Episode 115: What Remains
Written By Karl White
After 1984, to the world at large, Broderick Zayne simply vanished. Following years of isolation on the Nebraska Plains, the collapse of the Church of the Seven Angels, and the fire that consumed its homestead, no one could say with certainty what’d become of him. Some believed the aging Eternal slipped into hiding. Others whispered he’d finally succumbed to madness, or somehow found his way back to the Abyss.
What remained in Nebraska - © 2026 Headless Horseman Productions, LLC
None knew he’d chosen his own end. Before the flames claimed him, however, Broderick entrusted one final piece of the future to a man he believed could bear its burden...Renmaru Okayama.
Not every battle in the war between the Light and Dark was fought in grand fashion, or was hidden in the pages of ancient books. Most unfolded far from history, waged in the lonely quiet. The thing about evil, was it rarely announced itself with spectacle. It preferred silence, preying upon the weak, swallowing lives in shadows. And for over two centuries, there was one figure who quietly ensured many of those stories never reached their tragic conclusion.
Ren’s path began in despair. Once a samurai, the tragic loss of his wife and newborn daughter stripped away his reason for living. In 1792, his plans to take his own life were interrupted by the desperate cries of a child in a darkened forest. Drawing him into an encounter that transformed him into a vampire.
Rather than surrender to the darkness that remade him, Ren embraced the principles of his bushidō with greater conviction. After destroying his maker, Keiko, he turned his blade upon his own kind, believing no innocent soul should ever suffer at the hands of evil.
Ren battles Anu - © 2025 Headless Horseman Productions, LLC
His pursuit eventually led him to Anu, one of the three original vampires whose arrival on Earth gave rise to one of mankind's oldest legends. Their confrontation ended in an act no vampire ever survived or repeated since. By drinking Anu's blood, Ren inherited the ancient one's extraordinary gifts, becoming not merely one of the most powerful vampires to ever exist, but something altogether different. As a fierce predator, he’d ensure his own species would never again rule the night. But in a strange twist, the vampires needed to exist in the first place, to proliferate, so Ren could become what he was always meant to be.
Edwin Hawkes - © 2025 Headless Horseman Productions, LLC
Long before that victory, Ren inspired another legacy. After rescuing Edwin Hawkes from a vampire attack, the wayward sailor dedicated his own life to protecting humanity from creatures stalking the night. Giving rise to the Nightwardens, a brotherhood whose purpose mirrored the path Ren himself had chosen. Though the samurai never sought recognition, his influence quietly echoed through generations of protectors who never realized the debt they owed him.
The strength Ren carried after defeating Anu was matched only by his discipline. Under the guidance of the Eternal monk Heng Shao, he trained, mastering speed magic and refining abilities few living beings could rival. He’d also have the disturbing dreams of the man in a field, blood raining from the sky. Tracing the visions back to when he first became a vampire. He felt something dark and nefarious churning beneath life. Curiously enough, Ren’s visions of the man in the field, predated Reginald Black by nearly 75 years. Making him the first known witness to what would be recognized as an enduring warning.
Those visions convinced Ren that vampires represented only one face worn by the Dark. Throughout the world, different cultures gave different names to the horrors stalking the night. Some were ancient species surviving beyond their proper age. Others were twisted by forbidden magic, dimensional breaches, or curses that assumed physical form. Whenever rumors surfaced of villages emptied without explanation, or creatures that defied every law of nature, Ren quietly followed the trail.
Redcap hunting on the Scottish moors - © 2026 Headless Horseman Productions, LLC
Over the course of centuries, he hunted Redcaps, murderous goblin-like creatures who kept their caps stained crimson by dipping them in the blood of fresh human victims. He tracked Mordhounds, large canine predators that crossed into our world through an ancient breach to the Chasm, a primordial realm inhabited by things older than mankind itself. He exterminated Ghuls, not to be confused with humans trapped in limbo after consuming a drop of vampire blood, but an ancient race of subterranean scavengers drawn to the scent of death. He destroyed Wendigos, Hollow-Ones, Chupacabras, and countless other horrors, who all found themselves pursued by the same relentless swordsman.
Among those who trafficked in darkness, Ren became less a man than a warning. They spoke of a samurai who arrived before dawn. A vampire who hunted his own kind. And a warrior who never stopped. Every monster destroyed meant another person lived to see the sun rise. Those unseen victories became a foundation upon which every larger triumph against the Dark was built.
Zayne and Death watching Ren - © 2025 Headless Horseman Productions, LLC
When Broderick Zayne encountered Ren at the monastery in the Himalayas, both had been hardened by darkness. Zayne often watched the samurai practicing alone beneath the moonlight, seeing in him the same unwavering discipline that carried his own journey. When Death revealed Ren was a soldier of Light, fighting the same war on a different front, Zayne found a peace he’d rarely allowed himself to feel. For centuries, he believed the burden rested largely upon his shoulders. Though he stood beside the Order of Wormwood and Gérard Roux, the struggle against the Dark always felt deeply personal. Discovering others devoted to the same cause reassured him, mankind's defense was greater than any one person.
After Zayne left the monastery on his mission to track Orem Black and his Knights of the Black Serpent, he and Ren remained in regular correspondence. Writing of battles won and lost, and their quiet hope for the future of humankind. It was through those exchanges the alchemist and the samurai vampire came to know one another. Though remarkably different, Zayne the academic, and Ren the warrior, each recognized in the other, the same unwavering resolve. What began as mutual respect matured into a friendship sustained across decades, by the comfort of knowing, somewhere in the world the other still stood watch.
By the time Broderick Zayne's final letter reached Ren, he’d become far more than just a guardian of the night. Most never knew he existed, that anonymity suited Ren. He didn’t fight for recognition, protecting the innocent was the path he’d chosen. Unlike Zayne, Ren placed little faith in prophecy, believing the war was won a single life at a time.
Yet reading Zayne’s final words, Ren recognized the significance. What Zayne uncovered concerning the Seventh Procession spoke to him, as the alchemist distilled the future down to one single soul who would define the end.
The relentless swordsman - © 2026 Headless Horseman Productions, LLC
In the years following, Ren leaned further into the hunt for vampires. He’d meet fate during the Great Vampire War, killing Elizabeth Jovan on a bridge in New Orleans. By slaying the last of the original bloodline, he unknowingly fulfilled one of the Processions, advancing the Dark's designs despite fighting against it with every fiber of his being. Few burdens weighed heavier than discovering your greatest victory also served your enemy.
Even so, Ren refused to let regret define him. Alongside Heng Shao, he quietly sought out those who’d already proven themselves against the Dark. Strengthening the forces of the Light as history crept closer to the Absolution.
He remained close to Sara Ivy, recognizing her as one of the Light's greatest champions. And he quietly watched over Flora Mae Watkins, knowing Death himself had warned her difficult trials still lay ahead. Piece by piece, protector by protector, the scattered defenders of mankind were drawn toward the same inevitable horizon.
Centuries earlier, Ren accepted he’d likely never know death’s embrace. But he understood the road before him would almost certainly end in sacrifice. No true soldier of the Light marched toward battle believing victory was guaranteed. They fought because it was right. His bushidō taught Ren, that honor was measured not by survival, but by what one was willing to surrender so others might live. As the end drew closer, he often found himself thinking of Zayne. Of everything his friend sacrificed in pursuit of hope, and what still remained to be asked of those heading towards war.
He wasn’t the only one...
Roux in the Abyss - © 2026 Headless Horseman Productions, LLC
Trapped in the endless Abyss, with nothing but time, Gérard Roux often found his thoughts returning to his dear friend, Broderick Zayne. He learned of Zayne’s death, mourning the loss. But taking comfort that Zayne’s suffering had ended.
More importantly, Roux would remember him as a man who spent his entire existence refusing to yield, convinced providence demanded everything of those called to serve it.
Standing alongside Banerjee, Bhekizizwe, and countless other souls in the void, Roux couldn’t help but wonder whether they’d all been guided towards this from the very beginning. That’s the hope Broderick Zayne always clung to, that the sacrifices one makes are in honor of a greater purpose.
Both Ren and Roux hoped when their own moment finally came, they’d prove as faithful to their own calling, as Broderick Zayne had been to his.
TO BE CONTINUED…