The artifact pulsed in Karn’s hand like a heart. Each flicker pointed them deeper into the forest, away from Stoneveil, away from safety.
Elliot walked behind him in silence. The only sound was the crunch of leaves and the soft hum of corrupted residue being drawn from the air into the tracker.
“How far could they have taken him?” Elliot asked.
Karn didn’t look back. “Not far. With that kind of teleportation? It leaves a scar. But it fades quick.”
“You’re sure this artifact’s reliable?”
Karn smirked. “If it wasn’t, you’d be lost in the woods and your brother would already be dead.”
Elliot didn’t answer. Sothing about his tone was off. Like he was enjoying this just a little too much.
They crested a hill and found the ground scorched—blackened Essentia veins crawling through the dirt like spiderwebs.
“This is where they landed,” Karn said.
Elliot knelt. The air was heavier here. Twisted.
His eyes narrowed.
“Sothing’s wrong,” he muttered.
Karn nodded. “You feel it too, huh?”
Elliot stood. “Towan’s still alive.”
Karn gave a short laugh. “You’re sure?”
“I’d know if he wasn’t.”
The silence that followed stretched too long.
They found the tunnel hidden beneath collapsed stone—barely wide enough for a person to squeeze through. Black residue marked the edges, still warm.
Karn placed a hand on the stone. “Fresh. They wanted him taken here.”
Elliot hesitated. “Why would bandits go through this much effort for a Bronze-rank adventurer?”
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Karn didn’t answer imdiately. When he did, it was too casual.
“Maybe your brother’s more valuable than you think.”
The mont they stepped through the rusted iron door, the tunnel behind them groaned—
Then collapsed.
Stone slamd down with a deafening crash, dust swallowing the air in a thick wave.
“Great,” Elliot muttered, waving dust away. “Now we can’t go back even if we do find Towan.”
His words echoed. The tunnel ahead stretched on—twisting, dark, pulsing faintly with that sa corrupted hum.
Karn didn’t flinch. “Don’t worry,” he said, brushing a rock off his shoulder. “I’m sure there’s another exit sowhere up ahead.”
Elliot narrowed his eyes. “How are you so sure?”
Karn hesitated—just a beat too long.
“I’ve seen this kind of place before.”
They walked in silence a few steps more. The walls were jagged, cobbled together like the bones of sothing ancient. Dark Essentia veins crawled across the stone—thick, branching, alive.
Karn glanced at them and gave a short chuckle. “Not this creepy, though.”
Elliot didn’t laugh.
He was too busy noticing how Karn didn’t look surprised at all.
The passage yawned open into a circular chamber, its walls sheathed in frost-glazed stone. Runes—jagged, blackened scars—pulsed faintly across the surface like dormant veins. At the center stood a raised pedestal, encircled by three concentric rings carved into the floor, each rotating with a whisper of unseen chanisms. Their glyphs shimred, shapes writhing as if alive.
The only exit—a door of pitted iron—was sealed shut, its surface choked with creeping tendrils of corruption. Red glyphs throbbed across it in ti with a sound like a slow, distant heartbeat.
A plaque beside the pedestal bore a single line:
“The path is given to those who understand: the pain, the cost, the goal.”
Karn let out a low whistle. “Fancy words for a lock.” His voice echoed too loud in the dead air.
Elliot didn’t answer. He stepped forward, boots scuffing against the grooves in the stone, and knelt beside the rings. Each one turned under his fingertips, smooth and unnervingly weightless. The symbols etched into them twisted as he moved them—so worn with age, others jagged, as if carved in desperation. All of them reeked of sothing wrong.
“Three rings,” Elliot murmured. “Pain. Cost. Goal.”
The outer ring—pain.
A shattered heart.
A chain snapped clean through.
An empty eye socket, weeping dark streaks.
His fingers stilled. “There.” The eye wasn’t just loss—it was blindness. The kind that ca not from a knife, but from lies. From being made to not see. He twisted the ring until the socket aligned with the pedestal.
The middle ring—cost.
A figure on its knees, arms outstretched.
A fla consuming a great tree, roots and all.
A single drop of blood dissolving into black water.
Elliot exhaled. “Sacrifice,” he whispered, and turned the ring to the kneeling form.
Karn shifted behind him. “You’re awfully sure about this.”
Elliot didn’t look up. The inner ring—goal.
A throne split down the middle.
A clenched fist, knuckles bleeding.
A mirror exploding into a thousand shards.
His hand hovered. Then—deliberate—he rotated the ring until the broken throne clicked into place.
“Whoever built this didn’t want power,” he said softly. “They wanted to break it.”
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