Zerin's knees buckled.
Stone scraped beneath his blade as it struck the foundation, its edge biting deep enough to stop his fall. He sagged against the blackened blade. His body, heavy, trembled through his arms.
The breath tearing from his chest was shallow and uneven. "Come on. Come on." The words rose from his throat.
He leaned forward, resting his forehead against the pommel. The simple act of lifting the sword now felt unbearable.
Pain kept him awake. Barely.
Then, those screams returned again.
They weren't imagined. Like nails on a chalkboard they clawed at the edge of his thoughts. Zerin squeezed his eyes shut, fingers tightening around the hilt as he anchored himself.
It was his turn.
He shifted his weight back to his knees, lifting his head off the pommel of his blade. Even exhausted and anemic, he managed to push himself upright.
Arms protested, but Zerin ignored his body, lifting the sword above his head. He looked down at the Keeper's corpse, chest rising, a single time—then he brought the blade down.
The blade stabbed into the abdomen with a moment of resistance, not the clean give of flesh but something thicker. He leaned into it, until his blade sank in with a crack.
Grotesque.
He continued carving upward toward the collar. The sound followed—sharp, wet cracks, like splitting open a crab's chitinous shell.
When he was finished, carving a ravine up the creature's torso, Zerin changed his grip and used it as a lever, prying the creature open.
There was a final snap… the body opened up.
Rot burst free in a rushing, choking wave. The stench hit him all at once, crawling down his throat as he reflexively sucked in a breath and gagged.
Decay flooded his lungs, as if this creature was something ancient, as if the corpse had been festering long before he ever struck it down.
Staring directly at the source, Zerin's crimson eyes narrowed at the black, oily mass exposed within the corpse.
There was hardly any blood.
A curse slipped out before he could stop it. "Fuck…"
His eyes left the corpse, drifting to the slick floor beneath him, soaked from the earlier fight. He had bled it dry.
If the organs were like this—only after moments of death—then the blood spilled out on the floor would be no better.
A single thought brought him to focus: survival. Nothing more. Nothing less.
It wasn't courage. It was a pure necessity.
The First Nightmare was always lingering behind his eyes—Bashir, the festival chaos—but every time he pushed it aside.
The Keeper had lost and its corpse was all that remained. Its filth, its ruin, and the remnants of its power.
It was Zerin's to inherit.
He drew a slow breath. The rot… everything was wrong. And, yet, he knew it would sustain him. It was clear.
He had no other path.
This was all there was.
He forced his fingers in, scooping up the cold, rubbery mass. He swallowed down the rising bile in his throat, refusing to let go. The stench permeated his lungs, then he lifted it to his mouth.
The first bite made him retch, stomach heaving violently. He spat remnants and bile back into his hand. His body quaked commanding him to stop, but he forced what was in his hands back into his mouth and swallowed.
The flesh and organs themselves were nearly flavorless. But underneath, a sharp, sour, foul note told him it was tainted.
Still, he resisted his body's urge to recoil.
Eat. If you don't, they die. She dies.
He conjured anger. He clenched the gore, forcing more into his mouth. Teeth cutting through organs, muscle, and fibrous tissue.
Swallow. Chew. Swallow again.
***
In the cell, a red light flickered disturbing the captives inside.
A trembling voice broke the disturbance. "Lady Ecludia?" A female captive whispered in the darkness. Her voice quivered. "Where am I?"
Ecludia pressed herself against the wall she sat against, straining to hear. "Olivia?" she called, her voice uncertain. The sound came from beyond the cell bars.
"Olivia, how did you—"
A flash of red appeared, closer this time, right beside Ecludia.
"Everly?!" Ecludia's hand reached out, searching for her friend, but found only empty space.
Then Everly's voice came, from the same direction as Olivia's. "I think… we're outside the cell?"
Olivia clung desperately to her. "Everly?! Please don't leave me!"
"Olivia! Stop it!" Everly shouted back, the two pregnant girls struggling in the darkness.
Flashes continued, one by one. Finally, Ecludia herself was removed from the cell, displaced along with the others.
Ecludia hesitated. Her hand lifted, igniting a small flame in her palm. She gasped, watching it flicker weakly, then died. Her Aspect demanded soul fragments to sustain it, and she had just used whatever remained just to test whether she could wield it again.
A fragile smile touched her lips. Tears slipped down her cheeks, hidden away from the other captives in the darkness. She was free. Her ability to use her Aspect was proof—proof that Zerin had saved them.
"Enough." Another girl spoke up, her voice firm and commanding, immediately halting Olivia and Everly's bickering. Her name was Tina—she rarely spoke, at least not to Ecludia.
"Do you two not hear that screaming? Or the fact that thing could still be here?" Tina almost chastised the two women like children.
Ecludia turned away from the voices turning around and found her eyes falling on a pair of crimson eyes glaring at them in front of the adjacent cell.
Olivia and Everly soon noticed, and if it wasn't for Tina this would have definitely silenced them mute with terror. Olivia clutched Everly tightly, deathly close.
"Don't worry…" Theo said, stepping forward. "That is her friend, his name is Zerin, right?"
Beside him, two others stood silently— Ivan and Tina.
"No…" Ecludia murmured.
Those eyes, they pulsed like a slow, deliberate heartbeat. "Thank you," she whispered. "You are his, aren't you? Like Boris?"
She inched closer. The dim luminescence of its glowing eyes revealed feline features—adolescent, small, almost runt-like. Yet it radiated a sense of power unlike Boris or the Warden's surgical gaze. It was pure and wild.
"Is he in there? Her voice was thin as she took another step. "Can I see him?" She sought permission.
The creature paused. Instead of speaking, it exhaled a faint, glowing mist before stepping aside in silence.
Ecludia offered a small, respectful bow. "Thank you again," she whispered, then rose and entered the cell.