Kael stood at the center of the Family Square, surrounded by warriors who once thought of him as weak, a discarded failure. The air was thick with the anticipation of the slaughter his father had just incited. The warriors gathered, eager to earn Darius's favor, their eyes filled with hunger.
Kael's gaze swept over them slowly. His father had set the stage, but Kael had his own play to make.
With an almost bored tone, he called out to the warriors.
"Before you throw yourselves at me like dogs, let me ask—"
There was a brief pause, then a laugh erupted from one of his cousins. "What's he saying? Does he actually think he can talk his way out of this?"
Another voice mocked, "He's dead already. Let's just end this quickly."
Kael ignored them, locking eyes with the closest warrior. "Tell me—wouldn't you rather have a favor from me instead?"
There was a brief moment of silence before the crowd resumed their taunting laughter. No one took him seriously. They were too eager to please his father, too excited to claim his head as a trophy. None of them even heard what he was saying.
Except one person.
Darius Draven, the leader of the clan, narrowed his eyes. Something in Kael's voice, in his posture, caught his attention. He was too still, too calm, and there was something wrong with the way the air around Kael buzzed.
For the first time, Darius's amusement faltered. "Wait…" His eyes flickered toward his son, then narrowed with sudden realization. "No… this can't be."
Before he could shout a command, it was already too late.
Kael's sinister smile spread across his face as a low hum filled the air around him.
With a flicker of movement, Kael vanished.
In the blink of an eye, he reappeared in the center of the crowd, his body enveloped in a storm of lightning and darkness. The warriors didn't have time to react.
More than twenty men—no, they were barely men at all—were turned into nothing more than ash before their bodies could even hit the ground. Their screams were drowned out by the violent crackling of energy that erupted from Kael's body. His Forsaken Aura surged violently outward, ripping through everything in its path.
Their corpses disintegrated instantly, their flesh turning to cinders as the very air around Kael seemed to warp and bend. The ground cracked, scorched by the power that Kael had unleashed. He didn't need to move—they came to him, and he was their reckoning.
All that remained in the square was silence, the charred remains of those who had dared to challenge him, and the storm of his power swirling in the air.
Kael stood at the center, breathing evenly, not a single strand of his dark hair out of place. His eyes were cold as he surveyed the chaos he'd just wrought.
Darius stood frozen, his face pale as a ghost. His eyes widened with fear and disbelief.
Kael… Kael wasn't just a disappointment.
The warriors—his warriors—were reduced to ash in an instant. The very thing he had discarded, the son he had dismissed, had just obliterated them without breaking a sweat.
Kael's voice cut through the silence, low and dangerous.
"Did you think I was still the worthless boy you sent to die?" His voice echoed through the square, his tone like the calm before a storm. "Do you think you can just send me away again?"
Darius opened his mouth to speak, but no words came out. His mind was racing, trying to process what had just happened.
Kael took a slow step toward him, his body crackling with raw power, his Forsaken Aura flowing like liquid shadow.
"You wanted to kill me, father. You wanted to discard me. Now look at me. Look at what I've become."
Darius's gaze flickered to the remains of his warriors, the shattered remnants of his authority. His entire clan's power had just crumbled.
Kael smirked. "And now… Now you'll realize just how wrong you were."
Darius Draven stood frozen, staring at the remains of his warriors—once elite fighters now reduced to nothing but ash. The air was thick with the stench of burnt flesh, and the remnants of his clan's power smoldered in the air. He looked at his son, Kael, who stood at the center of the square, untouched and brimming with an ominous power.
Darius's breath was shallow, his mind racing. The realization hit him like a ton of bricks: Kael… his son, the one he had cast aside, the one he sent to die… was stronger than he could have ever imagined.
A Mystic-ranked warrior in a year? It was impossible. Yet here Kael stood, a being of power and destruction.
"No… No, Kael, please!" Darius's voice cracked, a desperate plea escaping his lips. "I didn't know… I didn't know this would happen. I thought you were—you were nothing! I disowned you because you were weak!"
Kael's lips curled into a dark smile. His eyes glowed with an unsettling intensity as he looked at his father, who was now kneeling before him, pleading for mercy. The once-mighty leader of the Draven Clan, now begging for his life. Begging for the lives of the very family that had cast Kael aside.
"Mercy?" Kael repeated the word slowly, as if savoring it. "You dared to send me to die, and now you think you deserve mercy?"
His laugh was chilling. It echoed across the square, cruel and mocking. "You were wrong about me, father. You always were. You thought I was weak, and now you see how wrong you were."
Kael stepped forward, his footsteps silent as he closed the distance between himself and his father. Darius recoiled, but he couldn't move—his legs were frozen, his pride shattered.
"I'm not your weak son anymore." Kael's voice was like steel, cold and unwavering. "I've become something far worse."
With that, Kael raised his hand, and the storm of power around him intensified. His Forsaken Aura surged, a swirling vortex of dark energy that crackled with raw, unfiltered force.
Then, in a flash of movement, Kael unleashed his wrath.
The first scream came from a distant cousin, a young warrior who had always mocked him in the past. He was obliterated in an instant—his body turned to dust, his soul nothing more than vapor in the air.
One by one, Kael cut through his family with ruthless efficiency. Each blow of his hand, each flick of his fingers, brought destruction. His power was absolute.
The warriors who had once been so confident in their superiority were reduced to nothing—ash, dust, nothingness.
The women who had belittled him, the elders who had dismissed him—each one fell before him as if they were nothing more than leaves in the wind. Their screams, their pleas for mercy, fell on deaf ears.
Kael stood at the center of the square, surrounded by the bodies of his family, a pile of smoldering corpses at his feet. He had not spared a single one. They had all been judged and found wanting.
Darius was still kneeling, his face pale with fear, his eyes wide in disbelief. He had watched his entire clan—the Draven name—be reduced to nothing before his eyes. His pride, his legacy, gone.
Kael approached his father slowly, his eyes cold and devoid of emotion. "Tell me, father… did you truly think I would spare you after all of this?"
Darius's voice was barely a whisper, broken and shattered. "Please… Kael, I didn't know. I didn't know… Please, I beg you—I'm sorry."
Kael's face twisted into a cruel smile. He leaned down, placing his hand on his father's shoulder. "Sorry? It's too late for apologies."
With a sudden movement, Kael summoned a wave of destructive energy. A flash of dark lightning coursed through his body and enveloped Darius.
The last thing Darius heard was his son's voice, low and calm, like a final judgment.
"You are the reason I became this. You are the reason I am the Forsaken."
And with that, Darius Draven—his last living tie to the Draven Clan—was reduced to nothing.
Kael stood alone amidst the ruin of his family, the storm of his power dissipating, leaving only silence.
He surveyed the destruction with a twisted satisfaction. He was no longer the boy they had cast aside. He had ascended beyond their petty judgments.