Josh Aratat's voice cut through the dusty air with quiet authority.
"Take me to the Kraken."
Aubrey flinched. Her breath caught in her throat as if the words themselves had struck her. She looked up at him—this mysterious figure wrapped in power and certainty—and trembled as though she'd just heard her death sentence.
Erale Arst had managed to steady himself by now, though his hands still trembled faintly at his sides. The experience he had just endured left him humbled, fragile—like porcelain barely glued together.
"I… I will take you, sir," he said, voice low but firm, stepping forward instinctively, positioning himself between Josh and Aubrey. She looked as if her spirit had momentarily left her body. He couldn't let her face this alone.
Josh observed him quietly for a moment. Then he gave a single, deliberate nod.
Without a word, he turned and strode back to where his generals stood guard beside the horses—Conrad Stan and Ralia Amia at his side. The rest of his men flanked the animals like sentinels, scanning the barren surroundings for signs of threat.
Erale and Aubrey followed in silence, their steps uncertain, like lambs following the butcher's shadow.
Josh reached for his horse, ready to mount. But Erale raised a cautious hand.
"Sir… if I may," he said hesitantly. "It would be wiser to go on foot. The horses would draw attention. The Kraken… and others… will sense the disturbance. Best to leave them here, with a guard."
Josh considered the advice. He didn't fear attention—he welcomed it. But he respected wisdom when it served the mission.
He stepped back from his horse and gave the order.
"Lola, Conrad, Ralia—you're with me. The rest of you, stay and guard the horses. We won't be long."
The response came swift and unified.
"Sir, yes sir."
With the formation settled, they began the trek. Josh walked behind Erale, who led them with quiet urgency. Aubrey remained behind with the rest of the men—as agreed.
They moved past scattered settlements—makeshift homes cobbled together from scraps, rags, and faded hopes. Walls made of nylon sheets fluttered like ghosts in the wind. No stone. No wood. No strength. Just fragile shelters clinging to the bones of a broken land.
Josh studied them silently. Each corner reeked of abandonment. This was not a place where people lived. This was a place where people endured.
Then, without warning, a presence stirred in the distance.
They turned a corner and saw a gathering. Dozens of figures stood in eerie stillness, watching Josh as if he were an apparition.
One woman stepped forward. Her eyes widened in disbelief. She whispered a single word.
"Ariamata."
Another man repeated it.
Then a child.
Then the crowd.
"Ariamata… Ariamata… ARIAMATA!"
The chant rose like a stormwind, echoing across the dry wasteland, carried by dust and desperation.
Josh furrowed his brow and turned to Erale.
"What is Ariamata?"
Erale didn't answer right away. His expression was unreadable—caught between reverence and uncertainty.
"Come," he said. "It will make more sense if I show you."
He led them deeper into the settlement, through narrow alleys lined with flapping tarps and crumbling cloth walls. The air grew heavier, thick with history.
Finally, they reached a small open space. At its center stood a statue—weather-worn, made of roughly polished stone.
Josh stopped in his tracks.
The figure carved in the stone… was him. Down to the black mask, the cloak, the solemn eyes.
It wasn't a vague resemblance.
It was exact.
Beneath the statue, one word was etched in the stone base.
ARIAMATA.
Josh stepped closer, studying the details. The symmetry of the mask. The set of the shoulders. Even the slight tilt of the head—it was as if someone had seen him before he'd ever arrived.
He turned to Erale, quietly stunned.
"How is this here? What is this statue… and why does it look like me?"
Erale exhaled deeply, as though releasing years of tension from his lungs.
"A long time ago," he began, "one of the first to be trapped here had a vision—a woman, gifted with foresight. She spoke of a savior who would come to defeat the Kraken and free our people. She described a figure cloaked in darkness, wearing a black mask. She called him… Ariamata. The one who brings reckoning."
Josh said nothing. His silence hung in the air like a thundercloud.
Erale continued, voice more solemn.
"This statue was built from her description. We have held onto that prophecy ever since. Waiting. Hoping. Watching. And then you arrived…"
He gestured around them.
"You see how nothing grows here. It rains, yes. But the soil is dead. The Kraken draws the land's magic into itself, feeding on it. That's how it maintains its strength."
Conrad, quiet until now, suddenly asked, "Then how do you survive? How do you feed yourselves in a place where even the ground has given up?"
Erale gave a weary smile—one that didn't quite reach his eyes.
"We don't always. Sometimes the new arrivals from El'dan city are ambushed, and their supplies are taken. Other times, if the gate guards are feeling merciful, they toss us scraps. But more often than not… we go hungry. Many have starved. Some simply vanished into the dust."
He looked at Josh, his voice now heavier, more cautious.
"When we saw you come through the pass… we expected someone to attack you almost immediately. I'm still surprised no one has."
Josh didn't flinch. He offered no words.
Only a faint smile—cold and certain—as if to say:
Let them try.
As Josh stood in silent contemplation before the statue, the distant chants of the people slowly faded into the wind. The word—ARIAMATA—lingered in the air like sacred incense, resonating with generations of hope and hunger.
Erale Arst's voice, soft but clear, broke the silence.
"Ariamata… it means 'Saviour' in our tongue."
Josh's gaze remained fixed on the statue a moment longer. The likeness was too perfect, too exact to be coincidence. As if fate had written his name into their bones long before he stepped into their world.
It was surreal.
From prophecy to person.
From myth to man.
Josh slowly lifted his head, drawing his thoughts away from the whirlwind inside him. His eyes met Erale's—calm, focused, unshaken.
"Now," he said, voice low and steady, "show me the Kraken."
Erale Arst froze.
A chill ran through him that no wind could have caused. His breath caught, and for a brief second, he looked as though he might fall.
A part of him did believe. He wanted to believe—that Josh truly was the saviour spoken of in the old vision. That the man who had walked through the gates of El'dan city to the land of dust was more than just muscle and mask.
But the legend of the Kraken… it wasn't just a tale.
It was a shadow that devoured courage. A creature so terrifying that most had stopped whispering its name, choosing instead to suffer quietly under its reign than to provoke its fury.
No one challenged the Kraken.
No one lived to tell the tale.
Erale swallowed, hard. His fingers twitched slightly at his sides.
And yet… he had made his choice long ago.
Right from the very moment when he decided to lead Josh through the wastes, he had surrendered to the possibility of death. Whether it came by the Kraken's wrath or something else—it didn't matter anymore.
So he took a trembling breath, steadied his voice, and nodded.
"This way, then…" he said, barely above a whisper.
"But may the gods help us all."