After a few hours, the clearing fell quiet as the Deacon arrived.
He didn’t walk in fast or slow—just steady like soone who had done this too many tis to be surprised.
His robe was deep red with black trim, different from the others. The hood covered his face fully.
Only the outline of his jaw was visible, and even that looked strange, like it wasn’t shaped right for a normal human.
Everyone stopped when he stepped past the torches.
The chanting halted.
The white-robed cultists dropped to their knees without a word. The black-cloaked rcenaries didn’t kneel, but they froze in place. Eyes forward. Weapons steady.
No one spoke.
The Deacon walked forward without looking left or right. His hands were covered in gloves made of dark leather. In them, he held the staff.
It wasn’t large or glowing with power. Just simple, old, made of so dark material that looked like wood but didn’t reflect light at all. At the top, a round gem pulsed dimly.
Not bright enough to see from the sky, but up close, it gave off a kind of heat. Not the burning kind. The kind that made your spine feel heavy.
He stepped up to the altar.
Didn’t say a word.
Then raised the staff.
Everyone in the circle held their breath.
And then, slowly, the Deacon brought the staff down, slotting it into a carved hole in the center of the altar.
The mont the base touched the stone, a low hum spread out across the clearing.
It didn’t co from the ground.
It ca from sothing beneath it.
The air changed.
Not colder or hotter—just heavier, like the world had been pulled down by a few inches.
No one moved.
Then, the chanting began again.
Slower this ti.
Deeper.
It didn’t sound human anymore.
No emotion, no panic, just voice after voice repeating the sa chant like it had been rehearsed a thousand tis.
The circle around the altar tightened.
The cultists pressed their hands into the dirt. Not the clean, outer ring—but the blood-soaked center.
As their hands touched the ground, the symbols they had carved earlier started to fill in.
Not with light or fire.
But with sothing darker—thick and slow, like black mud.
It looked like the ground was reacting. Like it had seen this before.
The guards resud their patrol.
But their eyes looked different now, no longer alert or curious; they had a dull, empty look. As if even they weren’t fully there anymore.
More cultists stepped forward.
Not to chant—but to offer.
A young man in white robes held a stone bowl filled with black blood.
Another had a beast core—still glowing.
One brought a cloth bag that looked small and harmless—until the top opened and a dozen tiny hands fell out.
Baby hands.
No one asked where they ca from.
The Deacon didn’t look at the items.
He just stood there.
Silent.
Watching the staff.
And the staff...
It was glowing now.
Not like light.
More like breath.
It pulsed. Slow, deep, like a heart that had just rembered how to beat.
Each glow ca with a sound—soft, distant, but steady. A beat that didn’t belong to any living creature.
It didn’t speed up.
It didn’t slow down.
But it didn’t stop.
One of the cultists near the front started shaking. His head dipped. He whispered sothing, then collapsed, blood pouring from his nose.
The Deacon didn’t move.
He just raised one hand, and the rcenaries dragged the collapsed cultist away.
More offerings were brought forward.
Not all of them were dead.
Two humans. One unconscious, the other bound and screaming. He didn’t know where he was. He didn’t know what was happening.
But he knew it was wrong.
The cultists didn’t react to his voice. They pressed him to the ground. Not cruelly. Just... thodically. Like this was a step in a recipe.
His scream stopped when the roots ca.
They didn’t stab or strangle.
They just wrapped around him.
Pulled him into the dirt.
By the ti the last bit of his hair vanished, the staff pulsed again, stronger.
The Deacon’s head lifted slightly.
The staff wasn’t just glowing now.
It was breathing.
And with every breath, the flas of the torches bent more toward the center. The roots dug deeper. The sky grew darker.
The wild-eyed cultist from earlier stood at the back of the ring, watching.
He wasn’t part of the main group. Not allowed that close.
But he couldn’t take his eyes off the staff.
"It’s starting," he whispered.
No one answered.
Because they all felt it too.
Far above, in the upper layers of the Forbidden Zone’s atmosphere, two drones shorted out at the sa ti.
One showed a blur of static before the screen went black.
The other didn’t even blink—just shut off.
The monitoring tower didn’t raise an alarm.
Because the command relay had been interrupted seconds before.
The satellites kept spinning.
But the forest below was no longer theirs to see.
—
Elsewhere, deeper in the zone, Ethan opened his eyes.
He didn’t jump or panic.
But sothing felt off.
He couldn’t hear anything strange. There was no movent around him. But still, sothing was wrong.
His instincts were telling him to pay attention.
He didn’t know what it was.
There was no threat nearby. No danger he could sense.
But the feeling wouldn’t go away.
He frowned slightly and focused on the system ssage blinking in the corner of his vision:
[Bronze Advancent Process: 92% Complete – Major requirents et the upgrade to the brone rank.]
He stared at it for a second.
Then dismissed it with a blink.
It wasn’t new. He had expected it.
His rank-up was close. Almost done.
He took a breath, stood up from the flat stone he’d been sitting on, and looked around.
The forest was quiet, but not in a strange way; it was just still, like the quiet before a storm.
He didn’t see anything.
Didn’t hear anything.
But his gut kept telling him sothing wasn’t right.
He grabbed his bag, slung it over his shoulder, and started walking.
Not fast. Not slow.
Just steady.
He didn’t make much noise. Not because of any special skill, but because the ground was soft and the trees were spaced wide enough apart.
He didn’t know if he was moving closer to danger or not.
But sothing was pulling at him.
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