Peter picked up a wine bottle from under the table, turning it slowly in his hands. The label was old and peeling-something he had kept for years but never opened.
With a sigh, he uncorked it and poured a glass, watching the deep liquid swirl.
"To old friends..."
He muttered, raising the glass to the empty room before taking a long sip. The warmth of the wine burned his chest, but it didn't ease the weight pressing on his shoulders.
He poured himself another glass. To drink away the sorrow that found its way into his heart.
"I'm not made for this."
But even as he said the words, he had made a promise. He was in a great debt to both Esme and Velkaar.
Another glass he poured.
"How the hell do you raise a dragon?"
He said to the surrounding darkness.
The wine burned on the way down, but it didn't warm him. Nothing really did anymore.
His fingers tightened around the glass.
And slammed it into the table, breaking it into many shards.
The shards scattered like stars across the wood, a few biting into his skin. He didn't flinch. He just stared at the blood coming out of his palm, trickling down to the floor.
He leaned back, closing his eyes.
"I was a soldier once. Not some grand general or noble hero-just another blade among thousands. Fought in the front lines when I was barely old enough to shave."
His voice was quiet.
"Back then, we didn't know what was waiting for us. What was stalking us, waiting for a chance to devour everything."
He let out a bitter laugh and ran his hand through his hair, ignoring the streak of red he left behind.
"In the beginning, they appeared without warning. Villages vanished overnight. Towns fell within hours. No one knew what they were-only that they came with the raven darkness and left nothing behind but ash."
Peter's gaze turned distant, as though he were staring straight through the walls of the manor, into memories long buried.
"We called them the Nytherak."
He shook his head.
"I don't even remember why we called them that."
He leaned forward, resting his elbows on the desk, hands clasped.
"We were children, playing at war... and the monsters reminded us how small we were."
Peter fell silent.
"They weren't beasts or demons. They were something worse. Something we couldn't understand. Twisted forms-each created to be the bane of a race."
He rubbed his eyes, exhaustion weighing down his voice. He opened his mouth.
"Drakhaliths. Shivorne. Nyss'Vahl. Abyzekh. Thalmyrr. Gralvorn. Veyrahn"
Peter spoke the names like curses etched into his soul, each one carrying the weight of blood and memory.
"Drakhaliths... made to slay dragons. Tall as a dragon, having the appearance of a stingray. I saw one rip through a flight of dragons like they were birds."
He leaned back, the chair creaking beneath him.
"Shivorne. Nightmare of men. Beautiful, terrible. They'd infiltrate cities, take on our faces. You'd trust one like a friend... until it tore off your limb one by one."
His voice dropped lower.
"Nyss'Vahl... bane of elves. Their limbs, too long, too thin, bending in ways no creature should. Everything they touched withered away."
Peter chuckled.
"They were one hell of a scary abomination... I saw one once-just one-and I still hear the silence it left behind. Not a bird. Not a breeze."
He shivered.
"Gralvorn, hell of the dwarfs. They tunneled through stone with ease, twisting the land like butter. The dwarves tried to fight them underground. Tried..."
He took out another glass from the cabinet under the desk.
"Thalmyrr, the calamity of the seas. After seeing them... we stopped travelling by water altogether."
He bit his lips.
"Abyzekh. Veyrahn ... Those weren't made for any one race. They were made to end everything. I only saw an Abyzekh once. The light died when it came near. Men screamed themselves to death just from the sound of it walking."
His eyes lost focus.
"I don't even remember how I survived. Just... the corpses. Piles of them. Some with shattered minds. Others..."
He paused, swallowing hard.
"Others who bit their own tongues to die faster. Anything to escape the Creature ."
Nothing remained of the wine. He has drunk the whole bottle.
"What keeps me up at night..."
He gripped the glass.
"Is that these abominations grow. They devour, they absorb, and they age. They learn from us. They weren't made to just kill. They were made to adapt."
Peter's voice was raw now, barely a whisper.
"Every time we fought them, they came back worse. Sharper. Smarter. Like they were remembering... like they were waiting."
He looked down at his hand, still trembling.
"And the worst part? We don't even know who made them... or why."
Suddenly he stood up. Out of his pocket, he pulled a white shard, given to him by Velessa when he was showing her around. An expression of raw anger appeared on his face. He threw it to the floor.
The shard hit the floor like thunder, sinking halfway into the splintered wood.
"Why?!"
He roared at the empty room, his voice echoing off the walls. He stood there, chest heaving, the vein on his neck pulsing. The silence that followed was thick, suffocating. The sound of blood dripping was the only thing breaking it.
Then he stared at the shard, now faintly glowing in the fractured floorboards.
"We sacrificed so much for these measly shards. Yet we don't even know what they do in the first place!"
Peter's hands trembled at his sides, clenched into fists. His voice cracked with a rage too tangled in grief to sound truly angry.
"We bled for them. Burned for them. Watched friends fall for them."
He stepped closer to the shard, its glow pulsing gently, mockingly.
"And for what?" he whispered, the weight of decades pressing down on his shoulders. "Hope? Power? A lie wrapped in light?"
He gazed outside, into the night sky again.
"Velkaar was our last hope..."
He crouched and picked up the shard. His blood splattered over the white, smooth surface. The shard reflected his eyes. His tired eyes.
"Tomorrow's going to be a mess..."