The first crack split the floor like lightning.
Then came the roar.
The temple's foundation buckled under an invisible weight, shaking the air with a sound that wasn't thunder it was a heartbeat.
Jaewon stumbled as the ground convulsed. "Move! Everyone out!"
Hunters scattered toward the tunnels, but the passage they'd come through was already sealed by falling stone. Crimson veins crawled across the ceiling, bursting open and spilling molten light.
Sumi raised her talisman, shouting over the chaos. "The seal's unraveling! The coffin's breaking loose!"
Behind them, the coffin pulsed like a living heart. The black glass split further, and a red mist seeped out — slow, deliberate, sentient.
Jaewon felt it pulling at his veins, tugging on something buried in his blood. He pressed a hand to his chest, fighting the growing hum in his bones. "It's calling to me."
Jinwoo snarled, gripping his blade. "Then shut it out before it kills us!"
But the words came too late.
The temple floor exploded upward, throwing hunters through the air. Jaewon slammed into a pillar, pain jolting through his spine. Dust filled the air, choking and heavy. Through the haze, he saw them shadows forming from the red mist.
Dozens. No — hundreds.
They were the same temple guardians from before, but now free of their chains. Their bodies glistened like obsidian soaked in blood, eyes burning white-hot.
Sumi screamed, "They're regenerating!"
"Form ranks!" Jinwoo ordered. His men moved, blades igniting with silver Qi. They fought in tight formation, every strike bursting in arcs of moonlight.
But for every guardian they cut down, two more rose from the mist.
Jaewon charged in, cutting through three in one motion. His sword, Bloodvein, pulsed brighter than before feeding off something not his own. Each swing came heavier, faster, until his movements blurred into pure instinct.
He didn't notice his reflection in the cracked stone eyes glowing faint red, veins darkening beneath his skin.
Sumi did.
"Jaewon—stop! You're changing!"
He didn't respond. The voice was back, whispering through his heartbeat.
"Yes… remember what you are. The blood of Varos does not crawl. It hunts."
His breath came ragged. His pulse thundered in his ears. The world tilted sound and light distorting into a single note of hunger.
A guardian leapt from behind. Sumi's warning barely reached him before instinct took over.
He turned, moving too fast for human sight his arm snapping up, claws extending from his fingers in a flash of black steel. He tore through the creature like paper.
Silence. Then Sumi's voice, small and trembling. "Jaewon… your hand."
He looked down. His nails had lengthened into talons. His veins glowed faintly red beneath his skin.
The realization hit like ice. He stumbled back, gripping his wrist, forcing the transformation down through sheer will. His Qi crackled violently, threatening to tear him apart.
"I'm… fine," he gasped. "Keep moving."
But Jinwoo had seen it. So had his men. Their blades shifted subtly toward Jaewon.
"You said you weren't tainted," Jinwoo hissed. "What the hell are you?"
"Later!" Sumi shouted, flinging a talisman that burst into blinding light. "If you want to live, fight first!"
The explosion ripped through the chamber, tearing a hole through the wall sunlight bled through from above, faint and gray. Their escape route.
"Go!" Jaewon roared.
Hunters surged toward the opening, scrambling up the broken slope. Jaewon and Sumi covered the rear, cutting through the last of the guardians.
The coffin pulsed again. The mist gathered into a single column, rising like a vortex toward the ceiling. Within it, a shape began to form tall, regal, inhumanly calm.
A voice echoed, deep enough to rattle the stones.
"Who breaks the seal of my silence?"
Jinwoo froze mid-climb. "It's awake—"
"Move!" Jaewon grabbed Sumi and pushed her upward. The tremor that followed split the entire temple in two.
They broke into the open air as the structure collapsed behind them, a roar like a dying god echoing across the mountain.
Chunks of stone and red crystal rained down. Jaewon shoved Sumi aside as a boulder fell, catching him across the shoulder. Pain exploded through him. He hit the ground hard, breath knocked from his chest.
"Jaewon!"
Sumi dropped beside him, her hands glowing as she pressed a talisman to his wound. "Stay with me!"
He tried to push himself up, but his vision swam. The voice was still there, faint now, whispering from the ruins below.
"You cannot deny me. The moon has already chosen."
Jaewon's mark burned through his clothes, the symbol pulsing like a living wound.
Sumi's eyes widened. "Your seal it's breaking apart."
He clenched his fists, forcing his Qi to stabilize. "Not yet. Not here."
Jinwoo and his remaining men reached the ridge, staring down at the crater where the temple once stood. Red mist still bled upward, twisting into the clouds.
"What in the gods' name was sealed down there?" one whispered.
Jinwoo didn't answer. He was watching Jaewon the faint red glow under his skin, the inhuman speed, the way the shadows seemed to bend toward him.
He finally spoke, low and cold. "We should've left you to die."
Sumi stood, stepping between them. "He just saved all of you."
"He's not one of us," Jinwoo shot back. "He's one of them."
Jaewon pushed himself to his feet, swaying slightly. "If I were one of them, none of you would still be breathing."
The silence stretched. Wind howled through the shattered mountain pass.
Jinwoo's blade stayed half-drawn, but he didn't strike. "If you turn… I'll end you myself."
Jaewon didn't respond. His gaze drifted toward the horizon. The moon was rising but it wasn't silver anymore. It glowed faint red, as if stained by the same corruption that had lived beneath the earth.
Sumi followed his stare, whispering, "The seal was never meant to hold forever."
Jaewon sheathed his blade, voice low. "Then we find the rest before they break too."
Below them, deep in the ruins, the coffin's whisper curled through the wind.
"The hunt begins anew."