South. The term turned into a beat coursing through his veins a force essential as gravity itself. He passed borders unmarked on any chart abandoning the shattered rule of the Scarlet Kingdom. The mountains, in this region were distinct—ancient fatigued their summits smoothed by eras of sharp with resistance. The valleys stretched broader holding calm lakes that reflected the sky with a flawless clarity that seemed almost mocking. This marked the edge of the Alps, a region of peaceful settlements and vigilant gazes, where information from the north came slowly and twisted resembling echoes, within an intricate cavern.
He passed through it like a stone gliding over a lake landing when needed. He exchanged work for sustenance at a mill, where the wheel spun with the ceaseless, beat of the river. He aided a woman in fixing a stone wall his hands discovering a familiar sincere pain, in the task. He tended to listen than speak. The fear present was not yet the acute, political menace of Silberbrücke nor the empty quiet anxiety of Oberalp. It was a more profound unease—a feeling that the world's base was becoming fragile. They mentioned wells with a flavor dreams that were intensely clear and carried a lingering sorrow and children echoing phrases in unknown tongues.
He found himself in an inn beside the edge of a shadowy lake when the information eventually reached him. It arrived via a tinker his cart rattling with cookware and gossip.
"—open conflict in the Scarlet Kingdom!" the tinker declared to the gathering taking a mug of beer as his fee. "The Radiant Host and Queen Greta's personal guard, clashing in the streets of Silberbrücke! Rumor has it the Queen attempted to detain the Host's Legate, something about exceeding authority…. Perhaps it was vice versa. The Host now controls the bridge glowing like a sun. The palace is, under siege."
Alexander gripped his mug firmly. Nicolette's resolute stance, by the river had ignited the fire. Greta had aligned herself—not with the Angel. Opposing the breach of her autonomy. The neutral territory had dissolved into conflict.
"And the… the other matter?" inquired a farmer his tone subdued. "The silent illness?"
The tinker's expression grew grim. "It spreads. Not swiftly like a disease. Gradually like a shadow stretching out. Entire villages in the valleys simply… fall silent. The Host claims it's the Abyss's revenge, for the Queen's rebellion. The handful of people who escape report there are no beasts, the grey."
The room absorbed this with quiet. They witnessed the two conclusions starting to rip their reality apart.
"They say there's a man " the tinker continued, a sparkle in his eye. "A ghost some name him. Once the Angel's own Messenger,. He fled. He's spreading word that thiss n't a holy war but a… a decision, between two damnations. That we're all fuel."
Every gaze in the room shifted, gradually unavoidably to the figure, in the corner bearing tired eyes and worn journey-marked attire.
Alexander rose to his feet. The noise of the chair dragging across the stone floor was overwhelming. He placed a coin on the table. Stepped outside into the fresh evening breeze carrying the heaviness of their gazes, behind him.
He ceased to be a rumor. He became an established reality. Realities carried risks.
That night he departed the village by the lake returning to the paths once more. Yet an unfamiliar weariness was taking hold, one profound than soreness, in the muscles. It was the exhaustion of witnessing the avalanche start its descent and realizing you are one pebble caught in its course. His tale had been told,. It was overshadowed by the thunderous accounts of conflict and fear.
After three days compelled by a desire to gauge its magnitude to verify the accuracy of the tinkers claims through the atmospheres sensation he ascended a isolated pass that delineated the boundary, between the broken north and the uneasy south. From this ridge he observed two distinct weather patterns. Towards the north beyond the summits where the Scarlet Kingdom stood the sky appeared as a metallic yellow streaked with slender, elevated clouds that seemed carved by a heavenly knife. To the south the sky showed a typical blue yet at the horizon a layer of mist gripped the valleys, a mist that appeared excessively still unduly dense. The gray quietness, expanding.
He stood atop the backbone of the world the wind ripping through his garments and sensed the suffocating force of the clamp. The Angel's conflict from the north. The Abyss's calm from the south.. Within the shrinking band, between, the anxious quarrelsome realms of men now clashing amongst themselves.
The anguish felt like a burden pressing him down toward collapse. What was his shield in the face of this? What served as his testimony, against the roar of legions and the advancing silent grey?
He wished to shut his eyes. To bring it to an end.
Alternatively he chose the option available. He faced the wind drew in the rare air deeply and let out a scream.
It wasn't a word. It was a primal inexpressible noise. A cry from the depths of his soul opposing the silence opposing the chisel opposing the dreadful structure of everything. It was the voice of the girl, in Muotathal's fear of the mourning knight's sorrow, of Nicolette's yell of the hermit's persistent blossom. It was the sound he was striving to protect.
The breeze stole the noise tearing it apart into oblivion amidst the apathy of the mountains.
He dropped to his knees, panting, hollow.
At that moment he caught sight of it. A slight motion beneath in a desolate cirque midway along the southern incline. It was neither a man nor a Purifier. A stag, a creature adorned with a rack of antlers poised at the border of a section of the quiet grey mist creeping upward from the valley below. The stag scraped the earth with its hoof tossed its head then pivoted and sprang off retreating toward the vibrant greenery moving away, from the encroaching void.
It was an incident. A creature responding on instinct. Yet at that instant Alexander didn't view it as escape. As a decision. The stag had judged the grey. Opted for life no matter how scared, no matter how brief.
It was an uprising. It required no seer, no artifact, no legion. It demanded solely the desire to face the clamor and sprint toward it.
He forced himself up to stand. The overwhelming burden remained,. He realized he could bear it. He wasn't the head of the resistance. He wasn't the hero. He was simply the man, on the ridge observing the convergence of the weather fronts. His role wasn't to halt the tempest. To direct attention to the stag. To demonstrate that the decision, no matter how dire no matter how slight was still present.
He came down from the pass not heading into the mist but moving eastward along the lofty ridge. He had finished warning others about what lay. They were aware. Now he sought those who like the stag were moving away, from the dullness. Those who were creating shelters made not of stone but also of tale and melody safeguarding the recollection of a world that was chaotic, vibrant and full of life. He would seek out the insurgents, the determined cultivators, the recluses, in their cabins the mothers softly singing lullabies amid the stillness. He would join them together not as a battalion. As a choir. A discordant delicate human choir.
He was bursting out of the cave of despair, not into a victorious sun, but into the agonizing, vivid, overwhelmingly loud light of a world worth mourning, and therefore, worth fighting for in the only way left: by remembering it, piece by stubborn piece. The final battle might be between the Silent and the Still. But he would fight for the Echo. However long it lasted.