Kael didn't answer imdiately.
The black fla in his hand crackled, flickering as if reacting on its own to the growing danger—but there was a different tension in his face. He was calculating. Assessing every movent of the Gélion, every snap, every pulse of blue light within the creature.
Sylphie gripped his shoulders.
"Kael! Don't do it alone!"
He looked at her—and for a mont, she saw the danger not in the fla, not in the guardian… but in the decision she was about to make.
"I didn't say I'd do it alone," he replied.
The Gélion raised both arms and slamd them into the ground, creating enormous fissures that spread like frozen roots in every direction. Alia raised her staff and threw a wide shield, but the impact nearly knocked her down.
Irelia scread:
"KAEL! NOW OR NEVER!"
He took a deep breath, clenched his teeth—and finally replied:
"I'm going to open him up from the inside."
Sylphie's eyes widened. "What?!"
"He has a core. Every Gélion has one. If I reach that vertical hole in his face, I can hit the center."
"YOU WILL DIE!" Alia yelled, dodging a huge shard of ice.
Kael twirled the fla between his fingers like a living dagger.
"Not if I'm quick."
Without waiting for permission—without waiting for anything—he lunged forward.
The Gélion attacked with its cracked arm, trying to crush him. Kael slid beneath the blow, leaving trails of heat on the ice as he passed. The creature turned its heavy trunk to follow him, emitting that deep, pulsating crack.
Sylphie extended her hands, channeling green mana like a cord that bound Kael's ankles, giving him a boost of speed.
"GO!"
Kael shot off.
Alia conjured floating symbols that exploded in violet flashes around the Gélion, blinding it for half a second.
Irelia leaped over a slab of ice, using it as a springboard to strike the creature's leg. Not to injure—but to destabilize. The blow ricocheted, but made the Gélion kneel on its right leg.
Kael ran down the left arm, which was still cracked from the previous fight. The fla in his hand extended, forming a long blade that snaked like solid smoke.
"Co here… you big piece of shit…"
The Gélion turned its eyeless face toward him. The blue light pulsed, reacting.
Kael leaped.
And then the creature attacked with its right arm, faster than anyone expected.
"KAEL!" Sylphie cried.
He realized the blow too late.
The arm descended like a giant ice log, about to crush him in mid-air.
But Irelia intercepted it.
She leaped like a spear, thrusting into Gélion's arm with such force that cracks spiraled all along its length. The creature turned the attack against her—and she was thrown far away, falling onto the snow in a painful collision.
"Irelia!" Alia rushed to her.
But the dodge was enough.
Kael landed on Gélion's shoulder.
And rushed towards its face.
The vertical "eye" glowed intensely, recognizing the imminent threat.
Kael raised the fla.
"OPEN!"
He plunged the black blade into the vertical fissure.
The sound was deafening.
Ice cracking.
Magic screaming.
Blue light exploded from within, so intense that Sylphie shielded her face with her arms.
The Gélion staggered, roaring with the crack of a thousand plates breaking at once. Kael pushed the fla deeper, feeling it vibrate as if it were piercing infinite layers.
But sothing pulled him back—the Gélion's arm, which tried to grasp him, even broken.
The icy hand closed around his torso.
Sylphie felt her heart plumt.
"KAEL!"
The creature tightened its grip.
Kael scread—not from fear, but from sheer effort.
The fla grew more intense.
Hotter.
More alive.
"LET HIM GO!" Irelia, even wounded, rose and hurled her sword like a dart. The blade spun in the air and struck Gélion's wrist, opening a deep crack.
Alia unleashed an arcane blast that pierced the creature's arm.
The hand split open.
And Kael fell—along with fragnts of burnt ice that detached from Gélion's body.
Sylphie ran to him, but stopped—because he still held the fla, and it was… different.
Brighter.
Denser.
More… alive?
Gélion took its last faltering step and fell to its knees. The inner light flickered hesitantly.
Kael stood.
Hand raised.
And struck once more, directly at the exposed core.
The explosion was silent—an expansion of shadow and blue light that scattered through the air like shimring dust.
Gélion froze.
Trembled.
And collapsed into thousands of fragnts, all at once.
The battle was over.
Kael staggered back.
Sylphie caught him before he fell.
"Are you alright?!"
He took a deep breath, the fla finally diminishing to the size of a dark ember.
"…yes."
Sylphie rested her forehead against his, relieved.
"Idiot…" she murmured.
Irelia wiped blood from her lip and approached with a tired smile.
"Next ti, warn us before you try to die."
Alia blew a strand of hair from her face.
"I don't know if I want to hug you or hit you."
Kael laughed weakly.
"Get in line."
But then everyone fell silent.
Because the ice before them—where the Gélion had erged—was different.
An opening.
A path.
A narrow, spiraling descent made of dark stone.
Sylphie took a deep breath.
"This is the tunnel."
Kael steadied his feet, finally regaining his balance.
"Then let's go."
Irelia picked up her fallen sword and wiped it on the snow.
Alia adjusted her staff.
Sylphie held Kael's hand for another second.
"You promise… not to do sothing like this alone down there?"
Kael hesitated.
Then he squeezed her hand.
"I promise… to try."
She rolled her eyes—but smiled.
The four of them turned toward the deep opening, the warm air escaping like the sigh of a sleeping monster.
Kael took the first step.
"Let's go find the King."
And they disappeared into the darkness below.
The air inside the tunnel was different—heavy, humid, too hot for a place buried under tons of snow and ice. It was a stifling heat, like that of a forge that never rested, mixed with the tallic sll of ancient stone. The narrow descent spiraled in gentle curves, so that each step reverberated low off the walls, creating echoes that sounded almost like whispers.
Kael was the first to notice.
"These walls… they aren't natural," he murmured, running his fingers over the dark stone. "They were sculpted."
Sylphie leaned over, touching another part of the surface. Gentle ripples ran through the rock, as if it had been lted and solidified again.
"By heat… or by magic," she said.
Irelia cleared her throat. "Whatever did this, it's not far off."
Alia raised her staff, and the tip glowed faintly violet. "The deeper we go, the stronger it gets. I feel it. It's like the air is alive."
Kael looked over his shoulder, raising an eyebrow. "Alive?"
"You know what I an!" she retorted. "There's energy coursing through these walls. Hot, dense, pulsating mana. There shouldn't be anything like this here."
He gave a small smile. "Maybe it's a good sign."
"Or a terrible one," Irelia retorted. "Signs are rarely good when they involve heat under a frozen lake."
Sylphie shook her head, amused. "Positivity doesn't hurt, Irelia."
"It does, when it makes you ignore that we're heading straight for what killed half the royal guard," the warrior replied. "I'm just saying."
Still, no one stopped.
The footsteps echoed like heartbeats—rhythmic, insistent, ever closer to the bottom.
The spiral ended in a narrow corridor, whose walls emanated faint blue light from crystalline veins that cut through the stone like frozen rivers.
Kael frowned.
"There's no ice here… but there is crystal."
Alia approached the glowing veins. "Arcane crystals. They grow where mana is highly concentrated. And this…" She tapped the crystal twice with her fingernails. "This is supercharged. Soone made it grow."
Irelia took a half-step back. "Grow? You talk like it's a plant."
"And it is," Alia replied. "In a way."
Sylphie ran her hand over the bluish light. "This is… warm."
"That's what's heating the tunnel," Kael concluded. "The heat cos from these veins."
He took a step deeper into the corridor.
The blue light, once soft, pulsed.
Everyone froze.
Kael instinctively raised his hand, the black fla flickering reflexively—but small, discreet, almost contained.
Sylphie touched his arm. "Wait. It wasn't hostile."
The next second, the pulsing ceased.
Alia breathed a sigh of relief. "It's just crystals reacting to living mana. Your mana, in this case."
"Then let's keep our distance from them," Irelia suggested. "I don't want to get fried by an angry crystal."
Kael took a deep breath.
"Stay behind ."
And he advanced.
The corridor ended in a wide chamber, where the ceiling was so high that the blue light from the veins didn't reach the top. Dense shadows filled the space, but there was heat—hot air rose through wide cracks in the floor, as if sothing were breathing down there.
Sylphie narrowed her eyes.
"This looks… like an access hall."
"Or an anteroom," Alia agreed. "Probably part of an ancient structure."
Irelia walked to the center of the chamber. "Ancient structure or not, this place is… too alive."
Kael approached one of the cracks in the floor, leaning over to get a better look. The edges were jagged, as if sothing had corroded the stone instead of breaking it.
"There's light down there," he murmured.
"Blue?" Sylphie asked.
"Red."
The others exchanged glances.
Red wasn't good.
It never was.
"Do we have to go down?" Alia asked, already knowing the answer.
"Yes," Kael replied.
Irelia tested the edge with her boot. "This will collapse if you jump."
"Is there another way out?" Sylphie asked.
They circled the chamber. Nothing. Only walls of living stone and blue crystals that seed to watch every movent.
"Then we go down," Alia sighed.
Kael nodded. "But carefully."
He crouched down, positioning himself on the edge of the opening.
"I'll go first."
Irelia grumbled. "He's going to do sothing stupid again."
"I heard that," Kael replied.
"You were supposed to."
Sylphie touched his shoulder. "If it goes wrong—"
"I won't fall," he assured her. "I promised I'd try not to ss things up on my own, rember?"
She pressed her lips together, but nodded.
Kael took a deep breath and let himself slide down the narrow opening—not falling, but descending using almost invisible stone steps that ford a natural vertical staircase.
He looked up.
"You can co."
Sylphie followed soon after, with Alia and Irelia in sequence.
The descent lasted just over thirty ters, until the red light beca so bright that it illuminated everything below. The heat increased dramatically, as if they were entering the interior of an underground furnace.
When the last of them reached the bottom, they remained motionless for a few seconds.
What they saw seed impossible.
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