When Kai woke, the world was silent.
The first thing he noticed was the cold. Not the biting chill of the slums or the chemical sting of rain, but something deeper — a cold that felt alive, crawling under his skin. He lay on hard ground, staring up at a gray sky streaked with veins of pale light. The air smelled of dust and old metal.
For a long moment, he didn't move. The last thing he remembered was the war-beast — the living machine — bowing its head as his hand touched it. Then light, sound, pain.
Now there was nothing but stillness.
He pushed himself up slowly, every bone in his body aching. The beast was gone. Only a crater remained where it had stood, the dirt scorched black in a perfect circle.
"Lia?"
His voice echoed faintly, swallowed by the wind.
He turned — and found her sitting a few meters away, knees drawn to her chest, eyes wide but alive. Jex was beside her, his weapon resting across his lap.
"You're finally awake," Jex said, voice low and rough. "We thought you weren't getting up."
"How long?" Kai asked.
"Two days."
Kai blinked. "Two—?"
"You collapsed after touching that thing," Lia said softly. "There was… light. And then everything around us froze. The air stopped moving. Even the fire. When it was over, the beast was gone."
Kai looked down at his arm. The mark was darker now, the eye open wider, the skin around it pale and cold. When he flexed his fingers, shadows bled faintly from his veins like smoke.
"What happened to me?" he whispered.
Jex leaned back against a slab of rusted metal. "You tell us. You're the one glowing like a damn reactor."
Lia frowned. "You're different, Kai."
He met her gaze. "How?"
"Your eyes. They change when you're not paying attention."
He turned away. He didn't want to see his reflection. He didn't want to see what the Pit had left in him.
They sat in silence for a while. The wind carried strange sounds — faint metallic creaks, whispers from the broken towers scattered across the plain. The sky was brighter now, though the light felt thin and sickly.
Finally, Jex stood. "We need to move. We're low on water, and those Enforcers won't stop at the wall. You saw what they sent after us."
Kai nodded slowly. "Agreed. But where?"
"North," Jex said. "There's supposed to be a relay tower up there. If it's still functional, we might get a signal. Maybe find out what's really happening in the sectors."
Lia pulled her jacket tighter. "And if it's not?"
"Then we keep walking until something kills us," Jex said flatly.
No one argued.
They packed what little they had and began moving again. The landscape stretched endlessly — rust plains broken by shattered machines, the occasional skeleton of a tower reaching toward the sky like a finger pointing to nowhere.
Kai walked ahead, senses alert. Every shadow seemed to twitch when he passed, bending toward him like iron filings drawn to a magnet. He could feel them — the echoes of the Pit's power rippling through this wasteland.
Lia noticed how he occasionally paused, head tilting as if listening to something she couldn't hear.
"What is it?" she asked once.
"Voices."
"From where?"
He looked at her. "Everywhere."
By midday, the heat was unbearable. The horizon shimmered. In the distance, something moved — not Enforcers this time, but figures wrapped in tattered robes, walking in clusters.
Jex squinted. "Scavenger tribes."
Lia frowned. "Out here?"
"They live wherever the city doesn't," he said. "Don't get close unless you want to end up stripped for parts."
But as they got closer, Kai felt the mark on his arm pulse again. The robed figures stopped. Slowly, cautiously, one of them raised a hand.
Jex reached for his weapon. "No sudden moves."
Kai stepped forward. The figure lowered its hood.
Beneath it was a woman — skin like ash, eyes pitch-black, lines of faint circuitry running down her neck. She wasn't human. Or maybe she used to be.
"You carry the Eye," she said, her voice thin but steady.
Kai's pulse quickened. "You know this symbol?"
She nodded once. "It marks the chosen of the Deep. The city cast you out, and the Pit claimed you."
Lia stepped closer. "The Deep? What is that?"
The woman looked at her. "The truth buried under your towers. The heart that feeds your power. The thing that wakes when men forget their debts."
Kai's mind raced. "You've seen it."
"Seen it? We serve it," the woman said. "We are the remnants of those who built the first walls. When the city turned its back on us, we turned to the shadows. They answered."
Behind her, the others knelt silently, heads bowed.
Lia whispered, "Kai… they're worshipping you."
The woman continued, "The Eye burns in you. The Hunter reborn. You stand between light and void."
Kai felt the mark throb harder. "I'm no god."
"No," the woman said. "But you carry one's memory."
Jex muttered under his breath. "I've heard enough ghost talk for a lifetime."
Kai ignored him. "You said I was chosen. Chosen for what?"
The woman's black eyes gleamed. "To finish what the city began. The towers feed on the Deep, draining what remains of its life. But every chain can break. Every debt can be paid in blood."
The ground trembled faintly beneath their feet. Far in the distance, thunder rolled — though the sky was clear.
The woman smiled faintly. "The Eye opens wider each time you draw breath. When it opens fully, the Deep will rise through you."
Kai stepped back. "No. That's not happening."
"It already is," she whispered.
Lia grabbed his hand. "We're leaving."
The woman didn't stop them. She only called out as they turned away. "When the black sun rises again, you will return to us, Hunter. You cannot escape what you are."
The words followed them long after the tribe disappeared behind the ruins.
By nightfall, they reached the edge of the wasteland. The ground sloped downward into a wide basin filled with what looked like water — but when the wind passed over it, the surface rippled metallically.
"The Ash Sea," Jex said quietly. "Didn't think it was real."
Lia stared. "It looks like a lake."
"It's not. It's liquefied dust and nanite residue from the old wars. You fall in, you don't come back out."
They camped on a ridge overlooking it, the pale light of the dying sun reflecting off the shifting surface below.
Kai sat apart from the others, staring at the mark on his arm. He could feel it moving now, like something alive under his skin. Each beat matched his heart. Each pulse felt stronger.
He thought of the woman's words — the Deep, the Eye, the Hunter reborn.
He didn't want to believe them. But the voice inside him was quiet tonight, and that silence scared him more than the whispers ever had.
Lia approached after a while, sitting beside him. "You're thinking again."
"Can't help it."
She hesitated. "What she said… about you. Do you think it's true?"
Kai looked at the horizon. "I think the city's built on lies. And maybe one of them crawled into me."
She didn't answer. Instead, she pulled her knees up and rested her chin on them. "You saved me, Kai. Even if something's changing in you, that part's still real."
He turned to her. The firelight caught her eyes — tired, but unbroken. "Don't put your faith in monsters."
She smiled faintly. "Then stop trying to be one."
He almost laughed, but the sound that came out was too hollow.
Later that night, as the others slept, Kai stood alone again, watching the Ash Sea shift in the moonlight. The wind carried strange whispers from across the basin — faint words that weren't in any language he knew.
Then he saw it.
Far across the metallic waves, something glowed — a tower of light rising from the haze, pulsing rhythmically like a heartbeat.
The mark on his arm flared in answer.
He whispered to himself, "What are you showing me?"
The wind answered with a word that wasn't his own. Home.
The next morning, Jex was already packing. "We're heading north. That tower looks like a signal relay. Might even have power."
Kai nodded, though he knew it wasn't a relay. He didn't know how he knew — he just did. The thing across the sea was calling to him.
They set off again, following the ridge as it curved around the basin. The ground became unstable, riddled with cracks that hissed faint vapor. Once, they passed the skeleton of a giant machine, half-buried, its ribs gleaming like polished steel.
Hours later, the tower was closer. It wasn't metal at all but stone — black and smooth, covered in veins of light that pulsed like veins in a living thing.
Jex frowned. "That's no relay."
"No," Kai said softly. "It's older."
As they drew near, the air changed. The wind stilled. The shadows lengthened.
The ground around the tower was covered in symbols — the same ones that had burned in the tunnels beneath the city. Circles within circles. Chains. Eyes.
Lia shivered. "It's like it's breathing."
Kai stepped forward. "Stay back."
He placed his hand against the stone. The mark on his arm flared. The tower responded, light crawling upward in spirals. The hum grew deeper until it wasn't sound anymore but feeling — vibrating through his bones.
A voice filled his head again, clearer than before.
The Deep stirs. You bring its pulse. You bring its will.
Kai staggered back, clutching his head. "No—"
The ground cracked. From beneath the tower, black liquid surged upward, forming shapes — faces screaming silently before dissolving into mist. The air turned heavy, suffocating.
Jex shouted something, pulling Lia away, but Kai didn't hear.
The mark on his arm was blazing now, the eye wide open. He felt the world tilt — shadows flooding toward him, wrapping around his legs, his arms, his chest.
Accept it, the voice urged. You are the bridge between the city and the void.
Kai's own voice broke through, low and defiant. "I'm not your weapon."
The darkness trembled. Then, from the center of the tower, a single drop of black light fell — slow, deliberate — and touched the ground before him.
When it hit, everything stopped.
The wind. The sound. Even the air.
And then he heard it — not the voice of the Pit this time, but something older, deeper, echoing from below the world itself.
Then prove it, Hunter. Stand against us.
The earth split open.
And the Deep answered.