Malrik
The hum of the jumpship's old engines filled the cockpit, a mechanical dirge accompanying my thoughts. The crimson system interface still floated before my eyes, a constant reminder of the pact I had made… or perhaps, what I had always been destined for. The name Malrik clung to me like armor, shedding the weak, forgotten soul I had once been.
I watched the cracked world below grow smaller. Ash-covered ruins, broken monuments to humanity's arrogance. Soon, I'd carve my mark into what remained.
[SYSTEM NOTICE: DESTINATION — SANCTUARY. TIME TO ARRIVAL: 7 MINUTES.]
The Sanctuary… a haven for the lost and damned Guardians who rejected the City's naive ideals. A place where the light was currency and fear, a language. My kind of place.
"Malrik… are you sure about this?" The Ghost's voice cut through the silence, hesitant, weighted with something dangerously close to fear.
I smirked. The little machine had seen what I'd become and knew there was no turning back.
"You afraid of your own Guardian now, Ghost?"
A pause.
"I… I don't know what you are anymore."
Good.
The relic sat beside me, pulsing faintly in the shadows. Its runes called to something deep within my marrow, ancient instincts older than the Traveler's lies. I'd built a lifetime being a good man in a dying world — and it got me betrayal. Now? I'd be something else. A legend painted in blood.
The ship's descent jolted slightly as the Sanctuary came into view.
A sprawling encampment hidden in a canyon of broken earth. Old barricades, rusted towers, and ships scavenged from wars long past. Figures moved like shadows in the dusk — rogues, outlaws, and those who had tasted the Light's bitterness.
[SYSTEM NOTICE: AREA REPUTATION — NEUTRAL HOSTILITY.]
I grinned.
"Time to make an entrance."
---
Ghost's POV
I hovered anxiously as Malrik guided the ship toward the landing pad. He wasn't the man I'd resurrected. His eyes… that light was wrong. Dark, ancient, hungry.
The other Guardians here were outcasts — even I knew that — but none of them felt like him. He was colder. Something else.
I accessed local comms, but static clawed at the feed. The relic in the hold was warping signals, poisoning the airwaves. I could feel its pull like a pressure behind my lens.
"This is a mistake," I muttered.
And still, I followed.
---
Malrik
The moment my boots hit the Sanctuary's cracked landing platform, all eyes turned.
Half a dozen weathered Guardians watched from the shadows, hands lingering near weapons. Warlocks with ragged cloaks, Titans whose armor bore scorch marks of betrayals past, and Hunters with faces hidden beneath cracked helms.
They could sense it. Power. Rage.
A figure approached — tall, pale-skinned, with one mechanical eye and a tattered crimson banner on her back.
"New blood?" she asked, voice sharp as glass.
I met her gaze. "Malrik. I'm here for what's mine."
Her brow furrowed. "No one owns anything here."
I smiled. "Yet."
[SYSTEM NOTICE: QUEST UPDATED — ESTABLISH DOMINANCE.]
The message appeared just as I expected.
Another Guardian, a brute of a Titan, stepped forward, cracking his knuckles. "We don't need another corpse clogging our air."
Without hesitation, I moved.
My hand shot out, grabbing him by the throat. The System surged through me, strength beyond reason. His eyes widened in shock.
"You don't decide what I am," I whispered.
And I slammed him to the ground.
A hush fell. Even the wind seemed to stop.
[SYSTEM NOTICE: FIRST MARK OF FEAR ACQUIRED.]
The woman watched, something like dark amusement in her gaze.
"Maybe you do belong here, Malrik."
"I didn't come to belong. I came to rule."
I stepped over the Titan's gasping form and headed toward the main structure, the relic on my back pulsing like a second heart. The Sanctuary was mine now — they just hadn't realized it yet.
And soon… neither would the City.
[THE DEVIL'S COVENANT DEEPENS.]