Her hands shook. The tremors worked their way through her, electric and endless, as she stumbled into the dimness of the abandoned tavern. There was nothing but silence. Her footsteps on the worn floorboards echoed back at her, each one louder and more accusing than the last. Her thoughts and memories—thousands of them, an angry swarm of bees in her skull—all screamed the same word: Failure. She ignored it, clamping down with her will as she slumped against the bar. Its battered surface was empty, except for a single bottle that stood like a monument to despair and desperation. The sight of it set the swarm off again, sending a bolt of electricity from her scalp to her spine. Not even this, she thought. Not even this can quiet the storm.

The roof of the tavern had been blown away, ripped open to the darkening sky by the Mana-Tech blast that left skeleton walls standing in gritty defiance. Splintered rafters hung like broken ribs above. Wind howled through the ruins.

At the entrance, the door hung crookedly on one hinge, barely attached to its frame. There lay a sword unattended, its blade catching the faint light from the outside

Ana's eyes followed the empty lines of ceiling before she forced her focus back to the bar.

She dragged her gaze away from the wreckage to the warped shelves behind it, their glass fronts shattered, leaving jagged edges framing empty shadows. A busted lantern dangled precariously from a hook, swaying like a pendulum in the gusts blowing through.

Most of the ale lays shattered, their broken necks spewing pungent puddles across the floor.

Beneath the lantern, dark stains marked where ale and whiskey had spilled, bleeding out like the tavern's lifeblood. The floorboards beneath Ana's feet were sticky with it—an ocean of drink wasted and gone.

All but that lone bottle stood like ruins of a desecrated temple, mocking her with its defiant survival. Ana lunged for it, her fingers closing around the dust-caked glass. She wrenched it free, half-expecting it to crumble like the rest. The label was singed black and unreadable, the cork barely clinging to its charred opening.

A groan escaped her lips as she slid the dual blades from her belt and pinched them into the wood. The gesture was forceful, almost defiant, leaving the blades to protrude like accusing fingers. Her eyes traced the blades. They reflected her turmoil back at her in their polished steel, ghostly and distorted. The hilts were intricately carved, each holding the shape of a dragon wound around a delicate elven glyph. These markings spoke of power and heritage, a delightful little memento of those charming battles she simply couldn't erase from her mind.

She ran a finger along one edge, feeling the sharpness bite into her skin like the memories themselves.

She could hear them —the screams from outside, the cries of villagers swallowed by chaos. Ana's heart pounded against her ribs like a caged animal desperate to escape. She seized the bottle with unsteady hands, every muscle in her body.

They quivered in harmony with her own trembling hands. It was a pathetic sight, and she knew it. The cruel mirth of the patrol had been deafening as she'd fled, their taunts searing into her skin like flames.

The tavern door creaked open, letting in a gust of cold air.

Ana sagged against the bar and breathed in the scent of dust and neglect. Her eyes adjusted slowly to the dim light and the desolation. The place was worse than she'd remembered, if she had even remembered it. Worn floorboards, an overturned chair in the corner. Broken glass, everywhere, as if someone had smashed everything they could find in a rage, leaving it to glitter angrily in the dull glow of the flickering light.

At that thought, the swarm buzzed again. She flinched as if she had been slapped, her eyes scanning the room for signs of what, or who, had done this. But there was no one, not even the shadow of a former patron or bartender. The entire tavern felt like it was haunted, but not by ghosts. By something much worse. Failure.

She held herself still until the swarm subsided, then straightened and tried to focus on the bottle in front of her. She wanted it, desperately. Wanted its silence, its oblivion. She needed something to shut the voices up. In this place, in her head. Her fingers closed around it, tightening like a vise, then loosening again as the tremors returned, jittery and angry.

With a stubbornness that surprised even her, she unscrewed the top. She had no idea what was inside—not ale, nor whiskey. She didn't know. She didn’t care. Instead, her eyes caught on a row of glasses beneath the bar. How had they survived intact when everything else had fallen to ruin? She grabbed one. Why not be classy today? The effort nearly drained her, and she paused to catch her breath before reaching for the glass. Her grip slipped, sending it skittering and crashing to the floor. She froze, the crash echoing through the room and her brain, sending both back into a flurry of chaos. She took a deep breath. Reached for a new glass.

The next time, her hand was steadier. Or maybe she just stopped caring. She couldn't tell. All she knew was that the bottle was open and there was nothing between her and its contents. She poured, too quickly, and the liquid splashed over the rim, pooling and dripping onto the floor. She watched it with numb fascination. Not even this, she thought again. Not even this can make things better.

But she kept pouring. As if by doing so, by drowning out the room, the noise, the memories, she could make something disappear. She wasn't sure what. The splash of the liquid against wood sounded like a thousand drums in her skull, all competing with each other for attention and doing a very good job at it.

She kept pouring until her hands were still, until the trembling stopped. Until the anger turned to sadness, the sadness to nothing. Until there was just her and the bottle, and she didn't care about anything else.

Ana paused.

She leaned against the bar, and for a moment, she wasn't sure whether she was about to laugh or cry. She settled on neither. The swarm of memories and failures beat against her, angry and accusing, but she didn't care. There was a small victory in that, even if it felt hollow. The bar, the bottle, the room—everything might be ruined, but she was still here. It was something. The bottle was open. It was enough.

It would have to be.

Ana's mind flew back to that night, the one when Ethan and she had stood defiant against the towering, monstrous figure.

Fire. All-consuming fire, cracking the sky and scorching the heavens. Ana flew through the air, kinetic energy coursing through her veins as she dodged the inferno. Below, a colossus roared—a monstrous beast with wings that spanned the valley and teeth that glittered like blades. Erlijin, an archdevil of unfathomable power, rose amidst the chaos, his laughter a symphony of malice and destruction.

"Ethan!" Ana's voice cut through the din as she landed beside him, their backs pressed together against the onslaught.

“Push on!” Ethan yelled, his words ripped away by the crashing power of—

“Ana.”

The voice shattered the memory, dragging her back into the present like a cataclysm.