The cavern breathed like a living thing.
Kairen stepped across the boundary where the Gate's influence bled into the natural stone, and the temperature dropped with a suddenness that made his breath fog. Shadows rippled over the walls—slow, pulsing waves that suggested something massive shifting beneath the mountain.
Rowan felt it too.
So did Eli, who tightened his grip on the spear Daniel had forced into his hands.
Daniel himself walked a few steps ahead, his shoulders tense, his jaw tight. The man never looked small, but here, inside the deeper heart of the Rift, even Daniel seemed overshadowed by something older and hungrier than any Ruin Beast they'd faced so far.
A faint hum echoed through the cavern.
At first, it sounded mechanical.
Then Kairen realized—
It was breathing.
Not the cavern.
Something within it.
Something waiting.
A thin fracture of light flickered overhead, like lightning trapped in a glass sphere. The core of the Rift pulsed, unstable, as if its connection to the world fluctuated with each of their steps.
Rowan slowed, staring up.
"That thing's close to bursting," he muttered.
Daniel didn't look back.
"It's not bursting. It's evolving."
Eli shivered.
"That's… supposed to be better?"
"No."
Daniel's voice was grave.
"It's worse."
Kairen's eyes narrowed. Daniel wasn't telling them something—again—but now wasn't the time to pry it out of him. The energy here made the hairs on his arms stand on end. His Disorder Core reacted to the Rift like a starving animal awakening at the scent of meat.
Kairen…
The whisper of the Primordial System slithered along his consciousness, cool and indifferent.
A new threshold approaches. Prepare.
His fingers twitched at his side.
Something was going to happen—something that would either empower him or tear him apart.
A low rumble rolled through the cavern. Dust drifted from above.
Eli stumbled. Rowan grabbed his arm.
"What was—"
The ground split.
Not with a crash or violent crack, but with a slow, deliberate unfolding, like the world itself was peeling back layers.
A single massive claw pushed through the earth.
Then another.
A skeletal, mask-white head rose, its shape reminiscent of a wolf but stretched too long, too thin, too alien. Empty eye sockets stared through the dim light. Its ribs expanded with each wrong, rattling breath.
A Ruin Guardian.
Not a beast.
Not a creature.
A sentinel made of the Rift's hunger.
Kairen sucked in a breath.
This one was different from the other beasts—larger, older, and visibly fused with the Rift's tendrils. Black strands wrapped around its bones like veins of smoke.
Rowan raised his blades.
Daniel spread his stance, calling energy into his arms.
Eli froze, trembling.
But the Guardian didn't attack.
It moved its head slowly… toward Kairen.
A clicking, almost insect-like sound rattled from its skull.
Recognition.
Not intelligence, not emotion—
Something deeper.
Like the Rift itself was greeting him.
Or claiming him.
Daniel's voice dropped to a whisper, barely audible.
"Don't move, Kairen."
Kairen kept his gaze steady.
But inside his chest, his Disorder Core thrashed, reacting violently, greedily, dangerously.
The Guardian stepped forward—heavy, deliberate.
Its massive jaw opened. A low, fractured groan filled the air, vibrating the ground beneath their feet.
It lowered its head—
—and bowed.
Eli choked on his own breath.
"What… what is it doing?!"
The cavern dimmed, shadows bending toward Kairen as if the Guardian's gesture had shifted the very rules inside the Rift.
Rowan hissed under his breath.
"That's not normal. Daniel. Talk."
Daniel clenched his fists.
"I was hoping it wouldn't happen this soon."
"What wouldn't—"
The Guardian suddenly snapped its head up, not at them—
But at the Rift above.
It screamed.
The sound tore through the cavern like a storm, sending shockwaves that nearly threw Rowan and Eli off their feet.
Daniel shouted, "GET BACK!"
Kairen froze—
—because the scream wasn't aimed at them.
It was warning them.
The air above the Guardian fractured.
A black fissure split the ceiling, spilling out not light but a viscous darkness that dripped like tar.
It hit the cavern floor with a hiss, burning into the stone.
Something emerged from the crack.
First a hand—long and thin, jointed wrongly, fingers ending in needle-sharp points.
Then an arm.
Then two burning gold eyes.
A Ruin Entity.
Not a beast.
Not a guardian.
A mind.
Bigger. Older.
A fragment of the original cataclysm that created all Rifts.
Kairen's vision blurred at the sheer pressure.
Eli collapsed to his knees, unable to breathe.
Rowan ground his teeth, fighting the weight pressing on his chest.
Daniel stepped in front of all three of them, releasing the full force of his aura—something he rarely did.
"Stay behind me."
The Entity laughed.
A low, whispering sound that echoed without a mouth.
"Disorder Seed… found."
Kairen stiffened.
It knew.
It knew what he carried.
Daniel swore under his breath.
"Kairen—don't respond to it. Don't let it hear your intent."
"You think you can hide him?"
The Entity's voice slithered through the cavern like smoke.
"His core calls to everything inside this Rift. Even the Guardian bows."
It smiled without lips.
"And now he is mine."
The Ruin Guardian lunged.
Not at Kairen.
At the Entity.
Its massive skeletal frame slammed into the dark mass, knocking it backward. Bones cracked, black tendrils writhed, and both creatures screeched—one mechanical and broken, the other smooth and chilling.
Daniel grabbed Kairen's shoulder.
"We move. Now."
"But the Guardian—"
"Isn't here to protect you. It's here to protect the Rift from being consumed."
Rowan blinked.
"Consumed… by that thing?"
"No." Daniel's jaw tightened.
"By Kairen."
Kairen's stomach dropped.
"What?"
"No time," Daniel snapped. "Move!"
The battle between Guardian and Entity tore the cavern apart.
Chunks of the ceiling collapsed.
Energy crackled, slicing open smaller rifts in midair.
Eli clung to Rowan's shoulder as they ran, struggling to breathe.
The pressure of the Entity's aura was crushing him.
Kairen's ears rang. His core pulsed out of rhythm.
He stumbled—
—and the world bent.
Not literally.
But his senses warped as the Primordial System surged to life.
Threshold Detected.
Disorder Resonance: Stabilization Required.
Prolonged exposure will result in irreversible assimilation.
Kairen gasped, clutching his chest.
He wasn't evolving.
He was breaking.
The Ruin Entity's attention snapped toward him even in the midst of battle.
"There you are."
The Guardian roared, trying to restrain it—
But the Entity broke free, twisting its body like smoke and reforming behind Daniel's group.
Daniel reacted instantly, shoving Rowan and Eli aside and catching the Entity's strike with both forearms.
Claws of condensed darkness screeched against Daniel's aura, sparks flying.
Rowan yelled, "Daniel!"
"RUN!" Daniel roared.
"I can't hold it for long!"
Kairen's heart hammered.
The Entity leaned close to Daniel's face.
"You are not the one I want."
Then it dissolved—
And reformed beside Kairen.
Before he could move, a clawed hand pressed to his chest.
His vision exploded in white.
He wasn't in the cavern anymore.
He floated in a void—half darkness, half blinding light.
His Core pulsed at the center, unstable, fracturing, pulling in everything around it.
The Entity's whisper slithered through the void.
"You are incomplete."
Kairen gritted his teeth.
"Get out of my head."
"You cannot reject the Rift's call. You were shaped for us."
Fragments of memory flashed—
His awakening.
The Surge event.
The feeling of falling into something endless.
"Accept your origin."
"No."
Kairen reached toward the fractured parts of his core—felt its instability—its desire to consume everything.
He wasn't meant to belong to the Rift.
He would choose for himself.
And he forced the fragments back together.
White light erupted.
The Entity screamed.
The explosion blasted outward in a ring of blinding luminescence.
Daniel, Rowan, and Eli shielded their eyes.
The Entity staggered back, smoking, its hand nearly severed.
Kairen collapsed to one knee, gasping, but the Core had stabilized—temporarily.
The Entity stared at him with something that almost resembled fury.
"You reject your nature."
Its voice crackled.
"Very well… I will carve your core out myself."
It surged forward.
Daniel moved instantly—too fast for Rowan or Eli to follow—slamming his arm into the Entity's neck and driving it back.
"Rowan! Eli! Get him out of here!" Daniel barked.
"No!" Kairen pushed himself to his feet. His core throbbed, ready to rupture again. "I can fight—"
"You'll die if you push that core again!" Daniel snapped.
The Entity's body stretched, splitting into three shadow limbs.
Daniel blocked one.
Rowan another.
The third streaked straight toward Eli.
Kairen moved.
He didn't think—
He didn't hesitate—
He let the Core pull just enough power to break his muscles, screaming as he intercepted the limb with his bare hands.
Black smoke burned into his skin.
The Entity hissed.
"Your refusal is irrelevant. Little vessel. You will—"
A voice cut through the cavern.
Cold.
Calm.
Deadly familiar.
"Step away from him."
Everyone froze.
Kairen turned—
And his breath caught.
A figure stepped out from the collapsing shadows at the back of the cavern.
Tall.
Monochrome aura.
Eyes like a storm collapsing in on itself.
Kairen knew that presence.
So did Daniel.
Rowan stared, speechless.
Eli went pale.
Because the man standing there—
—was supposed to be gone.