Flareon knelt beside Seren, a cold dread washing over him as he saw the raw pain etched on her face, the way she flinched from sounds that were barely registering to him. Her hearing, her sharpest Farseer sense after her sight, was wounded.
Just as he helped her sit up, the ground beneath them shifted. A deep, gut-wrenching lurch, accompanied by a grinding groan that vibrated up through their bones. Across the square, Korbin let out a guttural roar, struggling to regain his footing. Gravus, his face pale with exertion, slammed a hand to the ground.
"The ground... it's not stable!"
He yelled, his voice sounding distant and distorted.
A symphony of destruction erupted around them. With a sound like tearing fabric on a continental scale, a network of deep fissures raced across the ferrocrete and packed earth of the square. One massive crack, wider than the others, tore open directly at their feet.
"Flareon!"
Seren cried out, her balance gone.
The ground fell away. Flareon's stomach launched into his throat as he and Seren plunged into absolute darkness. He instinctively reached out, grabbing Seren's arm, holding on as they tumbled into the void.
Above, he heard Gravus's desperate roar. He saw the big Earth Sorcerai lunge towards the chasm's edge, his hands outstretched, trying to command the stone, to seal the breach. But the rock crumbled away from his touch, unresponsive.
"I can't! Too drained... It's not holding!"
Gravus bellowed, his voice filled with the agony of powerlessness.
The figures of their friends, silhouetted against the shrinking polygon of night sky, vanished as they fell deeper.
The freefall was a terrifying, disorienting rush of wind and darkness. Flareon's fire was useless here; there was nothing to burn, nothing to push against. They were utterly at the mercy of gravity. He held onto Seren tightly, a futile anchor in the abyss, the roar of displaced air overwhelming the ringing in his ears.
Then, he felt a change. A faint blue light blossomed below them, emanating from the Lumecryst on Seren's wrist. She had twisted in his grip, her face a mask of fierce concentration, her free hand thrust downwards. He felt a sudden, strange resistance, a buffering pressure that fought against their plummet. The violent rush of wind slowed to a powerful, controlled downdraft. Her Arcane power was working, pushing against the air, against their own momentum, slowing their terrifying descent.
A desperate application of force that was clearly taking a massive toll on her. Her breath came in ragged gasps, her arm trembling from the strain. Flareon shifted his grip, trying to steady her, to lend what little support he could as she fought to save them both.
They descended for what felt like an eternity, passing through layers of rock and earth, the darkness absolute. Then, a faint, dull red glow began to illuminate the abyss from below. The air grew thick, humid, and scorching hot, carrying the acrid stench of sulphur and burnt rock.
Their controlled fall ended with a jarring but survivable impact on a surface of black, glassy stone that was uncomfortably warm to the touch. Seren collapsed the moment their feet touched down, the blue light on her bracelet extinguishing, leaving her panting and trembling with exhaustion.
Flareon helped her to her feet, his eyes adjusting to the hellish new landscape, his mind reeling. They were in an immense cavern, so vast its ceiling was lost in oppressive darkness far above. There was no sky, no sun, no stars. The only light came from the world itself. Sluggish rivers of molten lava flowed through channels carved in the black rock, casting a menacing, undulating red-orange glow on their surroundings. Geysers of steam and noxious gas hissed from fissures in the ground. In the distance, strange, jagged structures of obsidian rose like twisted spires towards the unseen roof. The air was thick, heavy, and radiated a searing heat that made Flareon's own inner fire feel like a flickering candle in a furnace.
He stared at the rivers of magma, the incandescent glow, the sheer, raw, uncontrolled elemental power of this impossible place. Looked at Seren, her face streaked with grime and tears, her eyes wide with the same horrified awe that he felt.
Flareon dropped to his knees, slamming a fist against the obsidian floor, the impact barely registering over the low rumble of the lava flows.
"NO!"
A raw, guttural scream tore from his throat, echoing out over the molten landscape, a sound of pure, undiluted rage and grief. It was the cry of a man who had endured too much, who had been pushed past every conceivable limit only to be cast into a new, more profound level of suffering.
"We survived!"
He roared at the darkness, his voice cracking with fury.
"AND FOR WHAT?! TO BE THROWN INTO HELL ITSELF?! IS THIS IT?! IS THIS THE REWARD FOR ENDURING?!"
He was spent. The rage, the grief, the frustration, all of it poured out in that single, desperate outburst, leaving behind a vast, hollow emptiness.
Seren had watched in silence, not moving to intervene. She understood. Every word he screamed, she felt in her own bruised and battered soul.
He slowly pushed himself to his feet, his body trembling with exhaustion. He looked over at Seren, his eyes, still glowing faintly from his outburst, reflecting the molten rivers around them. The anger was gone, replaced by a profound, desolate weariness. They were alone. Trapped at the literal bottom of the world.
He met Seren's gaze, and the question hung unspoken between them in the hot, stagnant air, a shared acknowledgment of their impossible fate.
Now what?