Now with the energy and wind at my feet, the island no longer loomed. It no longer held danger but instead, mysteries left for me to uncover. A cove of darkness once held every possible death humanly conceivable, only my imagination limited the evil at its core. It now held for me any treasure or power locked away for me to uncover.

Diving into the undergrowth, searching for clues to unlock my caged power, I searched every nook no matter how bleak, every cranny no matter how frightening.

With it came adventures and stories and people that would be a tale in themselves. This island held a race of people close to the ground with a soul and spirit that rivaled that of the hidden villagers of my past life. Those black fiends I battled from time to time were the products of puberty gone astray.

Not much older than children were those things, I couldn't even imagine the battle between one fully grown and allowed to develop.

With their help, I was able to achieve the soul of the mountain.

With this, I was granted my unmoving abilities, the passives that eased my nerves. Making me feel confident and secure in my unwavering peers of old. I could rest as if I no longer needed to be on edge.

Yet, I stayed there.

For the edge is all I know now.

Maybe when I get back when I return. When I see my guild…I hope they've managed, no I hope they've thrived without me.

After descending the Horned Peaks, in which a ritual of diabolical nature was underway and thwarted by the people of the island, and with my help, they pointed me to the lands of fiery flame. To where I might be able to find the soul of fire.

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Evocation, magefire, ambers of fallen snow, everything that could rain, did. This was the land of unmoving flame. It was a desolate place filled with beasts that grew exponentially strong due to simply surviving their surroundings.

Their people were ebony with eyes of gold with movements that mimicked the flames around them.

Then came the night I would never forget as if burned and charred into my being.

Off into the mountains, away from the rings of fire and the ponds of lava, rested inside the base of a mountain, this is where their homes resided.

I was not allowed entry at first, or the following week, or the months that followed those. It was only until I forged my domain, one in which men and beast fought for me, deep down in the underground of the nation of flame I ruled for how long, I could not say, because the day would end and the next day would begin without pause. War would be waged, won, then repeated.

This was their cycle of life.

I grew strong beyond compare.

Without respite, like a flame which burned indefinitely.

I fought, killed, survived, and thrived.

I became the Warlord of Ashe.

Once strong enough, once I had become a threat on the horizon, then I was granted an audience during their festival of favored flame.

They considered themselves the chosen ones. The golden light burned inside the sacred flame. I was the intruder, the foreigner who fought like a demon out of the fires of hell.

They looked down on me for my lack of birthright, but they respected my power.

I looked down on them because most of my men, of my people, were exiles and castaways. The men who I loved, who burned with a flame that cannot be ignored, were shunned by these snobs. I thought as I looked around and saw pretentiousness in every carved stone, in every balcony that hung, that jutted from the mountain. Their fires took the form of flowered glass. Of the beauty in the flame, not the power needed to be harnessed.

Smut and Ashe did not stain their garments. Fire without consequence, how idiotic, I thought

They have forgotten the true nature of flame: lost in the aesthetics of the wavering petal.

Do they not sense the heat?

The urgency and danger that is at the core of all flame?

Then, a trigger.

A text box

Teach the people of the wrath of fire.

Reward: Soul of Fire.

Nothing more was needed.

At the festival, a tournament was set. One in which I was offered a seat by the high priest of fire himself.

I denied it.

Instead, I asked if I could compete.

They smiled and bowed and nodded.

Their very essence told of a cocky nature that pressed into dangerous incompetence.

I grinned back with a cold fire in my eyes.