The first thing Xavier felt was cold.
Not ordinary cold, but a dead, ancient cold—one that sank through skin, through flesh, through bone, until it touched the soul.
His eyes opened.
Above him, there was no ceiling.
Only a torn expanse of pale sky framed by ruined arches.
Snow drifted soundlessly through the gaping wounds in the cathedral roof, falling in silver sheets through broken rib-vaults and jagged stone beams. It gathered across the floor in a blanket of white, covering cracked tiles, fallen masonry, and the bones of a forgotten hall.
For a long moment, Xavier did not move.
He simply stared.
Black pillars rose on either side of him, enormous and solemn, their surfaces scarred by age, crawling with dead ivy and frost. Time had gnawed at them until they seemed less carved by men than grown from darkness itself.
This place might once have been a throne hall.
Or a temple.
Now it was a ruin left to winter.
Wind moaned through shattered stained-glass windows, carrying loose snow across the floor in ghostly spirals. Somewhere high above, broken chains swayed from unseen rafters, clinking faintly.
The sound was enough to make his skin crawl.
Xavier pushed himself upright.
Iron scraped.
His breath caught.
Chains.
Heavy shackles clasped his wrists.
He looked down in disbelief.
Cold black iron.
Real.
His pulse spiked.
Then he realized—
He was not alone.
Shapes stirred in the snow.
Dozens.
No…
Scores.
At least fifty people, scattered across the ruined cathedral floor, each wearing ragged cloth and rough woven wraps, hardly fit against the cold. Faces pale with shock. Eyes wide. Some whispering. Some praying.
Some were already crying.
The same terror lived in every face.
No one knew where they were.
Or why.
A woman muttered broken prayers.
Someone farther away tugged uselessly at chains.
Another laughed hysterically.
Snow continued to fall through the open roof.
Soft.
Silent.
Merciless.
Xavier's breath fogged before him. His fingers had already begun going numb.
If this continued, frostbite would claim them before monsters ever could.
A voice suddenly rose over the confusion.
"Gather together!"
Heads turned.
A broad-shouldered Middle-aged man had stood, tall, waving, signaling people to gather close.
A scar cut across one side of his face, and though age had touched him, there was a hard steadiness to his eyes—like a man who had looked disaster in the face before and refused to kneel.
He raised a chained hand.
"Closer," he commanded. "All of you. Stay close if you wish to keep warm."
His voice called loudly—
People hesitated, wondering who he was, but looking at the situation, he seemed the calmest amongst them, so they moved.
Instinct herded them together.
Xavier also joined. Maybe this person had some idea of what to do; he had only discovered the existence of this world hours ago.
One by one, people got closer, Bodies pressed near. The shared breath made a thin warmth.
"My name is Raiden," he said. "If this is what I think it is… then this is the Trial of The Spell World."
A murmur spread quickly as Fear sharpened.
Raiden continued,
"Panic will kill us before anything else does, just Stay together and watch one another. We survive by reason. This isn't my first time being here; it's actually my second."
Then a woman yelled out. '' If this is your second, then you must know how to get out safely, right?'' It was in that moment that Raiden fell silent. ''Right, Sir.'' She asked again.
''No. That's not how it works, I can't assure you that all will be well; some of you, most of you, will definitely die here.''
Everyone stood still, "die," they thought, that word, the string of hope they held onto vanished instantly.
Then a sound rolled through the cathedral.
A deep impact.
Then another.
Boom.
Boom.
Boom.
Something was striking the great doors at the far end.
The entire hall seemed to tremble.
Silence swallowed everyone even more now.
Even breathing stopped.
Then—
CRACK.
The old doors burst inward.
And something stepped through.
People screamed.
Xavier forgot the cold.
Forgot the chains.
Forgot to breathe.
Because what entered was not born of reason.
The creatures were monstrous beyond description. Their lower bodies resembled horses wrapped in blackened scales instead of hide, the jagged plates grinding against one another whenever they moved. Pale dark blue mist drifted endlessly from the gaps between those scales, curling around their body like wandering spirits.
Then panic erupted.
The creatures moved.
Not like beasts.
Not like men.
They came forward in a dreadful, uneven gallop that made the ruined cathedral tremble beneath their weight. Snow shook loose from broken pillars. Frost slid from the ancient stone in soft white streams. The sound alone was enough to strangle reason.
A wet scraping of claws.
Heavy hooves crashing against marble.
And beneath it all—
that horrible breathing.
Slow.
Deep.
Xavier felt his stomach twist.
Above the waist, however, they became something far worse.
Long torsos.
Dark blue flesh stretched tightly over protruding ribs.
Arms so unnaturally lengthy their clawed fingers nearly scraped the floor.
And their faces—
if those things could even be called faces—
were eyeless masses of black skin split apart by enormous horns curving from where eye sockets where supposed to be.
No eyes.
No pupils.
Yet Xavier could feel them staring.
Watching.
Hunting.
The nearest creature tilted its head slightly.
Then inhaled.
A horrible shriek erupted from somewhere deep within its throat.
Panic exploded.
People screamed.
Chains rattled violently.
Someone fell into the snow.
Another began praying.
Raiden's expression hardened, though even he had gone pale.
Xavier's heart pounded violently against his ribs.
This is my first day here…
And I'm already going to die?
No.
No—
move.
While the others froze beneath terror, Xavier dropped low and dug his hand into the snow-covered floor. His fingers brushed against cracked stone. He tore a loose slab free from the frozen ground with trembling hands.
The monsters were getting closer, taking intentional slow steps .
One of them dragged its claws across a pillar, leaving deep grooves in the ancient black stone.
Xavier backed away through the chaos, clutching the rock tightly against his chest. His eyes darted toward the ruined cathedral windows lining the far wall.
Tall.
Broken.
Open to the storm outside.
If I stay here, I die.
The thought struck him with terrifying clarity.
I need to survive.
" I need to get back, I just got to this world, a second chance to atone- I owe the dead too much to die here, this is no place for a prince to die."
Without hesitating further, Xavier sprinted toward the rear of the crowd.
Someone shouted at him.
Another grabbed at his shoulder.
He ignored them all.
The creatures suddenly lunged forward.
Chains snapped.
People scattered in terror.
And Xavier hurled the stone.
CRASH!
The cathedral window shattered apart in an explosion of glass. Freezing wind burst inward instantly, roaring through the ruin like a living thing.
For a brief moment, Xavier caught sight of the outside world.
The cathedral stood atop a snowy cliffside overlooking a steep descent blanketed in thick white drifts. Below, endless forests stretched beneath grey skies.
Far beneath the cliff—
snow.
Deep enough.
Maybe.
If he timed it correctly…
He could survive.
Maybe.
That was enough.
Xavier jumped.
The freezing wind tore the breath from his lungs as his body plunged through open air. Broken glass spun around him like fragments of ice beneath dull daylight.
Then—
impact.
The snow swallowed him whole.
Pain exploded through his body, but the thick drift softened the fall enough to keep his bones intact.
Xavier rolled violently down the slope before crashing against frozen ground. A groan escaped his lips.
Alive.
He was alive.
Above him, Raiden appeared at the shattered window.
The older man looked downward once—
then immediately turned and roared toward the others.
"Everyone here, Jump! NOW!"
The crowd surged instantly.
Men and women shoved one another desperately toward the broken opening.
Another crash of glass followed.
Bodies began falling from the cathedral.
Some landed safely.
Others didn't.
One man struck a jagged tree trunk hidden beneath the snow. The branch pierced through his chest instantly.
Another landed poorly and vanished beneath the cliffside rocks with a sickening crack.
Inside the castle was a nightmare, the monsters rushed reaching out for their prey.
One of the scaled horrors lunged forward with terrifying speed. Its grotesquely elongated arm shot through the crowd and seized a screaming girl by the face.
Her scream lasted only a second.
The creature slammed her against the stone floor hard enough to burst blood across the snow.
Another man shoved people aside in blind terror, trying desperately to reach the window first.
The creature caught him by the leg.
A wet, tearing sound echoed through the cathedral.
The man's body split apart before he could even finish screaming.
Blood sprayed across shattered marble.
The remaining monsters descended upon the corpses immediately, feeding on the bodies of the victims as it seeped through their skin.
This was how they fed.
The survivors broke completely after that.
People hurled themselves through the broken window without thought, without caution, choosing the cliff over the monsters behind them, many safely falling into the snow and making their escape.