BLOOD OF THE FORGOTTEN BLADE

The Hunter

The desert didn’t sleep.

Far from the smoldering ruins of the caravan, a column of soldiers moved in silence. Their armor clinked softly with each step, but no voices carried. Even the horses seemed subdued, as if they sensed the weight of the mission pressing down on their riders.

At the front rode Captain Lucian. His crimson cloak snapped in the desert wind, and his face—sharply angled, clean-shaven, disciplined to the point of stone—never wavered. His eyes, a cold shade of steel, scanned the horizon for signs of his prey.

Behind him, a younger officer urged his horse forward. “Captain,” he said cautiously, “the men are uneasy. They thought this was a simple raid. But what we found at the camp…” He hesitated. “That wasn’t bandit work.”

Lucian didn’t turn his head. “It wasn’t meant to be.”

The officer swallowed. “Then the rumors are true?”

“They’re always true,” Lucian said flatly. He tugged his reins, slowing his horse as they crested a dune. Below them, faint in the distance, smoke from the ruined camp still drifted into the night. “The Fang has surfaced again.”

The officer went pale. “A cursed blade? I thought the Order destroyed it generations ago.”

“They destroyed nothing,” Lucian said. His voice carried the weight of an old wound, though his expression remained carved from stone. “The Fang sleeps. It waits. And now some fool has woken it.”

The younger man fell silent, his eyes on the sand.

Lucian dismounted and knelt, scooping up a handful of pale grains. He let them run slowly through his fingers, watching how the wind carried them. Tracks marred the surface—human, not horse. Two sets, heading north.

“They survived,” he murmured. Not surprise. Not relief. Just certainty.

He rose, brushing the sand from his glove. “Tell the men to tighten formation. They’re close, and the desert won’t hide them for long.”

“Yes, Captain.” The officer saluted and rode back to the column.

Alone on the ridge, Lucian let his gaze linger on the horizon. He remembered the old stories, whispered by scholars and priests. The Fang was no mere weapon. It was a relic of conquest, a remnant of a time when men wielded power beyond the Empire’s control. A blade that consumed its wielder, body and soul.

Most feared such legends.

Lucian did not.

To him, the Fang was not a curse. It was a test. Whoever carried it was either weak enough to be broken—or strong enough to be worth breaking.

And if the sword had chosen some wandering mercenary? Then the game was already set.

A thin smile tugged at his mouth. He mounted his horse once more and raised his hand. The soldiers moved as one, shifting into a tight line. Torches flickered in the dark, a serpent of fire winding through the dunes.

“The prey runs north,” Lucian said. “We run them down.”

The men roared in unison, the sound carried by the desert wind.

As the column advanced, the younger officer dared one more question. “Captain, what if the wielder resists the Fang? What if he masters it?”

Lucian’s eyes glinted like steel beneath the starlight. “No man masters hunger. He’ll feed it, whether he wills it or not. And when he breaks, I’ll be there to claim what’s left.”

The officer shivered, though the night was warm.

Above them, clouds drifted across the moon, dimming the light over the desert. For the first time, the stars seemed to retreat, as if unwilling to watch what was coming.

The Empire had loosed its hunter.

And Captain Lucian never missed his quarry.