It was not long before the King received the dreaded news: the Black Army (Hei-Jun) had reached the borders of Haryu, turning every village in its path to ash. They sought not just land, but absolute vengeance and total victory. When the King looked toward the horizon from atop the ramparts, he must have felt the end approaching, for a deep despair lay in his eyes. Emergency meetings were held immediately; bloody strategies were shared over maps. Soldiers bid farewell to their families, perhaps knowing it was for the last time. The two princes, Muhan and Murin, would once again fight side by side on the front lines of this war, perhaps to perish together on that field. While a heavy, damp silence of death loomed over the palace, Prince Muhan and Prince Murin bowed respectfully before the King, confirming the decision.
At that exact moment, the sound of determined footsteps approached from behind—the familiar metallic clinking of armor rings and the rustle of scales. This sound recalled the day Kökçin first entered this palace as a timid yet proud bride; but this time, her arrival was entirely different. The King turned toward her, struck by the uncompromising and resolute gait of the steppe girl. Kökçin had completely stripped away her silken palace garments; she was clad in the warrior attire of her ancient steppe, her hair braided tightly like a lady of war. She bowed before the King with the dignity of a queen but the fury of a warrior. Muhan and Murin stood speechless, stunned by the formidable woman before them.
"My August King," Kökçin said. Upon her face was the sharp gaze of a steppe wolf lying in ambush. "Send me to the war as well. Your army and commanders are unparalleled in the world, however... However, this war will be fought by the rules of the steppe. My uncle Kökhan has become the supreme commander of the Black Army, and Alpagu is his right hand. My uncle will undoubtedly attack you with the finishing tactics of the steppe."
The King, with the worry of a father and the wrath of a monarch, shook his head in refusal and turned away. But the words that followed pinned him to his spot, forcing him to reconsider:
"If I do not go, your army will swing its swords against an invisible enemy. Against the steppe's 'feigned retreat' games, night raids, and ambushes, only my eyes can protect you. I know their minds, for their blood flows in my veins. If you leave me here, you bury not only your soldiers but this palace and your people in a pit of betrayal!"
The King paused, his shoulders slumped. Kökçin continued, her voice now as sharp as a blade:
"If you do not send me, your army will fall to the devious strategies of the steppe. They will not exhaust you in an open field; they will consume you with ambushes, feigned retreats, and night raids. I know their every move, their every thought; for I came from within that hatred. If you do not want your army to lose thousands of lives, accept me as a commander on that field!"
The King found these words logical. This steppe girl was right; to stand before the Black Army, one needed not just a steel sword, but another mind capable of reading that savage intellect. If she did not go, the Black Army would burn everything and seize the palace and the people. The King raised his head and looked at Muhan. Muhan was looking at his wife in a state of agitation and horror. No matter how logical her words were, how could he take the woman he was willing to die for—and the sacred, yet-unannounced legacy in her womb—into battle? Sensing the agonizing pain in his son's eyes, the King took a deep breath and solemnly approved Kökçin's words.
Crushed by the weight of this decision, Muhan fell to his knees before the King; at that moment, he wished a thousand times to die right there, to be the first to fall on that field. As the King passed by his son, he walked away with heavy steps, hiding the ache in his heart. All night long, no one slept amidst the sounds of iron forging, the neighing of horses, and the cries of preparation echoing in the palace courtyard. Haryu Palace held its breath for the greatest and most personal war in its history.
THE OATH OF THOSE WHOSE SHROUD IS ARMOR
While the roar of war preparations echoed in the courtyard of Haryu Palace like the moan of a giant beast, Muhan and Kökçin's room had turned into a silent, dark sanctuary in the eye of the storm, severed from the rest of the universe. The torches on the walls flickered as if in fear of the blood to be spilled outside, casting the shadows of the two armored warriors onto the room like massive, interlocking statues of grief. The hearts beating beneath that steel armor were shaken by a burden much heavier and more crushing than the fate of an empire: the possibility of a final farewell.
Muhan approached Kökçin with heavy steps that felt like nails being driven into the earth. Even as his hands touched the stiff leather armor on his wife's shoulders, they trembled like a leaf, as if touching the world's most delicate jewel. The wrath that could bring an entire army to its knees with a single shout had vanished from his gaze; it had been replaced by the soul of a man shattered into a thousand pieces, writhing in helplessness.
"Don't..." Muhan said. His voice was muffled, raspy, and broken as he tried to build a dungeon wall against the massive sob in his throat. "How can I entrust you to that hell, to the mercy of that bloody field? You are the breath I take, Kökçin... If anything happens to you there, if a single strand of your hair is harmed in that gunpowder-scented dust and soil, this vast world would instantly become a narrow grave for me. In a world where I failed to protect you, where you do not breathe, I would bury my own life with my own hands. You are the only thing I cannot live without, the only thing I cannot tie one day to the next without... If you fall, Muhan falls upon his own sword on that field. What use is a victory without you, or a throne where your name does not echo?"
When Kökçin saw the pure, naked horror in Muhan's eyes, her heart ached once again, for the thousandth time. She took her husband's hardened face between her hands with great tenderness, as if touching him for the last time, as if wishing to seal that moment into eternity. The blue depth in her eyes had now turned into an indestructible fortress, steeled by the resolve for vengeance and the blood of her family.
"Listen to me, my Prince," Kökçin said. Her voice was as sharp as a dagger, as unshakable as an oath. "I am not mounting that horse only for myself. I go for the unfinished cry choked in Tuman's throat, for the honor of my father that fell to the earth with dignity, and for every drop of my mother's sacred blood. If I do not step onto that field, the gilded walls of this palace will be a dungeon to us, an eternal grave. But I have one request of you, my Prince... The heaviest, most terrifying, soul-shattering request a man could ever hear from his beloved..."
She paused. The words turned into burning embers in her throat. Her hand went involuntarily to her stomach, to the life growing there in miraculous silence, unaware of the storms of the world. A single tear escaped her eye and fell onto Muhan's calloused fingers like a seal.
"If we fall... If my cruel uncle Kökhan and the Black Army surround us; do not leave me in their hands, Muhan. Do not let them keep me as a captive, a trophy, a slave in the tents of those bloody-handed men. I would a thousand times rather drown in my own blood than be a shadow in their filthy hands... If our end comes, if the light goes out... You kill me, Muhan. Death from the hand of the man I love is more sacred to me than a thousand years of life in the hands of those murderers. Do not... do not let them have us."
Muhan was shaken by this horrific request as if the sky had collapsed upon him, as if he were being buried alive. His knees gave out; he collapsed before his wife, his beloved. He buried his face in her armored hands and burst into sobs, not with the cry of a warrior, but with the wail of a man whose world was being destroyed. For a man, there was only one thing a thousand times more painful than death: having his beloved hand him her own death warrant.
"Do not ask this of me, Kökçin... I would tear my own life into a thousand pieces and lay them before you, but how... how could I draw that sword against you?" Muhan moaned. His voice echoed like a dirge against the cold stones of the room.
Kökçin knelt with him on that cold floor. She pressed her forehead against his; their breaths mingled, their tears merged. In that moment, there was only the silent scream of İwo souls locked together, having sworn to death and love at the same time.
"Promise me, my Prince!" Kökçin whispered, her voice as soft as a farewell kiss but as commanding as a decree. "For our love... So that the innocent life in my womb sees no stain... For our honor... Promise."
Muhan nodded in agony, as if a massive piece of his soul were being ripped away, as if his heart were being split in two. That night, it was not only swords that were sharpened in Haryu Palace; a man's greatest love was sealed with the heaviest and bloodiest oath in the world. As the sounds of drums outside heralded the approaching apocalypse, they clung to each other in each other's warmth, as if they would never be able to breathe again, as if flesh would never part from bone.
DAWN AND THE FINAL FAREWELL
When dawn broke, the sky was painted crimson, as if a harbinger of the blood to be spilled; Muhan and Murin appeared at the head of the army, standing as unshakable as rocks. When the first light of day hit the courtyard of Haryu Palace, even the sun hesitated to illuminate this mournful grandeur, hiding behind the clouds. The sound rising in the courtyard was not just the clashing of steel, but a heavy, damp silence of death blended with history's saddest farewell. As every ring of Prince Muhan's armor sparkled in the pale light of the sun, he looked at Kökçin, who stood beside him like a god of war. His heart was squeezed with remorse like a vise. Taking her into the midst of this hell, to the mercy of swords, was synonymous with burying his own soul alive with his own hands.
As Muhan's gaze flickered over Kökçin, he wished to wrap her in that look like an invisible protective shield. But the woman before him was no longer just his spouse, whom he cherished more than his own life; she was the sharp and dangerous key that would change the course of history with the tips of her fingers. Muhan tried to swallow the desperate acceptance that knotted in his throat like a lump; he gripped the hilt of his sword so hard that the creak of his armored glove echoed in the courtyard.
Kökçin, however, had withdrawn from the world, taking refuge in the cold climate of vengeance. Her war attire combined the wild and free spirit of the steppe with the noble discipline of Haryu in a single body. The first deep breath she took from behind the visor of her helmet filled her lungs not just with the morning cool, but with the acrid scent of approaching gunpowder, blood, and scorched earth. The silks had been torn away, replaced by the cold, heavy metal of revenge. Karatay beneath her, as if sensing the pre-apocalyptic storm within his owner, pawed the marble floor with rage, letting out a neigh that shook heaven and earth with his longing for the steppe. Kökçin had chosen him; for in this war, she needed not just speed and strength, but a loyal companion who knew every ache of her soul.
As they exited the gates of Haryu, the pleas and prayers of the people mingled with the wind of the steppe. After a dusty and silent journey of days, when they reached the familiar, boundless horizon of the steppe, the past within Kökçin overflowed like a dam bursting. These plains where her childhood was spent, where she slept peacefully in her father's shadow, and whose every inch she knew by heart—now looked back at her with the silence of foreign executioners and graves.
The thought of trampling over the faces of those who once stroked her head with affection, those with whom she had ridden and sworn oaths, clouded her mind for a moment. Little Tuman's innocent laughter seemed to echo in the wind... But at that instant, the fire of vengeance in her heart turned even this last hesitation to ash. Kökçin held her head higher than ever, throwing piercing, sharp looks like poisoned arrows toward the enemy lines from atop the maneuvering Karatay.
Muhan, watching her grow into this monumental figure, felt his chest swell with pride while simultaneously being driven mad by the horror of "losing" her. A fire woven of rage and grief had begun within Muhan. Every time he saw the deep pain on Kökçin's face, he wanted to tear apart everyone who had caused her this sorrow—especially that traitor Uncle Kökhan and that waste of a soul, Alpagu. He was like a wolf whose eyes were filled with blood; he gripped his sword so tightly that his knuckles...
"As the war drums of the Black Army thundered in the distance, Muhan tightened his grip until his knuckles turned white, his eyes locking onto the horizon with a terrifying promise: he would either return with the heads of her betrayers or turn the entire steppe into a funeral pyre large enough for the world to see."