I didn't look back.
Not because I didn't want to.
But because if I did, I wouldn't keep going.
The tunnel wound downward, carved from ancient obsidian veined with dying light. Dust rose with every step, clinging to my skin, my throat, my thoughts. Somewhere far behind, the Seeker's shriek echoed through the ruin like a curse refusing to fade.
Serin was gone.
I barely knew her—one conversation, a name, a single act of kindness wrapped in fire and blood. But her death cracked something open inside me. Not because she sacrificed herself… but because she believed in me.
She thought I was worth dying for.
I hated that.
The scroll she gave me trembled in my hand like it remembered her better than I ever could. I sat at a bend in the tunnel, lit by a flickering blue shard embedded in the wall. My fingers fumbled with the black wax seal. It cracked like brittle bone.
Inside: a map. Lines drawn in ink so fine it looked like spiderwebs. At the center, marked in a rune that glowed faintly beneath my gaze, a name burned across the parchment:
Grythvault.
I didn't know what it was. A fortress? A ruin? A tomb?
But the rune beside it matched one on my skin.
And that meant I had to go.
I folded the scroll carefully. Pressed it to my forehead. Not a prayer—just… acknowledgment. For her. For Serin.
"You shouldn't have had to die," I whispered. "But I'll make it mean something."
---
Hours passed in silence.
The tunnel eventually spat me into a forgotten valley hidden by cloud and cliff. I emerged into wind and the scent of wet stone. The world outside had changed. The Hall had let me in under moonlight. Now, the sun bled red through the mist, casting everything in shades of war.
The road ahead curved into mountains. Jagged, cold, and cruel.
I felt the weight of the map in my pack. Of Arelis in my mind. Of every death that had brought me here.
But now, for the first time, I didn't feel lost.
I felt angry. And alive.
The Kingdom of Serelith wanted me hunted, broken, forgotten.
But I was still walking.
And the next place they tried to kill me, I wouldn't run.
I'd remember.