The sun had long since set behind the jagged cliffs of the Mournfang Canyon. Only the dull crimson of a dying sky bled through the swirling clouds of dust that rose with every step of soldier and steed. I stood at the precipice of history, witnessing a kingdom on the verge of ruin. At the center of it all, wearing his famed crimson helm, stood King Emain—my king, my brother in arms, and the st hope of Irsedia.

  The air was thick with iron and smoke. The csh of steel rang out, sharp and relentless, echoing between the canyon walls like the dirges of a dying era. Groans of the wounded and dying rose with them, a chorus of agony that blurred the lines between life and death. It was here, in this battlefield where life and death raced like twin stallions toward an inevitable end, that Emain made his final stand.

  Irsedia had once been a kingdom of radiant spires and golden fields, a nd where the banners of unity flew high and the people’s ughter carried on the breeze. But time turns all things to dust, and what glory we once held had withered beneath the weight of betrayal and war. Emain fought to recim what had been stolen—fought not for himself, but for the people who still believed in the dream of Irsedia.

  His red helm gleamed faintly in the half-light, marking him as the rallying point for our broken forces. A hawk with a single wing, as the enemy called him. But even a one-winged hawk will take to the skies if only for one st flight.

  I remember the moment it happened—the moment fate mocked him most cruelly. His bde, dulled and chipped, had just struck down a foe in bckened mail. He turned, seeking me with his eyes from across the fray, and I thought for a heartbeat we might yet prevail. But then the glimmer came. A faint fsh, low and quick. The whisper of steel through flesh.

  The cursed bde found his chest just beneath the join of his armor. It glimmered faintly as it slid between his ribs, driven by a hand we had once trusted. Emain staggered, red running down the crimson of his breastpte until it was impossible to tell where one ended and the other began. His sword slipped from his fingers, cnging once, twice, before coming to rest in the dirt.

  I cried out his name. Others did as well. But the battle was merciless, and no miracle answered.

  He fell to one knee, and for a moment, it seemed he might yet rise. His hand stretched toward the standard of Irsedia—toward victory, or at least the hope of it. Yet his fingers grasped only dust. Despair weighed his arm down, and he could not reach far enough.

  I reached him too te.

  By the time I knelt at his side, his breath was ragged. Blood bubbled at his lips. His eyes, once bright with purpose, were dimming. He did not speak of vengeance or hatred. He did not curse the betrayer who stood above us, bde slick with his life. He only said my name.

  “Irsedia…” he murmured after, his gaze lifting weakly to the horizon, as if he could see beyond the battle, beyond the canyon walls, to the world he had failed to save. “Guide them.”

  His fingers grasped mine, weak but insistent. Then he exhaled, and the grip faded.

  Even now, I wonder if his hand was reaching not for victory… but for release.

  The pain must have been dull by then, dragging him slowly toward the abyss. His armor bore the scars of countless battles, but even the finest steel cannot hold forever. Nor can a man who bears the weight of a fading era stand alone without falling.

  We had not seen the betrayal coming. Emain least of all. The man who struck him down had been a brother of his youth, a general of his armies. Yet in the end, greed and fear had outweighed loyalty. And so, the Red-Helmed King was abandoned by his time, his dreams discarded as relics of a fading world.

  Fate, they say, ughs at such men.

  They severed his head soon after. I remember the moment vividly—how they held it aloft for the army to see. Even his crimson helm could not hide the lifelessness of his gaze. Hollow eyes stared out over the battlefield, seeing everything and nothing.

  I wondered then what he saw in those final moments.

  Did he see the nds he once ruled, their fields bckened by war? Did he see his people, broken and scattered, their hopes lying as dead as he? Or did he see the kingdom he had dreamed of, so long ago, in its days of light? Did he look upon Irsedia’s golden age, when peace was more than a memory?

  I will never know.

  Even the rising smoke signals, tall columns that darkened the sky above the canyon, did not know what came next. Whether they heralded a new dawn or deeper darkness, none could say. We were adrift in the tides of history, spiraling ever downward, or perhaps upward. Toward light, or into shadow.

  We buried Emain in secret, away from the canyon, away from the eyes of the enemy. Only a few of us remained—remnants of the Crimson Guard, our wings broken but not yet clipped. We carried him to the forest of Arcten, beneath the old oaks where kings of ancient blood had sworn their vows. There, we id him to rest.

  Some say a red hawk still flies above that pce, circling where no bird dares go. Others say it is only the wind through the branches. But I know better. I was there.

  The one-winged hawk still flies. Even in death, Emain flies.

  Years have passed since that day. The war did not end with Emain’s fall. The betrayer took the throne, but no man can hold a kingdom in chains forever. Irsedia still fights, though from the shadows and the hills, with the resolve Emain taught us. They call us rebels. They call us outws. But we are the st of the Crimson Guard, and we do not forget.

  I still wear his crest on my armor. The helm is battered, the paint faded, but I keep it clean. Every time I draw my bde, I remember his st stand. And I remember the crossroads he stood at.

  He could have surrendered. He could have fled. But he chose to stand, knowing he could not win, knowing betrayal and death awaited him.

  I wonder sometimes, as I stare into the firelight, whether he saw his fate clearly that day. Whether he knew his time had ended, that his dream would be cast aside. Or whether he believed we would rise again, like the phoenix from the ash.

  Perhaps he stood at those crossroads and chose hope.

  Or perhaps he chose darkness, knowing it would be his final companion.

  But if that is true, then why do I still see him in my dreams—standing beneath the rising sun, helm crimson and gleaming, sword in hand, ready to fly once more?

  Irsedia is not dead. Not yet. So long as we remember him, as long as we carry his legacy, the kingdom still lives. Whether we fly toward the light or the darkness is no longer his choice.

  It is ours.

  And I have made mine.