Everything that had happened and been said had been seen by Sylvan. not moved from his spot nor participated in the conversation, however, he missed nothing. watched Varik squad speak, noting how Varik scanned the corridor, analyzed the situation, and commanded everyone with unshakeable confidence.
also watched the other member squad– though he had not seen them use their sub-abilities yet, their gazes fixed on their leader, the silent coordination between them.
Though he was not part of them, Sylvan was a complete witness to everything.
And as moments passed, his astonishment deepened.
not joined many squads… rather, joined too many.
So many that the title "Leech Worm" had clung to him like a curse.
So many, in fact, that some peers in the Grey Strip – especially those familiar with his history of constant transfers – had dubbed him "Leech Worm."
Because he gravitated towards any new squad forming, as if sniffing out opportunity, clinging to them… briefly. Then detaching the moment they faced their first obstacle.
It wasn't cowardice. Nor weakness. Just terrible luck.
Joined squads that seemed cohesive… only to collapse at the first hardship. Followed confident leaders who froze under pressure. Served in squads that used newcomers as bait—sending them ahead to test the danger, then abandoning them to die.
And through it all…
Despite always staying on relatively safer ground,
Despite trying to be cautious,
Despite not being overly ambitious, even early in his Grey Strip journey…
He'd experienced it all.
Everything.
But now, watching Varik's squad face this deadly spell-ward with discipline and composure, Sylvan finally understood what a real squad looked like.
They weren't reckless. They weren't panicked. They were united.
And Varik—
In his eyes, Sylvan saw something rare. Not arrogance. Not fear. Understanding. Varik understood the place, the danger, and understood the people around him. And he knew how to guide them.
As for the rest of the squad… Sylvan hadn't seen their true strength yet, but their poise alone spoke volumes. This was no random gathering of survivors. This was a squad that could thrive in the Grey Strip.
And that realization… hurt.
Envy crept in quietly, not like a knife but like a slow, burning ache. Because Sylvan knew—his misfortune was unmatched. He'd been in every kind of doomed squad, served under every kind of failure, endured every flavor of betrayal and collapse.
Perhaps that was simply life in the Grey Strip.
But Sylvan had lived through it all.
And now, seeing a squad like this… he realized he might have been the unluckiest of them all.
Varik turned slowly, his eyes glowing with cool intensity. stepped before the mercenaries, his gaze sweeping over each one swiftly before speaking in a clear voice, carrying down the corridor:"Listen… it's best for all of you not to recklessly activate your Path sub-abilities."
He paused, his tone turning grim.
"The ward-spell protecting this place… even I wouldn't last long against it. None of you would."
Then he gestured ahead with a sharp, deliberate motion.
"Let's move."
No one spoke. No one even breathed.
They all stared at the corpses lying ahead, at the slow trickle of blood on the cold stone. They remembered how four men had died—unseen, unheard, without warning.
The ward-spell wasn't a myth.
It wasn't a threat.
It was real. And it killed.
Then, Varik's squad advanced.
Their steps were measured, neither hurried nor hesitant, crossing the zone where the subtle air currents had first stirred.
They passed by the man who had survived—the bearer of Faded Trace Weave, refrained from using his sub-ability.
He still stood frozen, trembling faintly, his eyes darting between the corpses and Varik squad, disbelief etched into his face.
Varik stopped beside him, studied him for a brief moment, then slowly reached out and patted his shoulder with unexpected gentleness.
"Well done," he said quietly.
Two word.
But it was enough.
He didn't look back.
Didn't offer a glance of appreciation or acknowledgment.
Didn't pause.
Moved past as if he were not there.
Then he continued forward — in absolute silence.
Sylvan followed along with the crowd, which had begun to thin out, even though they were still near the corridor's entrance and hadn't ventured deep yet.
Elowen walked beside him, her steps steady, her lips moving in faint whispers — silent prayers to her god accompanying each stride.
They moved cautiously, their pace measured. The air currents no longer swirled with the same violent unease, yet a strange sensation persisted… as if the place itself were watching them.
The walls remained damp, cracked, and silent — but that heavy, oppressive energy that had once pressed upon them had diminished, leaving only an uneasy echo behind.
Then… the corridor began to change.
The shift came gradually.
First, the light grew clearer, not bright, but no longer shrouded in the suffocating dimness of the previous sections. An unseen radiance began to emanate — from above, or perhaps from the walls themselves — soft, cold, and unnatural. It lifted some of the gloom… However, deepened the foreboding.
The shape of the corridor shifted next. The walls straightened, losing their winding irregularity. The floor widened. The ceiling rose.
It was as if they had crossed into an entirely different realm — one that shared little with the passage they had just left.
Then… they arrived.
Before them loomed an entrance — not a simple opening in the wall, but a massive stone door, or perhaps a passage leading into a great hall.
And when they stepped across the threshold… they entered a space that defied easy description.
A hall.
Ruined, but vast.
The walls were cracked, the ceiling fractured with wide fissures, and the floor lay buried beneath layers of dust and gravel, as though untouched for centuries. However, even through all that decay, traces of grandeur still lingered.
Precisely carved stone blocks. Corners still bearing remnants of faded gold. Broken-topped pillars that still stood proud and imposing. This place had once been important — perhaps a war room, a council chamber… or something far greater.
At the center of the hall stood a massive, shattered stone slab.
A slab… perhaps once a piece of art… or a map… or a historical record. But now, it was badly damaged. Parts were missing. Others eroded. What remained… depicted scenes of battles. But the drawing was no longer clear. Colors faded. Lines blurred. The images… merged with cracks and fissures, making it impossible to discern what was being shown.
But it was clear the slab had depicted different kinds of wars. Some resembled ancient conflicts, with swords and shields. Others… hinted at something stranger, perhaps battles against non-human entities.
The hall fell into silence.
Everyone stood still, surrounded by cracked walls bearing echoes of vanished splendor. The fractured ceiling cast shadows on the dust-covered floor, while a faint wind whispered through the cracks, though it no longer carried the strange pressure they'd grown accustomed to in the previous corridor.
And then… all attention shifted.
To a different corner of the hall. Where another slab stood.
Which seemed to have been the hall's centerpiece once, stood proud despite its cracks. Shattered into several pieces, some still anchored in the wall or dangling precariously, others fallen to the ground, smashed into irregular fragments.
However, the part that remained… held something.
Symbols. Drawings.
Or something between the two.
Scenes — if they could be called that — carved into the stone in a way no one understood.
Figures wielding weapons unlike any they'd seen. Wars raging beneath dark skies. Strange geometric configurations — triangles intersecting circles, twisted shapes resembling mutilated maps, symbols that defied logic or meaning.
And amid them…
Writing. Or what seemed like writing.
Were what appeared to be "text"... or symbols resembling writing… etched in cryptic lines upon parts of the slab.
It wasn't any script known to the human tongue. Lines intersected lines. Circles within triangles. Shapes like open eyes. And fine markings — threads — stretching outward in opposing directions, as if the stone itself couldn't agree where to point.
No one could read it.
No one could even guess.
Near the slab's base, a rectangular cavity had been carved — small, shallow, and empty. As if something had once been placed there… something now long gone.
The mercenaries stood in silence, gazes shifting between the drawings, the symbols, the hollow.
Everyone stood in silence. Eyes darting between the drawings, symbols, and cavities.
Someone whispered, barely audible: "What is this…?"
No one answered.
Even Varik, who stood watching with calm, sharp eyes, said nothing. His expression unreadable, his gaze steady — as if he were searching for something only he could sense.
Seen neglected slabs and maps before — collected by the Arcanum Institute Guild, purchased by adventurers seeking clues, treasures, or fragments of the ancient world.
Slabs depicting long-forgotten wars.
Others bearing cryptic symbols.
And some showing strange geographical or geometric formations whose meaning no one could decipher.
But what he saw now… surpassed everything he had ever encountered.
It wasn't merely a slab.
It was something deeper.
Older.
Infinitely more complex.
Beside him, Elowen stood — her eyes fixed on the carvings, their lingering fear softened by the faint light now filling the hall. She seemed calmer, though not because the danger had passed, nor because the air felt safer… but because the light here was brighter than in the previous corridor. A fragile illusion of safety.
Her voice came quiet, uncertain: "This slab… must have looked magnificent once."
Sylvan turned slightly toward her. He still didn't know why she clung so close to him. But he… didn't care.
He nodded slowly, affirming her statement, and said in a low voice: "That's true…"
Then, after a short pause, his eyes narrowing on the fractures and deep cavities in the stone, he added: "But what befell it… wasn't simple."
He gestured faintly toward the shattered drawings and torn edges. "As if something ripped it apart. Not time. Not erosion. Something else."
This was undeniably true.
True, clear to everyone.
The truth in his tone was clear to all who listened.
Whatever had happened to the slab — and perhaps to this entire place — was no mere result of age or decay.
It felt deliberate.
Violent.
As if someone — or something — had torn it apart.
Or as though a catastrophic battle had erupted here, destroying everything in its wake.
Elowen nodded gravely. "I agree… but for this to happen here, with that protective ward-spell still present…"
She shook her head slowly, her voice dropping to a murmur. "I can't even imagine what occurred in this place."
In the background, the other mercenaries — those not involved in the quiet exchange — were also watching the slab. For a while, curiosity held their gaze. But soon… that curiosity waned.
After realizing there was nothing to decipher, and that the smeared drawings offered no real clue, some began drifting away — wandering amidst the ruins, kicking through dust and debris, searching for anything that might hold value.
A relic.
A coin.
Anything that glittered faintly under the dim light — something old, sellable, or at least understandable.
However, Varik's squad didn't move from their spot. They remained standing together, slightly apart from the others, discussing in low tones.
And then… it came.
A scream.
"AAAAHHHHH…"
Sudden.
Sharp.
Laced with raw terror.
It came from one of the distant mercenaries, who had been scavenging amidst the ruins in a far corner of the hall. His voice rose abruptly, then cut off suddenly… as if something had silenced him.
Everyone froze in place. turned towards the source of the sound. stopped breathing.
Then… a bizarre, shadowy creature of rust emerged.
It wasn't clear at first. It appeared first as a shadow… a swift movement amidst the rubble. Then it stepped out from behind the collapsed stone blocks in the far corner of the hall.
It was a creature of jet-black hue, the size of a large wild boar, its body covered in dark grey scales resembling rusted iron plate. Its eyes glowed with a faint, menacing red, as if burning in the darkness. Its mouth… was filled with razor-sharp teeth, from which dripped black, rust-like droplets. It moved with eerie silence, as if part of the darkness itself.
No one recognized it at first… until one mercenary, a man who'd once scouted the outskirts of the Grey Strip, suddenly shouted in horror:
"It's a Rust Shadow…! from Darkness Path!"
The words struck like a curse.
Rust Shadows — not the weakest of beasts, but far from ordinary. In the Grey Strip, they were creatures hard to classify. Their sub-ability lay in partial invisibility within shadows, moving with deathly silence to strike their prey with a sudden, inescapable assault.
But what made them truly feared… was their bite. If you were bitten and lived, you wouldn't live for long. Their saliva carried a corrosive black substance — a living rust that devoured flesh from within, slowly and mercilessly. A death that came inch by inch… until pain itself felt endless.
And worse still — it was not alone.
From every crevice, from beneath shattered tiles and cracked floors, from the darkness between the pillars — more shapes began to stir.
Dozens.
Maybe more.
They came crawling, slinking, flowing like a tide of shadows. Each one moving with that same predatory grace — eyes glinting faintly red, bodies half-hidden in the dark.
Then, as if guided by some unheard signal… they attacked.
No roar. No warning.
Only motion — a surge of black death cutting through the hall like a living wave.
Screams erupted.
Metal clashed.
Spells flared to life in desperate bursts of light.
The quiet ruin… had become a battlefield of chaos.