Before they could ask more, the cavern shook. Dust fell from above. Screams echoed from the entrance. Mira drew her blades. "They’ve found us." Jude grabbed Nyra’s arm. "We need to move." The remnants began scattering. Magic sparked through the air. The man of light vanished into mist. As they ran toward the back of the cavern, another explosion rang out. The wall behind them cracked. From the opening stepped a creature, tall, wrapped in skin that shimred like oil, eyes glowing yellow. It had no mouth, no nose, just a face like polished stone. It didn’t speak. It didn’t need to. Jude knew what it was. Hollowed.
Mira stood between it and them. "Go!" she shouted. "Get to the Sorrowsteel! If you fall now, there is no tomorrow!" The creature lunged. Jude dragged Nyra through the collapsing tunnel. Behind them, the sound of blades and bone. Then silence.
They erged into night. The Hollow behind them burned, blue fire crackling in silence. Jude didn’t stop. Neither did Nyra. They moved until their feet gave out. And as they collapsed beneath a dead tree on the edge of the Withered Sea, Jude looked up at the stars and felt sothing new. Not hope. Not dread. Sothing in between. The world was unraveling. But maybe, just maybe, they were the thread that would bind it again.
Jude stirred to the sound of shifting sands. The Withered Sea stretched endlessly before them, its surface cracked and broken like the skin of an ancient beast. No water, no waves, just endless plates of scorched earth where oceans once sang. Nyra sat a few feet away, stitching the torn sleeve of her tunic with a rusted needle and quiet concentration. Her eyes, even in exhaustion, stayed sharp. They hadn’t spoken much since fleeing the Iron Hollow. Words felt fragile after what they saw, Mira’s last stand, the remnants falling one by one, and that creature, that Hollowed thing, stepping into the world like a nightmare breathing anew. But they were alive. That had to count for sothing.
Jude stood, brushing off the dust from his coat. His body still ached from the tunnel collapse, bruises blooming beneath his skin like dark flowers. He looked north. The Vault of Echoes was there sowhere, hidden past the bones of the world. "We should move before midday," he said. "The air here gets strange when the sun’s high." Nyra nodded and rose, looping the stitched sleeve tightly around her wrist. "Do you think she made it?" she asked quietly. Jude didn’t need to ask who. He just shook his head. "She knew what she was doing." They didn’t say more. So mories were ant to live in silence.
They walked until their feet blistered and bled. The Withered Sea offered no shade, no shelter, just relics. Massive broken statues poked from the ground like forgotten gods. Twisted tal spires humd with ancient energy, and once, they passed the shell of sothing enormous, so beast, chanical or otherwise, with eyes still glowing faintly. Jude kept a tight grip on his dagger. He didn’t trust silence anymore. The Table had eyes everywhere, and now, the Hollowed did too.
By the fifth day, Nyra collapsed from heat and strain. Jude caught her before her head hit the ground, laying her gently against a ridge of stone. Her lips were cracked, and her breathing shallow. "We need shelter," he muttered, scanning the horizon. Then he saw it, just barely, a shimr in the air. A mirage, maybe, or sothing else. He lifted her in his arms, teeth clenched against the pain, and stumbled toward the flickering edge. As he stepped through the shimr, the world bent.
The heat vanished. The light shifted. The cracked earth beca smooth obsidian. Before him stood a temple, long abandoned but untouched by ti. He looked down. Nyra still breathed, but barely. He carried her inside. The air was cool, almost cold. It slled of stone and rain, though no clouds had graced the sky in days. He laid her on a raised platform at the center of the hall and looked around. The walls were carved with unfamiliar script, neither Old Tongue nor Remnant, but they moved subtly, as though listening.
A voice echoed from above. "You co burdened." Jude spun, dagger raised, but saw nothing. The voice was male, deep and calm, echoing not from a body but from the stone itself. "Who are you?" Jude asked. The silence returned for a mont, then: "A warden. Nothing more. This place listens. Few are allowed entry. Fewer are allowed to leave." "We need no trouble. Just shelter," Jude said. "She’s dying." The stone pulsed beneath his feet. "Then she must decide to live."
Jude sat beside Nyra, unsure what to make of the cryptic response. Her eyes fluttered, then opened slightly. "Where are we?" she asked hoarsely. "A temple. Hidden." "Why is it cold?" "I don’t know." She swallowed, her throat dry. "Feels like... it’s watching ." Jude nodded. "It is."
They remained there for three days. On the second day, Nyra’s fever broke. By the third, she stood on her own. The temple offered no food, no water, but neither did they feel hunger or thirst within its walls. Ti felt heavy, slow. Jude spent hours tracing the carvings, trying to make sense of the place. On the morning of the fourth day, the voice returned. "You seek the Vault of Echoes." "Yes," Jude said. "Do you know where it is?" "I know where it sleeps. But to reach it, you must leave behind the weight you carry."
Jude hesitated. "What weight?" "Your fear. Your guilt. The shadows of your old world." Jude looked toward Nyra, who stood near the entrance, silent. He clenched his fists. "I can’t forget what I’ve done. I won’t." "Then you will carry it," the voice replied, "and the Vault will test the burden."
The shimr opened once more, and they left the temple. Outside, the world had shifted again.
Reviews
All reviews (0)