Chapter One — Part III: What Answers the Abyss
The forest smelled wrong.
Not of blood alone—that scent was everywhere—but of something older, something that had no place beneath the sky. Lucius felt it in his throat, dry and bitter, like ash swallowed too deep.
The mercenary camp was gone.
Where tents once stood, there were torn scraps of cloth clinging to branches. Where laughter had lingered, there were bodies—some crushed, some opened, some half-missing, as if the forest itself had taken bites and spat them out.
Jak stood rigid, axe lowered, staring at a corpse split nearly in half.
"They didn't even get time to run," he muttered.
Mike had sunk to his knees near the firepit, hands buried in his hair. His lute lay cracked beside him, a string still humming faintly in the night breeze. "They were veterans," he whispered. "I heard their stories. Sieges. Wyverns. Dungeon depths."
Lucy crouched near the edge of the clearing, fingers hovering above the soil without touching it. Her eyes glowed faintly blue as she traced the residue of mana in the air.
"This wasn't a hunt," she said quietly. "It was a release."
Alicia drew her cloak tighter around herself. Her expression was composed—but Lucius noticed her hand resting near her blade, knuckles white.
Then the forest shifted.
Not sound. Not movement.
Pressure.
The air folded inward, like the world inhaling too sharply.
Lucius felt it first.
"Get back," he said.
The ground split open.
A tear—vertical, jagged, screaming without sound—ripped reality apart. Blackness spilled from it, edged with writhing violet veins. Something dragged itself through, claws carving furrows into the earth.
The thing that emerged had no single shape. Too many limbs. Too many joints bending the wrong way. Its surface reflected nothing, like oil swallowing moonlight. Where its face should have been was a裂—an opening that pulsed and whispered.
An Abyss creature.
Jak moved without thinking, stepping forward with a roar.
The monster struck faster than instinct.
Jak was thrown aside like a broken doll, smashing through a tree. The trunk splintered. Jak did not rise.
"Jak!" Mike shouted.
Lucy raised her staff, chanting rapidly, mana flaring—then gasped.
The creature turned toward her.
Lucius felt something snap inside him.
Not fear.
Restraint.
His heartbeat thundered. His blood burned. A pressure unfurled in his chest, vast and suffocating, like something enormous stretching its wings in a confined space.
Enough.
He stepped forward.
The creature lunged.
Lucius drew his blade.
He wasn't fast enough.
But his sword ignited.
Not flame—will.
Red-gold energy surged along the steel, heat warping the air. When he swung, the strike carried weight beyond muscle or skill.
The impact shattered the ground.
The monster screamed—not with sound, but with force. Lucius was thrown backward, rolling hard, breath ripped from his lungs. Pain flared through his arms, his ribs.
Something had been taken.
His vision blurred. His hands shook.
Equivalent exchange.
The creature staggered—but did not fall.
It learned.
Shadows hardened around its limbs. It moved again, faster, smarter.
Lucius forced himself up.
The world dimmed at the edges. His heart pounded like a war drum.
Then something answered him.
Not magic.
Blood.
Heat flooded his veins, violent and proud. His spine straightened. His breath steadied. The pain dulled—not gone, but ignored.
A presence loomed within him.
Ancient. Arrogant. Vast.
Stand.
Lucius roared.
The sound tore from his chest, raw and inhuman. The creature hesitated—just for a fraction of a heartbeat.
That was enough.
Lucius drove forward, blade blazing brighter, and plunged it into the monster's core.
The Abyss-spawn convulsed violently. Shadows peeled away like burning flesh. The裂-mouth stretched wide—
—and collapsed.
The creature dissolved into ash and light.
What remained was an aura—dark crimson, pulsing slowly above the ground like a dying heart.
Silence returned.
Lucius dropped to one knee. His sword slipped from his fingers. His lungs burned. His vision swam.
Lucy stared at the aura in horror.
"That's—don't—" she started.
The aura moved.
It drifted toward Lucius, drawn like breath toward flame.
Then it entered him.
Agony exploded.
Lucius screamed as visions flooded his mind—towering beings chained in void, wings torn, voices screaming defiance as light devoured them. A vast darkness pulling power inward, endlessly inward.
The Abyss.
A colossal eye opened—and looked at him.
Lucius collapsed.
When he woke, dawn painted the forest in pale gold.
His body ached as if remade. Every breath felt heavier. Stronger.
Jak sat nearby, arm bound tightly, face pale but alive. Mike watched Lucius with fear he didn't try to hide. Alicia's gaze was sharp, guarded.
Lucy knelt beside him.
"That aura shouldn't have bonded to you," she said quietly. "It should've torn you apart."
Lucius swallowed.
"I felt something," he admitted. "Like it recognized me."
Far away, in a place beyond prayer, a god stirred uneasily.
And in Dragonia's capital, the First Prince paused mid-step, a smile slowly spreading across his face as a chill ran down his spine.
Something ancient had awakened.
And the world had begun to move.