Kaimana stood knee-deep in ashen mud, the sky boiling red above him. The roar of battle rang in his ears, a ceaseless thunder of shrieking dragons, screaming warriors, and the crash of collapsing palisades. His ribs ached; he coughed up blood. The haft of his broken spear was slippery in his hands as he lurched forward through the charred husks of what had once been lush coastal mangroves. Embers danced across the surface of the tide, smoldering debris that stank of salt, burnt kelp, and charred flesh.

He had been a stable-hand once, years ago—just a nameless boy sweeping manure from hatchling dens. He remembered that life vaguely, the scent of warm hay, and the tiny squeaks of newly hatched dragons pressing their beaks to his palm. Such memories tasted like a distant dream. Tonight, on the eve of annihilation, Kaimana was nothing but a foot soldier in ragged attire, scabs for armor, and fear gripping his heart. The Nuku-Ra Compact’s grand army—the confederation that claimed unity among the islands—had splintered. Great heroes had fallen. Commanders he had once admired lay dead or fled into the jungle. Almost no one remained to take a stand against the raiders.

A silhouette rose before him, outlined by the infernal glow of volcanic fires in the hills. The invader wore a helmet of hammered iron, his face hidden behind a mask carved with snarling serpents. He hefted a wicked blade the length of Kaimana’s arm. Another Járnsál warrior—one of the northern raiders who had arrived at dusk in wave after wave of longboats, each disgorging iron-helmed killers and their savage dragons. The northerner’s breath steamed in the heated air. He advanced slowly, savoring the sight of an exhausted and outmatched opponent.

Kaimana’s legs trembled. He could see the enemy’s dragon—a lean, ice-pale beast—circling overhead, its roar sending tremors through the mangrove roots. The Nuku-Ra warriors who had taken flight were gone now, their dragons shot down by runic spears or driven away in panic. Kaimana had never earned a dragon-bond himself. He had never even managed to awaken his Koroki seed—his dormant elemental spark. He was just a castoff conscript who had been pressed into the militia once the chain of command collapsed.

If he fled, he’d be cut down from behind. If he stood his ground, he’d be carved apart. For all his longing to be a hero, Kaimana had never risen above his station. He had no elemental arts to call upon—no gust of wind to deflect the blade, no tide of water to shield him, no molten flame to blaze a path of escape. Around him, screams cut short as others of the Nuku-Ra fell. In the distance he caught a glimpse of a battered war canoe overturned, its occupants strewn like driftwood across the mud. This was the end of everything he’d known.

The northerner growled a command Kaimana couldn’t understand. The man swung his blade in a mocking arc, as if inviting Kaimana to make a move. The stable-hand turned soldier tried to raise his broken spear, but his arms shook so badly the point wavered. His enemy laughed, a harsh, barking sound. The dragon overhead shrieked, its pale form casting a long shadow across the charred flats.

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Something cracked in Kaimana’s chest—rage, fear, regret, all tangling into a knot of hopeless emotion. He made a desperate lunge. The northerner was too quick. A gauntleted hand caught Kaimana’s wrist, crushing it. The spear shaft dropped with a dull thud. The invader’s knee slammed into Kaimana’s ribs and sent him sprawling on his back, gasping. His vision blurred as hot pain arced through his body. He spat blood into the mud and tried to crawl away, fingers clawing at soggy ash, desperately seeking any weapon—a stone, a shard of bone, anything.

Then came the heavy footstep and the cold press of a blade against his neck. Kaimana looked up. The raider’s eyes, visible through the helmet’s slits, were pale and pitiless. Far behind the warrior, the ocean glowed with reflected flames. The island’s once-lush canopies had collapsed into blackened skeletons of trees. He could see shapes moving—perhaps the last defenders being hunted down. It made him sick, knowing he had survived this long just to die pointlessly.

He thought of Mako’o, the timid hatchling he had once fed scraps of fish in the old stable. In another life, if he had been braver, if he had tried harder to be chosen as a warrior-apprentice… maybe he would’ve bonded with that dragon and soared above this battlefield as a protector, not a victim. Maybe he could’ve warned the leaders of the Compact before the invasion fell like a hammer. Maybe he could’ve averted this fate.

But “maybe” had no place here. He was going to die, and the future—the one he had not the strength to shape—would burn in these flames. His heart sank.

The northerner tensed, arm muscles bunching beneath mail and leather. The blade pressed closer. Kaimana shut his eyes, tears escaping the corners. He felt the sword bite into his skin. Pain. Despair.

A final roar filled the night—dragons and men howling amid cinders and ruin. The noise crashed into silence as if the world’s voice had been snuffed out. In that quiet instant, the sword finished its work.

Kaimana died with the taste of ash in his throat.

The darkness that followed death was strangely calm. He drifted without shape, memory stripping away. Yet some ember of consciousness clung on, refusing to vanish. Inside that endless void, he realized something: he could still feel regret. He could still form thought. Had his spirit not passed on? Was there no afterlife waiting to claim him?

It seemed an eternity before he felt a stirring. A distant sound, like the gentle hush of ocean waves against a sandy shore. He tried to remember the last time he had heard such a soothing noise. Before the war, before the raids, before the screams. Long ago, when he was just a boy.

The darkness cracked, light seeping in through tiny fractures. The hush of waves grew louder, and alongside it came the faint scent of salt, of damp straw… and hatchling musk.

He knew that smell. It was imprinted on his youth. Not the stench of burning forests or the iron tang of blood—but fresh, coastal breezes and dragon nests lined with dried kelp. How could he smell it now, after death?

In the final flicker of that timeless void, the embers of Kaimana’s regret sparked into something new: a question, a longing, and a faint, mad hope.

Then the darkness shattered completely.