Lord of the Foresaken
Chapter 72: NEW DAWN

Chapter 72: NEW DAWN

The smoldering ruins of the ritual site stretched across the once-verdant valley like a festering wound. Where ancient trees had stood for millennia, now only blackened stumps remained, their charred fingers reaching skyward in silent accusation. The air itself seemed heavier, laden with the metallic tang of arcane residue and the bitter scent of ash. Not even the carrion birds dared approach this place of power and devastation.

Reed opened his eyes to this ruined landscape, his consciousness swimming back from whatever void had claimed it. Every nerve ending in his body screamed with unfamiliar sensation. His skin felt too tight, too sensitive—as if he had been flayed and poorly reassembled. Beneath his flesh, something pulsed with rhythms that did not match his heartbeat.

"You feel it too." Shia’s voice came from somewhere to his right, a statement rather than a question.

Reed turned to find her sitting cross-legged atop a shattered column. Her once-olive skin now possessed an ashen undertone, with faint luminescent veins tracing patterns beneath. Her eyes—gods, her eyes—had become pools of obsidian light, the irises fractured like cracked gemstones.

"What happened to us?" Reed whispered, already knowing the answer but needing to hear it spoken aloud.

Shia’s lips curled into what might have been a smile on her former face. Now, with her altered features, it appeared more like a predatory grimace. "We survived. We changed. We became what was necessary."

Reed looked down at his hands. The artifact fragments—six ancient relics of power beyond comprehension—had melded with his flesh. Where once they had been distinct objects clutched in desperate fingers, they were now part of him, their arcane geometries fused into the whorls of his skin. Beneath the surface, they pulsed with a cold, alien light.

"The Unmaker is gone," Reed said, "but not destroyed."

"No," Shia agreed, sliding from her perch with unnatural grace. "Not destroyed. Merely... severed. And we are changed. Watchwards, as the ancient texts named those who came before us."

Reed tried to stand, his new body responding with uncanny precision. He felt stronger, his senses sharper—yet somehow removed, as if experiencing everything through the thinnest layer of ice.

"I can hear your thoughts," he said suddenly, realizing that some of the impressions in his mind were not his own.

Shia nodded, her movements fluid and predatory. "And I yours. We are bound now, in ways perhaps no two beings have been before. Your blood, my blood. Your power, my power."

In the distance, Reed could see figures making their way cautiously toward them—survivors from the evacuation. He recognized the crimson banners of Astoria, the green standards of the Forest Kingdoms, even the tattered black flags of the Desolation. All had come to witness the ritual. All now approached to survey what remained.

"They fear us," Reed observed, plucking the emotion from the air like a scent.

"As they should," Shia replied, her voice echoing strangely in both the air and Reed’s mind. "We are no longer entirely human. No longer entirely goblin. We are something... else."

The recovery efforts spread across three kingdoms over the following weeks. The ritual’s backlash had torn holes in reality itself, leaving pockets of distorted space where the laws of nature bent and twisted. In some places, gravity reversed. In others, time flowed backward or sideways. The affected lands were cordoned off with runic barriers, the inhabitants evacuated to overcrowded refugee camps.

Reed and Shia traveled between these broken places, their transformed bodies uniquely capable of navigating the twisted realities. Where they walked, stability followed—temporarily, at least. The artifacts embedded in their flesh resonated with the damaged fabric of existence, allowing them to stitch together the worst tears.

"This isn’t sustainable," Reed said as they finished sealing a temporal anomaly outside the village of Thorncleft. The effort had left both of them drained, their shared consciousness flickering like a candle in a draft. "We can seal these breaches, but more appear daily."

"The aftershocks will continue for some time," Shia replied, kneeling to examine a flower that had aged, bloomed, withered, and regrown in the span of seconds before stabilizing. "The ritual was never meant to be interrupted. When we altered its purpose—"

"We damaged the framework," Reed finished, feeling her thoughts intertwine with his. The sensation was still disorienting—like speaking and being spoken to simultaneously.

Their shared consciousness had become both blessing and curse. In battle against the reality distortions, they functioned as one perfect being, their movements synchronized with inhuman precision. But in quieter moments, the boundaries between their separate identities blurred. Reed sometimes found himself thinking in Shia’s patterns, recalling memories of goblin childhood rituals he had never experienced. Shia, likewise, occasionally slipped into Reed’s mannerisms, her hands moving through the practiced motions of arcane gestures she had never been taught.

"We’re becoming something new," she said aloud, her fingers intertwining with his as the artifacts in their flesh pulsed in sympathetic rhythm. "Neither fully ourselves, nor fully each other."

Reed looked down at their joined hands. Where their skin touched, the embedded artifacts glowed brighter, veins of power intertwining like lovers.

"I don’t regret it," he said softly.

"No," she agreed, her alien eyes meeting his. "Neither do I."

The return to Goblin’s Hollow came after a month of healing work across the blighted lands. Once a hidden refuge, a place of shame and exile for Shia’s people, the underground settlement had transformed. Word of what had happened at the ritual site—garbled and mythologized as it was—had spread. The goblin enclave that had once hidden from human persecution now found itself elevated to legendary status.

As Reed and Shia approached the hidden entrance among the ancient roots of the Grandfather Tree, they found an honor guard waiting—not just goblins, but humans as well. Knights in the livery of three kingdoms stood alongside goblin warriors, all bearing ceremonial arms.

"The saviors return," announced Elder Trask, his wizened features betraying both awe and fear as he approached. The ancient goblin, once Shia’s mentor and critic, now bowed deeply. "The Watchwards who severed the Unmaker."

Reed felt Shia’s discomfort through their bond. This worship is unearned, her thoughts whispered into his. We did not destroy the threat. We merely postponed it.

And yet we must use their respect, Reed thought back. If we are to prepare them for what may still come.

The procession led them down into the heart of Goblin’s Hollow, now transformed. Where once the goblins had lived in cramped, hidden chambers, now the caverns had been expanded. Diplomatic envoys from human kingdoms occupied newly carved chambers. Trade goods lined passages that had once been kept deliberately obscure.

"The world has changed," Elder Trask explained as they walked. "When the skies tore open and the ground split, when the Unmaker’s shadow fell across the land—distinctions between goblin and human seemed suddenly trivial. Now kingdoms that once hunted our kind seek our knowledge of the old magics."

They entered the central chamber, where the Heart-Stone—the sacred center of goblin culture—pulsed with renewed vigor. Around it stood representatives from a dozen human realms, each wearing ceremonial garb and solemn expressions.

"The Conclave of Kingdoms awaits you," Elder Trask said, gesturing toward the gathered dignitaries. "They wish to honor the Watchwards who saved us all."

Reed stepped forward, feeling the weight of expectation press down upon him. These were the same kingdoms that had dismissed his warnings months ago. The same powers that had persecuted Shia’s people for generations. Now they stood in reverence, offering tribute and alliance.

They know nothing of what truly happened, Shia’s thoughts touched his. They believe the threat is ended.

Then we must tell them the truth, Reed replied silently.

He raised his hand, the embedded artifacts glowing beneath his skin, casting eerie shadows across the cavern walls. The assembled representatives fell silent.

"We thank you for this honor," Reed began, his voice carrying strange harmonics that hadn’t been present before his transformation. "But we come not to receive your praise. We come to warn you."

A murmur ran through the crowd. From the corner of his eye, Reed saw Elder Trask stiffen.

"The ritual did not destroy the enemy," Reed continued. "It merely severed its connection to our world. And in doing so, we have become its primary targets."

"The artifacts that we now carry," Shia added, stepping forward to stand beside Reed, "remain the keys that could allow the Unmaker’s return. We have been transformed into guardians—Watchwards—but we are not invulnerable."

"What are you saying?" demanded a nobleman in the blue and silver of Astoria. "That the threat remains?"

Reed and Shia exchanged a glance, their shared consciousness momentarily focused on a single memory: the final moments of the ritual, when they had felt something fragment, something infiltrate...

"We are saying," Reed said gravely, "that our victory was incomplete."

"And that something worse may be coming," Shia finished.

The cavern erupted in fearful murmurs. Questions were shouted from all directions. Demands for explanation, for reassurance.

Amid the chaos, Reed felt a sudden, sharp pain lance through his chest. He gasped, doubling over. Through their link, he felt Shia experience the same agony. The artifacts embedded in their flesh pulsed rapidly, painfully, as if responding to some distant call.

"Reed?" Elder Trask approached cautiously. "What troubles you?"

Reed couldn’t answer. His vision blurred, replaced by flashing images: a distant mountain range he didn’t recognize, a storm of unnatural colors, a tear in the fabric of reality—and beyond it, watching, waiting, a presence of such malevolence that even its attention caused physical pain.

Shia gripped his arm, her own face contorted in shared agony. Through clenched teeth, she managed to whisper: "It’s found another way in."

As suddenly as it had come, the vision faded. Reed and Shia stood trembling in the silent cavern, aware that all eyes were upon them.

"What just happened?" demanded the Astorian nobleman.

Reed looked up, meeting the man’s gaze with eyes that now swirled with eldritch power. "The fragment we couldn’t account for—the piece of the Unmaker that remained hidden—it’s awake."

"And it’s not alone," Shia added, her voice hollow with dread. "Something followed us back when we cut the connection."

From deep within Reed’s transformed flesh, one of the artifacts began to move of its own accord, shifting beneath his skin like a living thing seeking escape. The pain was excruciating, but Reed barely noticed it—his attention was captured by the artifact’s response to an impossible presence.

"It’s here," he whispered, as blood began to seep from beneath his fingernails. "It’s been here all along."

Every light in Goblin’s Hollow flickered simultaneously. The Heart-Stone’s steady pulse faltered for one terrible moment. And in that instant of darkness, something whispered directly into the minds of every being present—a voice like the void between stars, like the cold that exists before the concept of warmth.

I AM FRAGMENTED, BUT I ENDURE. AND NOW, I KNOW WHERE YOU HIDE.