Kael Eze had been dragging the same body for almost ten minutes when the rope finally slipped from his hand.
He stopped for a moment, bent forward, and took a slow breath.
The smell coming from the water was getting worse every week. It used to smell like the sea. Now it smelled like rot and metal mixed together.
He wiped the sweat from his forehead and looked at the body lying in the black water beside the barge.
The man had probably been in the water for days. His clothes were swollen and heavy. One shoe was missing.
Kael grabbed the rope again and pulled.
The body slid across the wet metal floor with a dull sound.
"Three more," he muttered to himself.
The collection barge rocked slightly as waves pushed against its sides. Around him, the skyline of Lagos looked like a graveyard made of stone.
Half the buildings near the water had already collapsed. The rest leaned at strange angles, windows broken, lights flickering weakly in the dark.
People used to call this flooding.
Nobody called it that anymore.
Now they called it the End of the world.
The rain had stopped years ago, but the ocean kept rising anyway. Black sludge that used to be seawater slowly swallowed the streets and crawled up the sides of buildings like something alive.
Kael pulled the body closer to the pile and tied the rope around its ankle.
He worked quickly.
The syndicate didn't care how tired he was. They only cared about numbers. If he didn't bring the bodies by the end of the day, someone else would take the job.
And the job was the only thing keeping him alive.
A faint buzzing sound drifted across the water. Mosquitoes.
Even they had changed over the years. Bigger and faster.
Kael swatted one away from his neck and sighed.
"Great life," he muttered quietly.
Then the sky tore open.
Like a thin crack stretching slowly across the clouds above Carter Bridge.
At first Kael thought his eyes were playing tricks on him. He blinked and looked again.
The crack was still there.
It widened silently, like scissors cutting through a sheet of paper.
People on nearby rooftops began shouting. Some pointed upward. Others started running.
Kael didn't move.
He had seen enough strange things over the last few years that a crack in the sky barely surprised him anymore.
Then words appeared in front of his eyes.
Not in the sky.
Right in front of him.
Clear. Silver. Floating in the air.
Everywhere around the city people froze as the same message appeared before them.
[Final Calibration Complete]
[Planetary Status: Unsalvageable]
[Sovereign Selection Protocol Activated]
A long pause followed.
The water around the barge became strangely still.
Even the mosquitoes stopped buzzing.
Then the next line appeared.
[Selecting Candidate…]
People began screaming.
Some fell to their knees and started praying. Others ran across rooftops or jumped into boats, as if moving somewhere would change what was happening.
Kael simply stared at the floating words.
He still had three bodies left to collect before sunset.
The message changed again.
[Candidate Selected]
[Name: Kael Eze]
[Age: 23]
[Soul Rank: Damaged]
[Compatibility Evaluation…]
The words flickered for a moment.
Then new lines appeared.
[Compatibility: Acceptable]
Kael frowned slightly.
"Acceptable?" he muttered.
Then the corpse he was holding suddenly became lighter.
He looked down.
The body crumbled into grey dust.
Before he could react, the rope in his hands turned to ash as well.
Then the metal floor of the barge began breaking apart.
Buildings along the shoreline collapsed into clouds of grey powder.
The black water beneath the boat turned pale and dry.
Everything around him dissolved slowly .
Cars.
Boats.
Buildings.
Even the people on the streets.
Within seconds the entire city was breaking apart into drifting ash that spiraled upward like smoke moving in reverse.
Kael stood in the middle of it all, watching silently.
He had spent three years carrying dead strangers through this ruined city.
Now the whole place was dying with them.
The next message appeared.
[Welcome, Sovereign Candidate]
[Authority Rank: 0.0001%]
[Initial Trial Location: The Ashen Cradle]
[Warning: Death is permanent]
[Do you accept the Throne of Ashes]
And two options appeared in front of him.
[YES]
[NO — Soul Disintegration]
Kael stared at the words for a long moment.
There was nothing left around him now.
Just empty grey space stretching endlessly in every direction he could see.
He slowly looked down at his hardened, thick hands covered in rough patches from carrying corpses more than he could remember.
A tired breath escaped his lips.
"If I'm already at the bottom," he murmured quietly, "what exactly do I have left to lose?"
He pressed YES.
The world inhaled.
Everything vanished.
For a brief moment there was nothing but darkness and silence.
When Kael opened his eyes again.
The first thing he noticed was the cold and that he could not move properly.
He blinked slowly.
Grey ash covered the ground around him like snow.
Above him was a dark sky filled with drifting particles that looked like burnt dust.
He tried to sit up, but his body barely responded.
Looking down, he realized why.
His body was small.
Very small.
He was lying on something shaped like a crib made out of blackened bones.
He stared at his tiny hands in confusion.
"…You've got to be kidding me."
A soft laugh came from above.
"Well, that was faster than i expected."
Kael turned his head slowly.
A tall woman stood beside the bone crib.
Six black wings spread behind her back like shadows stretching across the ash-covered ground. Her long dark hair moved gently in the wind, and her eyes glowed faintly like dying stars.
She leaned slightly over the crib and studied him with a curious expression.
"So you're the one they chose," she said calmly.
Kael blinked up at her.
Even in his current state he could tell something about her presence was wrong.
"Who are you?" he asked, his voice coming out much weaker than he expected.
The woman smiled faintly.
"You can call me Lirien."
She folded one of her wings behind her back and crouched beside the crib.
"For now, I suppose you could say I'm your caretaker."
Kael frowned slightly.
"Caretaker?"
"Yes." Her smile widened a little. "Someone has to make sure the new sovereign candidate doesn't die too early."
That didn't sound very comforting.
A cold wind drifted across the grey landscape, stirring the ash into slow spirals around the bone crib.
Kael turned his head and looked out toward the empty horizon.
The land stretched endlessly in every direction, only broken by scattered bone structures rising from the ash like the remains of an ancient graveyard.
"Where am I?" he asked.
"The Ashen Cradle," Lirien replied casually.
She stood up and looked out across the grey wasteland.
"First floor of the Infinite Staircase."
Kael was about to ask another question when a strange sound echoed faintly through the fog.
A dry scraping noise.
Like claws dragging against stone.
Lirien's wings shifted slightly behind her.
"Oh," she said softly.
Her tone carried the calm interest of someone watching a small animal approach.
"Looks like your welcome party arrived early."
Kael slowly turned his head.
Shapes were moving in the distant ash.
At first it was small.
Then more appeared.
Thin figures crawling across the ground.
Dozens of them.
Their bodies twisted and skeletal, their movements rough and abnormal as they dragged themselves through the grey dust.
Growling sounds drifted across the wind.
Lirien glanced down at him with a small smile.
"Well," she said gently, "it seems your first lesson is starting."
Kael stared at the approaching creatures.
His tiny fingers tightened slowly.
The hunger inside his chest suddenly stirred.
And somewhere deep within his mind, a cold mechanical voice spoke for the first time.
[Hidden Trait Activated]
[Soul Devourer — EX]
The creatures began running.
And the ash began to scream.