Before the massive stone entrance of the sealed temple, a lone figure stood. He stared at the now-broken seal with a calm that bordered on inhuman.
There was no sign of alarm, nor curiosity. Just quiet.
Stillness.
He looked... too composed. As if he had already known what he would find.
Faint traces of recent entry remained subtle footprints in the moss, a few scattered scuff marks on the marble platform where the seal had once shimmered. He crouched, gloved fingers brushing the ground gently.
Two sets of prints. One light, precise. The other heavier, uncertain.
He stood again, adjusting the strap of the satchel slung across his shoulder. Gazed up toward the temple's carved archway. Symbols, ancient, sacred were etched into the stone, still glowing faintly from the recent disturbance.
"The Harmonicon is close."
The words left his lips not with urgency, but with a quiet inevitability.
"I need to reach it before they ruin everything."
His expression remained unreadable. No anger. No fear. No excitement.
Only certainty.
Behind him, the wind shifted. A sound, a crunch of twigs, barely audible. Even in the unnatural silence, it was almost imperceptible. Almost.
The figure did not turn. He didn't flinch.
From the shadows of the underbrush, a beast lunged skin like wet bark, limbs twisted like broken branches, its gaping maw lined with teeth too numerous, too sharp, too misplaced. A creature born from the forest's anger itself.
It roared, an ugly, wet sound.
The man moved only when necessary.
In one fluid motion, he turned, stepped sideways, and drew a long, narrow blade from beneath his cloak. The sword didn't shine. It didn't hum with magic or scream with fury. It was... quiet. Like him.
One swing. Just one.
The creature's roar was cut short. Its body collapsed before it even realized it had been cleaved through. Steam rose from the precise incision that split it diagonally.
He exhaled softly, almost bored.
"Too noisy,"
He sheathed the sword again, turning back to the temple. The dead creature behind him didn't deserve another glance.
He stepped forward, placing a hand on the stone arch.
Inside was more than just ruin and dust.
Inside was a truth waiting to be unearthed, a heartbeat waiting to be heard.
A third rhythm, long forgotten.
And he had no intention of letting anyone else reach it first.
***
Somewhere deeper within the Sealed Temple...
"RunrunrunrunrunRUN!"
Altherion's panicked voice echoed through the narrow stone corridor as a monstrous mass of scales, claws, and tentacles thundered behind them.
The thing had no face, just one massive, glowing eye and too many limbs to count.
Liesette was ahead of him, sprinting with an almost comical flail to her steps, trying to hold up the hem of her long coat as she ran.
"I told you not to touch anything!" Altherion shouted, barely dodging a chunk of collapsing stone that fell from the ceiling.
"I didn't mean to!" she shrieked back. "It looked like a decorative switch!"
"It had fangs, Liesette! FANGS! Decorative switches don't have fangs!"
"I've seen worse designs in antique bathrooms!"
Another screech echoed from behind them , deep, wet, and angry. The creature's massive limb slammed into the wall near Altherion, sending sharp stone shrapnel flying. He ducked, rolled, and cursed in three different dialects.
They stumbled into a wider chamber, still too narrow for comfort but at least not a dead end. Columns lined the room, and in the center sat an ancient altar surrounded by strange, flickering orbs of light.
Altherion skidded to a halt and quickly scanned the chamber. "We can't keep running. I need time to cast something stable. You, distract it!"
"Excuse me?" Liesette blinked, panting. "That thing is half the size of a house!"
"And you're half the size of its lunch. That gives you an advantage in mobility. Go!"
Before she could argue, Altherion had already dropped to one knee, frantically drawing an array on the floor using a small vial of glowing powder.
Liesette groaned. "I swear, if I survive this, I'm never opening a door again."
The creature burst into the chamber, screeching. Its massive tentacle lashed out toward Altherion but Liesette, with a scream more from panic than bravery, picked up a loose piece of masonry and chucked it at the monster.
"Hey, ugly!" she yelled. "Over here! I have more bad decisions to make!"
It worked. The creature turned toward her, tentacles flailing.
Altherion didn't waste a second.
His fingers moved quickly across the sigil. Sweat beaded on his forehead not from fear, but from the mental pressure. "Confined space, limited escape vectors, unreliable arcane flow. I'll need a sigil that doesn't require full stabilization."
He muttered to himself as he worked.
"Combustion matrix? No. Too much splash damage. Sound disruption? Useless against a creature with no ears. Kinetic redirection... viable if I can calculate rebound angles."
He glanced up. Liesette had ducked behind a pillar, throwing pebbles at the creature to keep it from charging directly.
"I hope you're almost done!" she yelled.
"Almost," Altherion said through gritted teeth, drawing a complex triple-layered spiral. "I'm adjusting the mana conduit flow to split into three focal points. Each one acts as a timed kinetic burst. With the creature's mass and predictable lunge trajectory..."
"What the hell you talking about!"
He pressed his palm to the center of the sigil.
The array flared to life.
"Liesette! Now, duck left on my mark!"
"What-"
"Now!"
Liesette dove sideways just as the creature lunged again. Its bulk triggered the sigil's perimeter, and three pulses of force erupted in sequence.
The bursts didn't aim to damage but to redirect. The creature's body was launched backward, bouncing off two columns and slamming into the ceiling before crumpling into the far wall.
It twitched, stunned.
Liesette peeked from behind her pillar. "Did... did you just pinball a monster to death?"
"I recalculated the room as a geometric battlefield. It was the most efficient solution," Altherion muttered, shaking his hand from residual mana feedback.
She blinked, mouth agape. "You're terrifying."
He stood up slowly, catching his breath. "I'm efficient."
They looked at the creature. Still breathing. Growling now.
"Oh come on," Altherion muttered.
Before the beast could rise again, he drew a second, smaller array fast and messy and unleashed a blast of pressurized wind directly into its core. The creature collapsed for good this time.
Silence returned to the chamber.
Except for Liesette's heavy breathing and a sarcastic clap.
"Bravo, genius. Truly impressive. You nearly got us both killed, but impressive."
"I nearly got us killed?" Altherion turned to her, eyes wide. "You're the one who triggered a death trap while giving a fake lecture about 'ancient ceremonial door knobs'!"
"It looked ceremonial!"
"It bit you!"
Liesette sulked, rubbing her slightly bandaged hand. "It was a friendly bite..."
Altherion sat against the wall, rubbing his temples. "I swear, the next time you feel inspired to touch something, just... don't. Channel that energy into not dying."
She smirked. "Where would be the fun in that?"
He didn't answer. His eyes drifted toward the far end of the chamber. A set of stairs led even deeper into the temple.
"Let's keep moving," he said eventually, rising again. "But this time, I open the doors."
Their footsteps echoed across the ancient stone corridor, each step heavy with silence. Only the dim flicker of age-worn crystal torches lit their path, casting long shadows on the cracked walls.
Altherion walked ahead, his shoulders tense. He didn't look back. Not even once.
Liesette followed several paces behind. Her steps were quieter now, hesitant.
She held her arm, still bruised from the earlier encounter, though the pain wasn't what troubled her. It was the way Altherion kept avoiding her gaze. The way he hadn't spoken since they left the trap chamber.
Then he stopped.
"I've had enough," he said, his voice low.
Liesette froze.
Altherion slowly turned, face cold, eyes sharp like daggers. "How long were you planning to keep up this little performance?"
"What do you mean?" she asked, trying to keep her voice steady.
"I checked," he snapped. "After we came back to Daltheria. I looked into the professors you named. The books you said you wrote. The institute you said you graduated from." He stepped closer, his tone rising. "None of it exists. Not as you described it."
Liesette's lips parted, but no words came out.
"You made it all up, didn't you?" His eyes narrowed. "All those stories, all that fake expertise… Was it to impress me? To use me?"
"No!" she suddenly said, louder than she intended. "I didn't make anything up!"
Altherion blinked, stunned for a second. "You're still lying."
"I'm not!" she insisted, fists clenched. "I'm not lying, Altherion! I've never lied to you!"
His mouth curled into a bitter smile if it could even be called a smile. "Then you're even worse than I thought."
Liesette took a step back. "You think I'm some kind of fraud, don't you? You think I'm useless."
Altherion didn't answer. He just stared at her with an expression that made her chest tighten, disgust. Pure, quiet, disgust.
Liesette flinched as if he had slapped her. :Why are you looking at me like that?:
"Because I trusted you," he said slowly.
"I am-"
"No, you're not," he cut her off, his voice like ice. "You're a little girl playing historian. You don't read Trilium. You don't know the history. You don't even try. All you do is make things up and act like you're clever."
"I'm not making things up!" she shouted. Her eyes gleamed with tears. "I remember those lectures! I remember those names! Maybe... maybe something's wrong with the records, or-"
Then the air suddenly changed.
It was subtle at first. A strange vibration through the stone beneath their feet. The crystals on the walls flickered unnaturally, one by one, like something unseen had passed through them.
Liesette's voice caught in her throat.
Altherion's breath hitched. He knew that sensation. He had felt it before, once.
The wall behind them exploded.
A monstrous force tore through the rock like paper. Dust and chunks of stone shot in all directions.
From the debris stepped a creature not beast, not man. Its body was vaguely humanoid, towering and coiled with unnatural muscle. Its skin shimmered like wet obsidian etched with glowing red runes. There was no face, only an eyeless mask of shifting lines that blinked in and out like corrupted code.
It didn't scream.
It didn't growl.
It only existed, and that was terrifying enough.
CRACK!
Before either of them could speak, it vanished from its spot, its body blurring in motion.
It reappeared in front of Liesette.
With a fluid, grotesque movement, it swung its arm, no, its weaponized limb at her torso.
SPLAAAM!
Liesette was flung through the air like a ragdoll, crashing into the opposite wall with bone-shattering force. She collapsed in a heap, unmoving, blood trailing down her side.
"LIESETTE-"
Altherion barely had time to turn before a brutal force struck his chest.
BAM!
He flew backwards, his ribs buckling under the pressure. A wet sound escaped his throat as blood sprayed from his lips.
He hit the floor, rolled once, then stopped, coughing violently.
The monster turned its head slowly, like a machine calculating its next move.
The torchlight dimmed around them.
Dust settled in the silence.
Something had been watching.
And now… it was here.
Altherion staggered to his feet, one hand clutching his side. Warm blood soaked his tunic, dripping down in slow, steady lines. His vision blurred, and for a brief second, everything tilted.
But he didn't fall.
Not yet.
"Liesette…" he whispered, eyes darting to her broken form crumpled near the base of the shattered wall. She was breathing, barely, her chest rising in small, uneven movements.
The creature was standing between them.
Its body moved with unnatural fluidity, joints bending at angles that shouldn't exist. Each step it took made a low, vibrating hum like a broken melody from an ancient instrument. It wasn't just a monster.
It was a weapon.
Altherion's fingers twitched, tracing invisible lines through the air.
He had to think. Fast. Precise. No room for error.
"Equation 9... Layered Deflection Matrix… dampened by structural resonance in close quarters…" he muttered through gritted teeth.
His hand lit up with pale blue sigils as he slammed his palm into the stone floor.
A sudden burst like a barrier forming from math itself.
The monster struck with its bladed limb.
BOOM!
The shield cracked but held, barely. The impact sent Altherion sliding back, his boots scraping the stone. Pain flared again in his chest, sharp and unrelenting.
He coughed more blood.
Too strong…
No single spell could overpower that thing. It wasn't just brute force, it was adaptive. Every movement it made was faster than the last. It studied him. Learned him.
Another blow came.
Altherion dropped, rolled beneath the strike, and conjured a burst of force at the creature's knee joint.
Direct hit.
It stumbled but didn't fall.
With one spin, it kicked him in the ribs again.
CRACK.
He screamed this time, his voice raw. Pain lanced through his spine. He could barely breathe.
But even now he calculated.
Where it turned. How it paused. How it responded to impact.
"I need... thirty seconds," he whispered.
Thirty seconds to create a trap.
Thirty seconds to build something from the raw elements of this cursed place. Not magic, mechanics. Math. Architecture. All built in his head.
But he didn't have thirty seconds.
Not unless…
He looked at Liesette.
"Damn it…"
Altherion forced himself up.
Using the broken stones around him, he activated a crude reflection spell, one that created multiple false images of himself blinking across the room.
He darted behind one of the remaining pillars, hand etching sigils against the surface as fast as his broken body would allow.
He needed angles. He needed motion redirection. He needed momentum.
The monster growled now. Its eyeless face flickered with shifting lines, scanning, learning faster than before.
One illusion was destroyed. Then another.
Fourteen seconds.
His hand slipped blood made it hard to grip the stone. The pillar was marked now with a spiral array: a trap that multiplied force against a fixed point and released it like a slingshot.
Seventeen seconds.
Another image exploded.
Nineteen.
It turned toward the real him.
"Come on…" Altherion whispered.
The creature launched forward like a missile.
He dove out of the way, gritting his teeth as his ribs screamed. The monster's charge struck the pillar exactly as planned.
For a second, the array activated.
BOOM.
The pillar shattered, and raw redirected force slammed the monster into the ceiling. A rain of dust and broken rock followed.
Crash!
It fell to the floor, unmoving.
Altherion collapsed to his knees, panting. His arms trembled. Blood pooled beneath him.
But then-
The dust moved.
A low, mechanical hiss echoed in the silence.
The monster rose. Its body twisted back into shape, bones reconfiguring, muscle snapping into place with unnatural precision. Its runes pulsed faster now, as if mocking him.
"No…" Altherion whispered, shaking his head.
He had given everything.
All the formulas, all the calculations, perfect. But it wasn't enough. Not for this.
He dragged himself to Liesette's side. Her eyelids fluttered. She was pale, blood on her lips.
"You idiot…" he murmured. "You're supposed to be good at surviving."
The monster stepped forward, slow and deliberate.
Altherion stood between her and it.
His body wouldn't hold long.
But even now he calculated.
Somewhere in this maze of pain and fear and numbers, there was still an answer.
There had to be.