Chapter 678: 678

For Gram, his family and his small town had been a haven amid the madness spreading across the kingdom, a sanctuary where the shadows of despair dared not linger.

Their town had long prided itself on its vigilance and unity. When the curse began to spread across Erik’s kingdom, corrupting the hearts and minds of ordinary people, the townsfolk had taken matters into their own hands. Whenever one among them began to show signs of becoming a cursed being, the town moved swiftly and without hesitation. Together, they would drive the afflicted out, or when mercy was no longer an option, end them.

It was a grim tradition, but it had kept them safe. For years, their town had stood untouched while others fell into ruin. Many even called it blessed, one of the few last refuge for those who still believed in order and sanity.

And through it all, their faith in their ruler, Erik, had withered. His silence, his inaction, his inability to control the growing crisis had turned admiration into resentment. To them, Erik had abandoned his people to madness and ruin.

Yet none of them could have imagined that even their well-guarded town would one day face a horror far beyond any cursed being.

That night, Gram slept deeply, as he always did. His wife rested beside him, their children curled close for warmth. The air was calm, the lull before the storm.

Then came the screams.

They pierced the stillness, sharp and raw, echoing through his dreams. At first, Gram thought he was imagining them, a nightmare brought on by exhaustion. But the sounds grew louder, closer... too real, too desperate.

H

e opened his eyes.

The world was chaos.

Wind howled like a thousand voices crying out in agony. His body was no longer touching the ground, he was floating, suspended high above in the sky, surrounded by flashes of lightning and debris swirling through the sky.

Below him, the town that had once been his sanctuary was no more. Houses splintered, trees tore free from the earth, and fire danced amid the storm’s fury.

Gram’s mind could not comprehend what was happening. His thoughts blurred, his heart pounded. The cold air cut into his skin as he realized he was at the eye of the tornado, trapped in its terrible calm while destruction spun violently around him.

He opened his mouth to scream, but his voice was swallowed by the roaring wind.

Around him, debris spun wildly, shattered timbers, fragments of stone, and the broken remnants of lives torn from the earth. Amid the chaos, Gram saw faces, familiar faces. His neighbors. His friends. People he had shared meals and laughter with. They were screaming, flailing helplessly as the raging wind carried them higher into the night sky.

It took him a moment to understand that they were his townsfolk, all caught in the same merciless storm. Their voices blended into a single, unending wail of terror, echoing through the churning darkness.

Then, in a moment of sickening realization, Gram’s thoughts snapped to his family.

"Lira! Taren! Myra!" he shouted, the names of his wife and children tearing from his throat. His voice was lost to the roar of the wind. The air was so loud it seemed to swallow his cries before they could reach even his own ears. He tried again, screaming until his voice cracked, but the gale only tossed him harder, spinning his body like a rag doll through the sky.

Still, Gram refused to stop. His lungs burned, his throat ached, but he kept calling for them, over and over, clinging to the faint hope that somehow, they could hear him.

Then after a while, suddenly the wind stopped.

The world fell silent.

For one suspended heartbeat, everything hung in stillness. People, trees, pieces of rooftops, even livestock, all floating together in eerie quiet. Gram’s breath caught in his chest. Then gravity returned.

Everything began to fall.

The night was torn by the collective scream of hundreds of thousands of voices as the sky rained death. Gram could no longer distinguish his own voice from the others. The terror that consumed him was beyond words; his throat produced only a hoarse, instinctive cry as he plummeted through the storm-torn air.

He caught fleeting glimpses of others falling beside him, arms reaching, mouths open in panic before they vanished into the darkness below. The world became a blur of cold air, rushing wind, and fear.

Then for a while in his view came the brief apperance of water.

He hit it hard. The impact stole his breath and filled his lungs with icy cold water. Pain shot through his body as he sank beneath the surface, limbs flailing uselessly before darkness closed in around him.

When Gram next opened his eyes, he gasped, a ragged, desperate sound that tore through the silence of dawn. For a fleeting moment, he thought it had all been a nightmare.

But he wasn’t in his bed. His wife wasn’t beside him. There was no scent of breakfast, no sound of his children’s laughter echoing through the wooden walls.

Instead, he found himself lying amid green leaves and broken branches, his body aching with every breath.

Gram tried to move. Pain flared instantly, sharp and unforgiving, radiating through his ribs and limbs. He gritted his teeth, biting back a cry as he forced himself to shift.

He had to know, he had to see.

"Where... where am I?" he whispered to no one, his voice hoarse. His heart pounded with one thought, one desperate hope that overpowered all else.

He needed to find his family.

It took some time before Gram managed to sit upright, every movement sending sharp jolts of pain through his battered body. He winced, bracing himself against a rough surface beneath him. When his vision finally cleared and the dizziness faded, he looked around and froze.

He wasn’t on solid ground.

Gram was sitting atop the splintered remains of a tree, its massive trunk half-submerged and drifting along what appeared to be a wide, muddy river. The current was slow, but steady, carrying him through a landscape that didn’t look familiar anymore.

As his eyes traced the horizon, realization dawned upon him and with it, horror.

The world around him was nothing but ruin. Trees lay uprooted and scattered like broken matchsticks, their roots jutting out toward the sky. What might once have been fields or villages were now just flattened stretches of debris, stretching endlessly in every direction. The stench of damp earth and splintered wood filled the air.

"It was real..." Gram murmured, the words trembling out of him.

That nightmare, the storm, the screaming, the fall. It wasn’t a dream and he had somehow truly lived through it. Somehow, impossibly, he had survived.

For a brief, fragile moment, joy flickered in his chest. If he was alive... maybe his family was too. Maybe by some miracle, they had escaped the storm. His heart leapt at the thought, and for a fleeting instant, pain meant nothing.

Ignoring the protest of his wounds, Gram began to move, crawling across the wet bark and broken branches. Every shift sent new stabs of pain through his ribs and arms, but he pressed on, gritting his teeth. The rough bark tore at his skin, leaving shallow cuts across his arms and legs, but he didn’t stop, not until his footing slipped and he fell into the river with a heavy splash.

The cold water shocked his system awake. Gasping, Gram kicked with what little strength he had left, pushing himself toward the riverbank. Each stroke was agony, his limbs screaming for rest, but the thought of his wife and children kept him moving. When he finally reached the shore, he dragged himself onto the muddy ground and collapsed, chest heaving.

He lay there for a long while, staring up at the clear blue sky, so calm, so deceptively beautiful. The contrast between the peaceful morning and the devastation around him made it feel unreal.

"Why...?" he whispered. Natural disasters were rare here. Never in his lifetime had he seen a storm of such fury. What could have caused it?

Then a memory surfaced, a few months ago, when heavy rains had battered the kingdom for days. The people had feared flooding then too, until the priests spread the tale: their king, Erik, had angered a god, and the rain had been a sign of divine wrath. The memory tightened something in Gram’s chest.

His gaze hardened as he clenched his fist, dirt grinding between his fingers.

"Damn that incompetent king," he spat, his voice trembling with rage and exhaustion.

Maybe Erik had angered another god. Maybe the storm that destroyed everything he loved was the punishment for Erik’s arrogance. But whatever the reason, it didn’t matter to Gram anymore. His faith in his ruler had long died. No god, no king was coming to save them.

All that mattered now was his family.

If his wife and children were still alive, then that was reason enough to keep moving. The rest, the ruins, the gods and the king, none of it mattered.