The warning bell's resonance still hung in the air as Saguna, Radji, and Osa emerged from Professor Nyala's office. The hallway outside was eerily empty, the usual bustle of students and faculty conspicuously absent.
"Where is everyone?" Osa whispered, his usual bravado subdued.
"Protocol dictates evacuation to designated safe zones when the warning bell sounds," Radji replied, adjusting his glasses. "According to the student handbook, page forty-three, section—"
"Seriously? You memorized the handbook already?" Osa interrupted, shaking his head in disbelief.
Saguna wasn't listening to their banter. His attention was fixed on a strange sensation prickling at the edges of his awareness, a cold pressure, like the air before a storm, but concentrated in a specific direction.
"This way," he said, already moving down the corridor toward the east wing.
"How do you know?" Radji asked, hurrying to keep pace.
"I just... feel it." Saguna couldn't articulate the certainty guiding him. It was as if the marks on his neck were pulling him forward, responding to whatever had triggered the warning bell.
They followed empty hallways through the Academy's east wing, each step bringing that cold pressure closer. Saguna noticed frost forming on the windows they passed, strange, considering the warm day outside. His breath began to fog in front of his face.
"It's getting colder," Osa observed, rubbing his arms. "Like weirdly cold. Not normal cold."
"Shadow entity," Saguna said grimly. "Like the one that took Sahara."
Radji and Osa exchanged concerned glances but continued following. As they rounded a corner, the hallway opened into a wide colonnade overlooking a smaller garden, not the grand Tranquility Garden, but a modest courtyard centered around an old stone well with a heavy slab covering its mouth.
"The Sorrow Well," Radji whispered, recognition in his voice. "I read about it in the Academy history. It was sealed three centuries ago after some kind of incident, though details are scarce."
Saguna felt the whispers returning, urgent and afraid:
Old wounds... first to tear... the hungry one awakens...
The garden below had transformed into a scene from nightmare. The well's stone cover had been partially displaced, and from the dark gap, a familiar darkness poured like liquid shadow. The grass and flowers within ten feet of the well had withered and died, frost covering the ground in an expanding circle of crystalline white.
More alarmingly, the darkness had taken shape. Not the amorphous mass Saguna remembered from his childhood, but something more defined. A towering figure with too many limbs, its body constantly shifting yet maintaining a vaguely humanoid form. Where a face should be, there were only hollow sockets filled with pinpricks of cold light.
A Soul Drainer. Larger and more powerful than the one that had taken Sahara.
Professor Nyala stood in the garden, facing the entity alone. Her hands traced complex patterns in the air, and as they moved, sigils of silver light appeared, forming a protective barrier between herself and the shadow creature. Master Damian circled to the entity's flank, a crystal orb in his hand emitting a painful white radiance that seemed to push back the darkness wherever it touched.
"They're trying to reseal it," Saguna realized, watching Professor Nyala direct her silver sigils toward the well.
The Soul Drainer apparently understood this too. It lashed out with three shadow tendrils simultaneously. One whipping toward Professor Nyala, another toward Master Damian, and the third shooting up toward the colonnade directly at the three students.
"DOWN!" Saguna shouted, tackling his companions to the floor.
The shadow tendril passed overhead, striking a column behind them with enough force to crack the ancient stone. Where it touched, frost bloomed instantly, spreading outward in crystalline patterns.
"It knows we're here," Radji said, his voice steady despite the fear evident on his face.
"It knows what we are," Saguna corrected, remembering Sahara's warning.
They know about you, little brother. About what you might become.
Below, Professor Nyala had deflected the attack with her silver sigils, but the effort clearly cost her. Her face had paled, and her hands trembled slightly as she reformed her defensive barrier.
"We have to help them," Saguna said, pushing himself to his feet.
"How?" Osa demanded. "We just learned about our abilities, like, twenty minutes ago!"
Saguna felt the heat inside him — the ember that had manifested as flame in the training chamber — responding to his rising determination. "The triangle protects its points," he murmured, recalling Sahara's words.
"What?" Radji asked.
"When we formed the triangle below, we were stronger together," Saguna explained, the plan forming as he spoke. "We need to do that again."
"Here? Now?" Osa looked dubious.
"Yes. Like this." Saguna positioned himself at the balustrade with a clear view of the garden below. "Radji to my right, Osa to my left. Form the triangle."
To his surprise, they moved without further argument. The moment they took their positions, Saguna felt it. A resonance between the three marks, a harmony that strengthened the heat flowing through his veins.
Below, the Soul Drainer paused its assault, those pinprick lights in its hollow sockets turning upward toward them. It made a sound—not quite a hiss, not quite a growl, but something that raised the hairs on Saguna's neck nonetheless.
"Focus on your element," Saguna instructed, remembering Professor Nyala's lessons. "Don't force it. Partner with it."
He closed his eyes briefly, extending his awareness to that inner spark. This time, the response was immediate. Fire bloomed between his palms—not the small, tentative flame from the training chamber, but a swirling orb of orange-gold heat that illuminated the colonnade with its fierce light.
To his right, Radji had extended one hand, palm downward. The stone beneath his feet rippled, then rose in a flowing wave that circled his ankles before spiralling up to hover before him, a shield of solid rock formed without breaking the colonnade floor.
To his left, Osa had drawn moisture from the very air, weaving it into a complex lattice of water that flowed around his arms and torso like living armor.
Professor Nyala looked up from the garden, her eyes widening at the sight of them. "No!" she called. "You're not ready!"
But it was too late. The Soul Drainer had already launched its next attack, this time ignoring the professors and directing all its shadowy mass toward the colonnade. Dozens of tendrils shot upward, frost trailing in their wake, seeking to ensnare the three students.
Saguna acted instinctively. He thrust his hands forward, and the fire orb between his palms exploded outward in a searing wave. Where it met shadow, the darkness hissed and recoiled, unwilling to pass through the flames.
"Hold the line!" he shouted to the others. "Don't let it touch you!"
Radji responded with precision, his floating stone shield shattering into dozens of projectiles that he sent hurtling toward the ascending tendrils. Each stone shard struck with surprising force, disrupting the shadow's form momentarily.
Osa took a different approach. With a fluid gesture, he sent his water lattice spiraling downward in a protective vortex, creating a barrier that the colder shadow could not penetrate without being swept aside by the flowing current.
For a moment, it seemed they might succeed. The Soul Drainer's assault faltered, its form rippling with what might have been uncertainty.
Then the entity changed tactics. Instead of attacking directly, it plunged its mass back toward the well. The ground around the well frosted instantly, the circle of death widening as the temperature plummeted. The stone slab covering the well's mouth cracked with a sound like breaking bones, and the darkness poured through the widening crevices.
"It's drawing power from the breach!" Professor Nyala shouted. "We must seal the well!"
Saguna watched in horror as the Soul Drainer began to grow, its form expanding as it absorbed energy from whatever lay beyond the well's depths. The pinpricks of light in its eye sockets brightened to painful intensity, and when it moved again, it was with frightening speed.
A massive tendril — thicker than all the previous attacks combined — shot upward toward the colonnade, too fast for any of them to react. Saguna braced for impact, his fire flaring in desperate defense.
But the impact never came. Master Damian had positioned himself beneath them, his crystal orb raised high. A dome of silver light erupted from the orb, intercepting the shadow tendril just before it reached the students.
"GO!" he shouted up at them, his face contorted with effort as he held back the enormous shadow. "Get to the Conclave Chamber! Nyala knows the way!"
Professor Nyala was already moving, her silver sigils forming a bridge of light across the garden, creating a path untouched by the spreading frost. "Quickly!" she called to them. "Before it breaks through!"
Saguna hesitated, unwilling to leave Master Damian facing the entity alone.
"We need to go," Radji said, gripping Saguna's arm. "Tactical retreat is not the same as defeat."
Osa had already vaulted over the balustrade, landing deftly on Professor Nyala's light bridge. "Come on!" he urged.
With a final glance at Master Damian, Saguna followed. The moment all three of them were on the light bridge, Professor Nyala began moving deeper into the garden, away from the well and the struggling Master Damian.
"We can't just leave him!" Saguna protested.
"Damian knows what he's doing," Professor Nyala replied, her voice tight with controlled fear. "He's giving us time to reach safety."
"Safety?" Saguna demanded as they followed her through a side door he hadn't noticed before. "Where exactly—"
His question died as they entered a narrow passage that seemed to lead deep into the Academy foundations. Ancient stone walls close on either side, the passage sloped downward at a steep angle. Professor Nyala led them forward without hesitation, the silver sigils around her hands providing the only light.
Behind them, a terrible sound echoed from the garden, part scream, part roar, completely inhuman. The floor beneath their feet trembled.
"Master Damian," Radji whispered.
"Keep moving," Professor Nyala ordered, her voice allowing no argument.
They descended in tense silence, the passage growing narrower and the air colder with each step. After what seemed like an eternity, they emerged into a circular chamber that Saguna immediately recognized as directly beneath the training room they'd been in earlier.
The same triangle pattern decorated the floor, but here, each point featured a full-sized alcove rather than a simple pillar and bowl. In the center of the triangle stood a stone pedestal bearing a crystal similar to Master Damian's orb, though this one remained dark and inert.
Professor Nyala sealed the passage behind them with a complex gesture, silver sigils forming a barrier across the entrance.
"What is this place?" Osa asked, his usual bravado subdued.
"The Conclave Chamber. The last refuge of the Triumvirate when all else fails," Professor Nyala replied, moving to the central pedestal. "And I fear we have indeed failed this day."