The ruins did not quiet down.
Princess Lainsa and the remaining treasure hunters advanced without pattern or restraint, moving through broken terrain stained by repeated slaughter. Whatever emerged before them was cut down–beasts, variants, malformed species the Association had never catalogued. Blood soaked the land indiscriminately, pooling between shattered stone and twisted roots.
Above them, the sky changed.
A Blood Moon surfaced without warning, violent and unnatural, washing the battlefield in a crimson glaze that clung to armor and skin alike. Some slowed. Some looked up. No formation reacted. No guidance followed.
Then it vanished.
With no signal to stop and no authority to obey, the killing continued. Momentum replaced judgment, and survival became the only rule still obeyed.
–
Inside the anthill, that momentum fractured.
