The air shifted again as they moved deeper along the river, becoming cooler and carrying a damp, mineral-heavy weight that settled in their lungs. The light from their orb dimmed, as if struggling against the encroaching gloom, painting the walls in an uneven, sickly glow that flickered weakly against the persistent blue shimmer of the embedded minerals. The sound of running water grew louder, a constant, whispering rush that filled every pause between their breaths, a sound both soothing and unnerving in its permanence.
The cavern stretched ahead into a long, natural corridor where the river curved sharply and vanished into a throat of absolute darkness. Here, ancient carvings decorated the stone pillars—faint, nearly erased depictions of circular patterns and intertwined lines that looked less like art and more like a forgotten language. Gray slowed his pace, his senses on high alert. The markings were a silent siren, drawing his eyes again and again, their mysterious intent a puzzle he felt compelled to solve.
Each symbol looked deliberate, organized in precise spirals or rigid grids, their edges etched deep into the rock as if with great force. They resembled runes, but not of any form he recognized from his limited studies. They were older, stranger.
Aurelle brushed his hand along one of the thick, squat columns jutting out from the wall, wiping away a layer of chalky blue dust. Beneath the mineral crust, something faintly shimmered—a carved symbol of a simple circle cleanly divided by four vertical lines.
It was stark. Too simple to be decorative.
But Gray noticed it repeated with an obsessive frequency. On the pillars. On the shattered tiles littering the ground. And when he looked closer, his stomach tightening, he saw it carved into the foreheads of the skeletons scattered along the riverbank.
Every single one.
A faint, cold unease wormed through his chest. These skeletons were different from the aggressive ones in the church—these were utterly motionless, brittle and ancient, covered in a fine, grey dust that seemed centuries old. Yet they sat in strange, ritualistic positions, some kneeling as if in prayer, others half-turned toward the river as if frozen mid-flight.
"How…" Gray muttered under his breath, the question escaping before he could stop it. "How were they even alive before? They... they are just skeletons..."
Adel crouched beside one, her silhouette tense. "They're not," she said softly, her voice barely louder than the river's flow. "Not anymore. Not for a long time."
To demonstrate, she reached out, not touching the bone itself but the stone near its curled hand. A slight tremor from the contact was enough. The ancient bone crumbled at the slightest vibration, collapsing into a heap of fine, white powder. The soft, final sound echoed faintly through the still air.
Gray exhaled slowly, the tension in his shoulders easing a fraction—until his gaze dropped and he noticed something carved onto the ground beneath the dissolved remains.
Lines. Words.
The writing was archaic, the letters angular and foreign, spiraling inward in a tight, hypnotic circle around where the skeleton's heart would have been. The same ubiquitous circle-and-line symbol sat at the center of the spiral, a silent, stark period to the unreadable sentence.
Aurelle stepped closer, his usual detached calm replaced by a focused intensity. He crouched beside the carving, his eyes narrowing as he traced the grooves with his fingertips, his touch almost reverent.
"What's it say?" Adel asked, rising to her feet and scanning the darkness around them.
There was a long, heavy pause before Aurelle spoke, as if he were assembling the meaning in his mind. "It's not a full sentence," he murmured, his voice low and thoughtful. "Fragments. But it reads something like… 'Bound beneath her breath.'"
Gray frowned, the words feeling like ice down his spine. "What does that mean? Bound by what? By who?"
Aurelle didn't answer. His gaze remained locked on the symbols, a deep furrow in his brow, as if the words had snagged on a memory he couldn't quite retrieve.
The silence thickened, broken only by the endless whisper of water. Gray felt the air pressing physically against his skin.
They moved further along the river, their steps cautious and measured, careful not to step on the brittle, resting dead. The deeper they went, the more the cavern's character changed. The air grew warmer and more humid, the blue light from the veins in the walls strengthening, casting their faces in sharp, cerulean relief. And then, they saw it—a distinct, brighter glow emanating from a narrow crevice in the wall ahead, a tear in the rock that seemed to breathe light.
It was soft at first, diffuse like starlight filtered through deep water. But as they drew closer, the light deepened into a concentrated, vibrant blue—the unmistakable signature of pure, filtered Vyre, its energy vibrating gently through the very air, raising the fine hairs on Gray's arms.
Adel stopped, instinctively lowering her weapon. "Do you feel that?" she whispered, her eyes wide.
Gray nodded, his throat dry. The familiar hum inside him, the quiet thrum of his own Vyre, seemed to resonate in harmony with it, a faint, answering call that was both comforting and deeply alarming.
They slipped through the narrow gap in the stone one by one, emerging into a smaller, more intimate chamber.
A shrine.
Or what had once been one.
The ceiling was half-collapsed, and shattered stone lay scattered across the floor like the bones of the room itself. In the center, standing defiantly amidst the ruin, was a statue of a woman—tall, graceful, carved from a pearlescent marble that glimmered with an internal light under the blue radiance. Her attire was intricate and flowing, detailed with patterns that reminded Gray of the ceremonial dresses he'd seen once in a book about the southern isles of Aurelia —ornate, layered folds, delicate jewelry carved into the stone at her neckline, and a thin, elegant veil that draped over her head and cascaded down her shoulders.
The paint that had once adorned her—a rich, royal purple—had long since dried and cracked, flaking away in thin, brittle strips that littered the base like sad confetti.
Adel took a slow, involuntary step forward, her warrior's pragmatism overcome by a sudden, compelling curiosity. She raised her hand, fingers outstretched, toward the statue's cold shoulder.
Before she could make contact, Aurelle's voice cut through the heavy air, sharp and uncharacteristically urgent. "Don't."
She turned, startled. "What? Why—"
But Aurelle only shook his head, his jaw tight. His expression was grim, his eyes focused not on the woman's serene face, but on the base of the statue where a network of faint, dark markings ran like poisoned veins across the pale stone.
"Don't touch random things, you should know that. It's also releasing a source of unfiltered Vyre.
Then a sound echoed behind them, dry and scraping.
Bone against rock.
Gray turned sharply, his heart lurching into his throat—skeletons, a handful of them, stepping weakly through the crevice entrance. But something was immediately, terribly off.
Their sockets were empty. No flickering flame of false life. No malevolent glow.
They moved slowly, their steps clumsy, disjointed, and uncertain, like broken puppets.
Adel and Aurelle stepped forward without hesitation, weapons ready. The first skeleton swung a rusted blade in a feeble, pathetic arc. Adel sidestepped with a dancer's grace and kicked its legs out from under it; it shattered on impact, its pieces scattering across the floor with a sound like falling pottery.
Another lurched for Aurelle, but he met it with a single, swift, downward strike, collapsing its ribcage. The bones scattered, lifeless and still.
Gray barely had time to process the ease of the fight before he himself was attacked.
He desperately attempted to undheath his sword but failed. Resorting to block a skeletons attack.
A sharp pain sprang through his forearm as he stumbled backwards—his boot catching on a loose, tilting flagstone. He fell backward, grabbing instinctively at the wall for balance. His splayed hand struck the base of the statue, directly over one of the dark, vein-like markings.
In that instant, Aurelle saw the color drain from Gray's face, leaving him pale as the marble itself.
Gray froze—his eyes wide and unfocused, his breath shallow, his body rigid.
'This..what the fuck is happening!?'
The shrine around him began to dissolve, the solid stone fading into a shimmering, insubstantial haze. A sharp pain seared in Gray's mind, he let out an agonizing acream and collapsed to his knees. He covered his eyes and squirmed on the floor.
The air shifted again, losing its damp chill, replaced by a warm, golden sunlight that spilled over him. The pain suddenly disappeared and Gray stopped squirming.
"What...the...fuck..." He gasped for air even afterwards and slowly opened his eyes.
What he seen left him stunned.
He was no longer in a cavern, but standing amidst a vast, vibrant crowd of people.
A mountain village spread out around him, alive and bustling. Simple homes of sun-baked clay and weathered wood nestled in the valley. Towering, snow-capped mountains encircled them, their peaks bathed in brilliant golden light. And at the center of it all stood the statue—but she was alive. The same woman, draped in her fine, ceremonial veil, her back turned to him as she serenely overlooked the thriving valley below.
People surrounded him, their clothes simple and homespun, their faces etched with a mixture of hope and fear. They were kneeling. Their voices rose together in a chant—low, rhythmic, and in a language utterly foreign to his ears. It was fluid, melodic, yet heavy with a profound, desperate reverence.
Gray looked around, confusion and a rising panic clawing at his mind. 'What is this? A memory? A dream?'
Someone stood beside him.
An older man, his hair streaked with distinguished gray, his face calm but deeply lined by a lifetime of sun and sorrow. He looked at Gray with an almost paternal smile and spoke—the words were warm, but their meaning was lost, just noise.
Gray didn't respond, he couldn't. He had no idea what he was even saying.
The man's smile faltered slightly. He repeated himself, louder this time, his tone becoming more insistent.
And again.
Each repetition grew sharper, more demanding. The warm, melodic syllables twisted, turning jagged and angry, the paternal concern curdling into something dark and accusatory.
Gray tried to speak—to ask what he wanted, who he was—but the words were thick and useless in his throat, refusing to form.
'What...what do I do? Why am I here?' Just then, hands grabbed his shoulders, hard and unyielding. The crowd pressed in, a suffocating wall of bodies, pushing him forward toward the stone stairs that led up to the veiled woman. He struggled, planting his feet, but he was powerless, stumbling up the worn, stone steps against his will.
At the top stood the woman.
The one from the statue.
Her veil fluttered in a clean, mountain wind. She stood perfectly motionless, a serene sentinel gazing outward at the golden horizon.
Gray hesitated at the precipice before her, his breath trembling in his chest. Then, slowly, she turned.
Her face was wrong.
The warmth and serenity he expected was gone—replaced by something hollow and ancient. Her eyes were not eyes, but black, bottomless voids. Her smile was stretched too wide, a grotesque rictus, her teeth behind it sharp and uneven like shattered glass.
The sound of the chanting twisted, deepened—turning into a roaring, monstrous cacophony that threatened to split his skull. The pain returned this time stronger.
Gray instantly collapsed onto the floor, screaming even louderthsn the chants.
"S—stop! Make it stop!" He closed his ears in an attempt to muffle the sounds around him.
Jus then the world dissolved into nothing.
Gray gasped, pain gone. He stumbled backward as solid reality rushed back in. The shrine was around him again, cold and dark. His chest ached violently, as if he'd been holding his breath for an hour. Adel and Aurelle stood near him, their weapons still drawn, though the skeletons lay still—lifeless, inert heaps on the ground. It had only been seconds.
Aurelle was rubbing his temple, his own expression strained. He stepped forward carefully. "Gray? You alright?"
Gray blinked rapidly, his pulse still a wild drum against his ribs. "Not really," he told the truth, his voice rough and hoarse. "I seen...a vision."
Aurelle frowned. "A vision?" His eyes lingered, studying Gray's pale face.
Gray nodded. "It was... was of this weird mountain village. People were chanting, in a weird language, ans at the top was..."
Adel sighed, "We should move now," she said, "these ones were pathetically easy. And something about this area is giving me a weird feeling."
Gray glanced at the shattered bones, then back at the statue. The woman's marble face seemed to stare back at him, her blank eyes now holding a secret he had unwillingly shared. The faint blue glow of the cavern reflected off her smooth, hollow eyes, making them look tragically, terrifyingly alive for a single, fleeting second.
"Let's leave, I'll tell you about the vision later." Gray said quietly, the words tasting of dust and dread.
Aurelle didn't argue. They turned toward the tunnel, but Gray paused one last time, his gaze pulled by a faint detail he'd missed before. Something had caught his eye.
On the wall beside the statue—almost hidden in shadow—were more faint lines. Not carvings, but paintings.
They were primitive, almost childlike. Drawn with something blunt, maybe a piece of charcoal or a sharp stone. The figures were rendered in uneven, desperate strokes, depicting a group of people kneeling before a tall, veiled woman. The same woman.
Gray reached out, his fingers hovering just above the cold, painted stone.
And a familiar chill crawled up his spine, a ghost of a memory.
He'd seen this before.
Back in Glacierfang. When he'd touched that wall in the cave, the same one he entered to save the rank 7.
The same sudden, violent rush of images. The same visceral sense of a memory, a tragedy, something alive and screaming, buried not just in the walls, but in the very fabric of this place.
He stared at his hand, feeling the faint, agitated tremor of his own Vyre still pulsing in his veins, a resonant string plucked by the shrine's dark harmony.
'Could it be a skill?' he wondered, a frantic, internal plea for logic. Some kind of latent divination ability triggered by contact with concentrated history or emotion? If so, it should have shown up in his system interface. A notification. A name. Something.
But it hadn't.
It never did.
So what was it? What was happening to him?
'Was it that man again? No...he said he'd only reveal himself again when the time was right. Then...is my strain reacting to these...images?' The vision was far too realistic. Even more than the one in Glacierfang. Unlike that one, he felt as if he was actually part of the vision. He felt as if he was involved. Which wasn't necessarily a good thing either.
The question settled deep in his chest, a heavy, cold stone of dread that sat alongside the Vyre orb.
He turned away from the statue, his movements stiff, and joined the others as they began following the river's downward slope back into the main cavern. The faint, manufactured light of their orb swayed with their steps, its beam a fragile thing against the overwhelming, ancient dark, its reflection dancing like a lost spirit on the surface of the black, relentless current.
And the deep, slow heartbeat of the stone followed them. A vibration through their boots. A pressure in their skulls.
Slow. Relentless. Watching.