besides himself, being at the peak of her Third Awakening. She stood nearly as tall as Stellan, but not as broad. She had a handsome face marked with a variety of small white scars and skin a few shades darker than Stellan, who was from the Southern seas. She made a half-hearted salute before clapping Stellan on the back, running a hand through her short-cropped hair as she did so.

"We're making good time and should reach Cissic territory within a few days, but some of our crew are still wondering why we're doing this. Want me to crack a few heads?"

Stellan chuckled, Kaidal's loyalty adding a bit of warmth to his bleak circumstances.

"Don't worry" he said, putting his arm around her in return. "They'll find out soon enough". He couldn't return the same friendly pat on the back she had given him out of fear of injuring his friend. The difference between the Third and Fourth Awakenings was stark, after all. He turned away to bark orders at the navigators, but was interrupted when Kaidal suddenly stiffened in alarm, before her voice rang out with a fear in it he had never heard from her before.

"Stellan?"

He turned back quickly. Anything that could worry Kaidal was sure to be a serious threat. "Yes?" he said.

"Who's that?"

Confused, Stellan looked across the foredeck, and then saw what Kaidal had been so scared of.

A man he had never seen before stood there, leaning casually against the ship's mast. He wore ornate black robes trimmed with gold, which contrasted sharply against his pale skin. Black veins stood out on his hands, but somehow Stellan couldn't make out his face. The stranger wore no mask or hood to obscure it, but Stellan's eyes simply could not focus on his blurry features. Some kind of Bloodline trait? But I don't sense any Essence from him at all. How?

He didn't understand. His four-times-enhanced senses should have been able to perceive anyone coming for miles off, and in any case, there was nothing around them but the vast Northern Seas. Even if the sun had been out there'd be no land in sight. Where had he come from? Stellan was sure there had been no stowaways on his fleet, and certainly not on his flagship. He was about to shout out a warning to the strange man before he was beaten to the punch by a voice that reminded him of a snake's nest hissing in unison. The man didn't raise his voice, but it carried easily over the Windrunner ensuring everyone heard it.

"Greetings, Stellan Sigurdsson. I wish I was here on lighter business, but unfortunately for you, I'm not. I simply cannot allow you to succeed in your quest. The bindings of the Cycle have finally grown weaker, and you will not jeopardise my freedom. Please keep in mind that I have the utmost respect for what you have achieved while I rip you all to pieces." He'd never once looked at Stellan while he had been talking, but Stellan could feel him watching.

Stunned silence hung in the air on the Windrunner before the whole crew attacked as one. Every member had attained at least their Second Awakening, and this was made clear by the sheer force of the attacks the stranger endured over the next few seconds. Bloodforged bodies struck at him with full force, both armed and unarmed, and the few who had reached their Third summoned the powers of their various different Bloodlines and directed them straight at the man.

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Wind, fire, light, and many more such abilities engulfed the pale man in a conflagration of power that may have even killed Stellan himself if he had been caught off-guard in such a manner.

It may as well have been piss on a bonfire for all the damage it did.

The man drifted away from the opaque cloud of power with a terrifying grace, before grabbing the nearest crewmember's head and tearing it clean off his shoulders with one ivory hand.

Anders Roper, a wife and three children. Two boys and a girl said a small voice in the back of Stellan's mind, as he tried to process how quickly everything had gone wrong.

To their credit, Stellan's soldiers did not stop in the face of his otherworldly power, but it had very quickly become clear that there was nothing they could do to harm this man. As he tore through them a warm knife through butter it became abundantly clear that he was a tier above them. Then again, so was Stellan.

He drew on the power of the Cycle, flooding his body with the Soulstream Essence that fuelled their world. Kaidal did the same beside him, and the two leapt into battle from above. They fell upon the stranger like two angry gods, with enough power between them to level a building.

The ivory man grabbed Kaidal out of midair by her throat and kicked Stellan in the gut in one smooth motion.

Stellan flew backwards, crashing through the deck with enough force to turn the previously solid wood to dust. He lay on the floor of the lower deck for a moment, his head full of a high-pitched whine which drowned out his hearing. Just for a moment, though. Rage flooded his body as he drew upon the power of his Bloodline, and a deep growl emerged from his throat as his transformation took hold.

Seconds later, an enormous white lion leapt from the hole he had crashed through as Stellan re-joined the battlefield. His leonine heart dropped, however, when he saw what had happened to Kaidal in his absence.

The faceless man peeked his head out from behind her body and smiled at Stellan, his fist speared through her stomach. Almost as an afterthought, the man tossed her aside, his hand making a wet schik sound as it left her. The rest of Stellan's crew were scattered in bloody chunks around him.

Despair gripped Stellan. His oldest friend had just died in front of him, and he hadn't even been there to help her. Not for the first time since his voyage, he felt powerless. Reigning in his fury, he addressed the terror.

"Who are you, stranger? Why are you doing this?"

Stellan still couldn't see his face, but he could tell when the man smiled.

"My dear Stellan, the longer you live in this world the question of who becomes far less important, especially if you've been here as long as I have. Names come and go, but I suppose for now the title you've given me serves adequately. You can call me the Stranger. As for why... well. I don't waste words on dead men." With that, the newly titled Stranger leapt at Stellan, and the warlord responded in kind.

The two met in the air above the ship with a clash that sent shockwaves out across the sea.

Stellan's Divine Lion Bloodline placed him in the upper echelons of Inheritors in terms of brute force. Even many of the Fifth Awakening were inferior to him in this respect. Even so, he was driven back again by the Stranger, blown downwards, deeper into the deck of the ship, his bones creaking under the force of the collision. The impact had felt wrong somehow, as if he had been attacking dirt or mud, rather than flesh and bone.

He hadn't been bested without cost, however, as four bloody streaks were carved into his opponent's torso from hip to shoulder, courtesy of Stellan's foot-long claws.

Once again, Stellan could somehow tell when the Stranger grimaced despite his obscured face. He ran his stark-white fingers over his wounds and looked at his own blood in the moonlight. It was black as ink. He started speaking to himself absently, no longer addressing Stellan.

"Ah. I'm weaker than I realised. With the Cycle as it is I thought... no matter. Another decade or so and there'll be no one on this planet who can match me."

The Stranger leapt into the air again, this time away from Stellan as the lion picked himself up from the shattered deck, before forcing the fingers of his right hand into the wood of the mast to hold himself in place. With his left, he made a up motion using his index and middle finger. Nothing happened.

Stellan heard the Stranger sigh from over a hundred feet away.

"Sorry. They live quite deep under the surface, so it can sometimes take a moment to – "

Dozens of massive tentacles the width of ancient trees exploded from the deep, wrapping themselves around the surrounding ships as the sounds of splintering wood echoed across the water. Stellan staggered as the Windrunner listed left.

The Stranger laughed loudly, the sound cold, mocking, and inhuman, before looking straight at Stellan with his face still obscured. However, the haze wasn't as good a disguise as it had been just a few minutes earlier. Gaps in the fog had formed, through which slices of the Strangers face could be seen. It was in this way that Stellan caught a glimpse of something very dark, very hungry, and very, very old.

Maybe the sea monster isn't such a bad way to go after all.

The Stranger's laughter continued as the Windrunner sunk further into the water.

"Better late than never, eh? Unfortunately for you, Stellan, there's an infinitesimally small chance you may win if we continue our battle now, and I don't quite care enough about you to risk dying at your hands. These beasts of the deep will have to do as your killers. Rest easy though, you'll never have to carry out the deed you fear so much – ah, here's my ride."

The Stranger cut himself off as a massive, winged beast descended from the sky above them. It was a twisted creature that resembled an eagle, only covered in rotting scales instead of feathers, and possessing the circular maw of a leech rather than a beak. The Stranger leapt again onto the creature's back, laughing as he did so.

Stellan tensed the muscles of his lion-body, preparing himself to make a final attempt to kill this destroyer. Somehow, he knew this would be his only chance. Before he could do so, however, more tendrils emerged from the deep and wrapped themselves around him, holding him tight. As the Stranger flew away on dark wings, he called out one more time.

"Bye-bye! Be careful. It's cold down there."

Stellan had just enough time to hear his ship shatter around him before he was dragged down into the depths.

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