The moon was veiled in thick clouds as fire painted the sky in shades of agony. The once-proud Temple of Varex, with its towering stone spires and ancient marble columns, now groaned beneath the weight of roaring flames. Smoke coiled into the heavens like the breath of a dying god, and within that inferno stood a lone figure. Von Stonefang.
Clad in tattered priestly robes stained with ash and blood, he stood before the shattered remains of the statue of Varex, the god he had served since he was a boy. The sacred image, once a proud colossus of obsidian and gold, bearing a mighty spear in one hand and the scales of judgment in the other now lay reduced to crumbling stone and embered ruin. Its face, once serene in divine confidence, was obliterated.
Von's chest heaved. The church had been ambushed by a cult, cloaked figures wielding cursed fire, leaving behind only one thing: a mark. It was a clawed symbol carved into the ground with such force the stone beneath it cracked. Jagged and cruel, the claw mark pulsed with a faint white aura, like moonlight soaked in venom.
He dropped to his knees, trembling, the taste of ash on his tongue. Tears had long dried. There was nothing left. Nothing but the weight of betrayal of helplessness. His hand moved slowly, fingers trembling as he touched the debris of the statue's base.
"I gave you everything..." he whispered.
His lip quivered before he bit into it, hard. Blood trickled down his chin as he reached for the old blade gifted to him by Varex at the age of twenty. He remembered the ceremony clearly. The pride in his chest. The warmth of purpose. Now, it was cold steel and memory. With a sharp cry, he plunged it into his own arm, slicing deep enough that blood spilled freely.
He staggered to his feet and with his own blood, began to draw a ritual circle upon the scorched stone floor. His strokes were precise despite the pain, honed through years of devotion and sacrament. As the circle completed, the air turned cold, unnaturally still.
From the center of the circle, light bled upward, twisting into a humanoid form cloaked entirely in flowing white. No face. Just smooth ivory features. No eyes, yet it saw him. It smiled.
"What do you want, Von Stonefang?" the being asked, its voice calm, almost serene.
Von lifted his head, his arm still bleeding. The blood now pooled around his knees. He met the figure's gaze with burning conviction.
"Power," he rasped. "I want power. Enough to make them kneel. Enough to make them beg for forgiveness. I want to watch the ones who took everything from me suffer."
The figure tilted its head. "Even if the cost is your soul?"
"I'll pay anything."
The being raised its right hand and snapped its fingers. A scroll of pure light appeared, floating before Von. Black script coiled across the surface. It was ancient, unknowable, and it was hungry.
"Sign it."
Without hesitation, Von dipped his bleeding fingers in his own wound and scrawled his name across the line. As the last letter was completed, his body convulsed. Pain split through every fiber of him as if reality itself rejected his existence. He collapsed to the floor, shaking.
His blonde hair deepened into a rich crimson, as if soaked in eternal blood. His brown eyes flashed, becoming a luminous emerald. The wound on his arm healed instantly, flesh knitting together as though divine fire raced through him.
A sound echoed when he spoke: "Arbiter: Resonance Lens"
[Name: Von Stonefang]
[Resonance Name: Twisted Contractor]
[Current Location: Tri]
[Age: 39]
[Time: 3:33 A.M]
Contracts:
Corrupted Contract with God Varex
Contract of Lies
Contract of Demonic Spirits
Contract with Spirit-Bound Vesper | Rank: Sovereign
Cores:
Aura Core: 100% | Sovereign
Demonic Core (Unobtainable): 100% | Calamity
Divinity Core (Unobtainable): 100% | Grace
Sequence Progression: Sequence Nine
Von stared blankly at the floating screen. He felt... nothing. No grief. No rage. No sorrow. All that remained was a vast, cold emptiness. He exhaled, and his breath came out as a crimson mist that shimmered faintly.
The figure in white raised its hand again. With a snap, the white robes it wore turned pitch black. Horns twisted from its skull as it revealed its true form.
"I left... a special core," the entity said, its voice now laced with malice. "It was designed just for you. And it fits perfectly."
It laughed—a twisted, echoing sound that clung to the air like smoke—before vanishing in a spiral of shadow.
Von stood in the ruin, surrounded by ash and memory. He turned his back on what remained of the Temple of Varex.
And walked into the night.
The moon hung low, cloaked in passing clouds that filtered its light through shifting shadows. The dirt road Von walked was damp with the evening mist, the edges of the path fading into tangled underbrush and crooked trees. He didn't wear a cloak, despite the chill. The cold didn't seem to touch him. His now-black robes swayed with each slow, deliberate step—tattered at the ends, brushing across stone and soil like whispering silk.
His eyes, pale emerald, flicked once toward the treeline but didn't stop. He had sensed them long before the first man even drew breath for a lunge.
They tried to be quiet. Five men. Rusted daggers. Cloth-wrapped boots. Painted faces—likely a local gang preying on travelers. One of them had a wolf-fang necklace, cracked and smeared with old blood. They probably thought Von looked like a priest who'd wandered too far from his sanctuary.
They were right—just not in the way they thought.
The first man leapt from behind a tree with a yell, brandishing a short blade. Von didn't even look at him. His arm flicked outward, a whip of red mist tearing through the attacker's throat with the sound of ripping fabric. The man collapsed, eyes wide, twitching.
The others shouted, rushing him from different angles.
Von turned his head, slowly.
His voice was calm, hollow, emotionless. "You should've stayed hungry, not foolish."
Crimson aura erupted around Von as the ground trembled beneath his feet as the soil behind him cracked in a jagged, branching line. Black vines, etched with glowing crimson veins erupted upward. They lashed out—snapping bones and wrapping around limbs like serpents drunk on blood.
One man screamed as the vines pierced through his back and dragged him into the ground. Another tried to run, but Von's shadow stretched, widened, and swallowed him whole—leaving behind only a severed boot and silence.
Only one remained—a young boy, barely older than fifteen. His dagger fell from trembling fingers. "P-please... d-don't kill... me!" He shouted
Von stepped closer, his shadow casting over the boy's face. He lifted a hand, a soft hum resonating in the air as his palm pulsed with dark red light. The black vines twisted and warped into the shape of a sword, and without hesitation, he drove the sharpened mass through the boy's chest—killing him instantly. He looked down, his expression utterly devoid of emotion. The black vines receded into the earth, which knitted itself back together, leaving behind only the boy's lifeless body, a random boot, and scattered pieces of flesh. Nothing else remained.
He continued forward, the moonlight breaking through the drifting clouds above, casting silver beams across the dirt path. With a slow exhale, he laced his fingers behind his back and let a grin spread across his face.
High above, perched atop a jagged cliff, a figure sat in silence. Cloaked entirely in black, their mask reflected none of the moon's light. They watched Von with unreadable intent, unmoving—until, without a sound, they rose to their feet.
In one fluid motion, the figure drew a slender dagger and hurled it downward, the blade whistling through the air toward Von. Then, without waiting to see the result, they turned and vanished into the night.
Von's eyes narrowed. He felt the shift in the air—the hum of threat.
His body twisted with unnatural grace, and his hand rose in a slow, deliberate motion. A surge of crimson aura erupted outward, violent and precise, crushing the dagger mid-air before it could travel half the distance to him. The shards clattered uselessly to the earth.
He stared at the shards scattered across the dirt, their edges still faintly glimmering under the moonlight. With a small shake of his head, Von turned away—unbothered, unhurried. His boots pressed into the earth with quiet confidence as he resumed his path.