Silence pressed against Arin's ears as he stood before the kneeling statues. Their stone faces—though cracked and weathered—held an expression he couldn't mistake.
Reverence.
Recognition.
Submission.
Lira stepped beside him, her voice barely a whisper. "Arin… these aren't just statues. They look like soldiers."
He nodded slowly. "Not soldiers."
His throat tightened.
"Knights."
The cold air shifted, carrying a faint metallic hum, like distant chains dragging across the floor. The Obsidian Vein pulsed against Arin's palm in response, glowing brighter in the hall's oppressive gloom.
"Why are they reacting to the shard?" Lira asked.
"Because this place knows it," Arin murmured. "Maybe… it knows me too."
Before Lira could question him, a deep vibration rolled through the hall. Dust rained down from the ceiling. The statues closest to them trembled—an almost human shudder—as if waking from a centuries-long slumber.
Lira instinctively grabbed Arin's wrist. "Please tell me they're not coming alive."
Arin swallowed hard. "I don't think they need to."
The hum intensified, resonating with the shard in Arin's hand. Slowly, the floor behind the kneeling statues cracked open, forming a circle of shifting stone. Symbols etched themselves across its surface—ancient, sharp, and disturbingly familiar.
"Arin… this language…" Lira backed away. "It's the same writing we saw in the ruins above. The same inscriptions around the relic chamber."
Arin stared at the emerging runes, the truth tightening inside his chest.
"They're not just ruins," he said quietly. "They're a throne room."
Lira blinked. "A throne room for who?"
He hesitated.
Because he didn't want to say it.
Because saying it made it real.
"For the Fallen Kings."
The runes lit up in a sudden flare, casting long shadows across the hall. A cold wind poured out of the circle, whipping Lira's hair back and forcing Arin to shield his eyes.
Then—
A voice.
Not spoken aloud, but echoing inside Arin's head. Ancient. Commanding. Broken by time.
Welcome back.
Arin staggered. "Did you hear that?"
Lira looked terrified. "Hear what?"
The voice came again—louder, clearer, vibrating through his bones.
You left us before the collapse… but you return bearing our core.
Arin's breath caught. The shard.
They were talking about the shard.
Lira shook him. "Arin! What's happening? Who's talking to you?"
He didn't know how to answer, because the voice wasn't stopping. It pushed into his mind like a tide breaking through a dam.
We served you once.
We can serve again.
Restore the throne.
Arin stumbled back, gripping his head as the images flooded in—shattered crowns, burning skies, rows of kneeling warriors, a shadowed figure standing at the center.
The same figure from his visions.
Lira panicked. "Arin, stop! Drop the shard!"
But he couldn't.
The floor beneath the glowing circle opened fully with a bone-deep sound, revealing a broad staircase spiraling downward into darkness. Violet light pulsed from below, steady like a heartbeat.
The voice whispered:
Return, Fallen One.
Your throne awaits.
Arin forced his eyes open, heart pounding.
He felt the pull of the staircase.
A force he didn't understand.
A force he couldn't refuse.
Lira grabbed his arm desperately. "Arin. You're scaring me. Where are you going?"
He looked down at the spiral path waiting beneath the hall.
And the truth hit him with a cold, shattering certainty:
"I think…" he whispered, voice trembling,
"I think this place was built for me."
But before either of them could move—
A sudden, violent roar echoed from outside the sealed chamber.
The Watcher had found them.
And something else was with it.
Something bigger.
Something angry.
Arin turned toward the noise, his hand tightening around the glowing shard.
The throne could wait.
For now, survival couldn't.