Seventeen-year-old Kaela knows only the ash-choked alleys of Ashvail, a city ruled by the tyrannical Ashen Sovereign and eternally shrouded in the fumes of the volcanic god they call the Ashen Sp
Seventeen-year-old Kaela knows only the ash-choked alleys of Ashvail, a city ruled by the tyrannical Ashen Sovereign and eternally shrouded in the fumes of the volcanic god they call the Ashen Spire. Survival is her only goal, until a false accusation exposes a truth she never imagined: Kaela is the last Emberborn, wielding a forgotten power tied to the mystical Gilded Pyre, a flame worshipped for its ability to control the very earth. Condemned to death, she’s thrust into a desperate fight for survival against a Sovereign obsessed with rekindling the Pyre’s fading strength – an obsession that threatens to shatter Ashvail’s foundations.Hunted by the Sovereign’s Obsidian Guard, Kaela’s escape plunges her into the city’s treacherous underbelly. Noble houses clash in a deadly game for the Pyre’s power, each seeking to control the vital resources extracted from the Spire's molten heart. Kaela, unknowingly, becomes the key to their ambitions, a living conduit to unimaginable power. But she’s not alone. Ren, an alchemist scarred by the Pyre's volatile energy, seeks atonement for past mistakes. Malek, a disgraced soldier stripped of his honor, sees in Kaela a weapon against the empire that ruined him. Bound by their shared desperation, they embark on a perilous quest to restore the Pyre’s balance, a journey that will take them to the heart of the Spire and force Kaela to confront the terrifying depths of her own power.Beneath the city, in a subterranean realm of lava flows and ancient forges, they face grotesque lava-wrought creatures, remnants of a shattered pact between humanity and the Spire’s fiery spirit. Above ground, rebellion simmers, fueled by the Sovereign’s tightening grip and the whispers of a vibrant past choked by his ambition. As the empire teeters on the brink of collapse, Kaela is haunted by visions of a verdant Ashvail, a land teeming with life before the Sovereign’s reign. She discovers a devastating truth: the Gilded Pyre is not merely a source of power, but a sentient entity, its fate interwoven with her own.Kaela faces a harrowing choice: unleash the Pyre’s full fury and risk Ashvail’s incineration, or forge a new pact with the fiery heart of her world. In the Spire’s molten core, she confronts the Sovereign in a final, explosive showdown. With the fate of Ashvail hanging in the balance, Kaela must choose her path – embrace destruction or forge a new beginning.
