sorry for the late upload guys, I got caught up in a lot of things this week but I promise to meet my weekly update of 3 chapters
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The hall still reeked of scorched flesh and ruptured magic long after Sabre disappeared down its broken passageway. The survivors — few as they were — didn't dare speak. None wanted their voices to echo in the same space where a monster had answered a boy's scream.
But far from that ruined hall, in a place carved out of nothingness itself, the Astryx leaders gathered.
The chamber wasn't built. It was grown — molded from thick, pulsing shadows that oozed like tar and dripped upward instead of down. The air tasted metallic, like old blood left too long on rusted blades. No torches burned here; the walls themselves gave off a faint, sickly glow, as though something imprisoned inside them struggled to escape.
A long, jagged table stood at the center, made from what looked disturbingly like bone fused together. Not human bone — these were too long, too hollow, too twisted.
Around it sat the Astryx hunters.
Their faces were half-masked in blackened metal, etched with crawling runes that moved when you weren't looking. Each mask curved into sharp points, like smiling jaws ready to swallow light.
The largest of them, a towering figure draped in ragged armor made of overlapping plates, slammed a clawed gauntlet onto the table.
"We lost the elders," he growled. His voice sounded like someone dragging chains across stone. "And the anomaly boy unleashed a fully-formed beast. Untrained. Uncontrolled. Yet it obeyed him."
A murmur rippled through the hunting circle — a murmur like insects crawling beneath skin.
Another hunter leaned forward. She had a long slit down her mask, revealing a single red eye — bright, sharp, and pulsing like a heartbeat. "It didn't obey," she hissed. "It responded. There is a difference. A terrifying one."
She placed a shard of something on the table.
It was still steaming.
Bits of elder robes clung to it.
"The creature didn't manifest on its own," she continued. "It was summoned."
A third hunter — smaller, cloaked, voice whisper-soft — tilted his head. "By a child who has not yet touched a geothermal vein? Impossible."
The red-eyed woman didn't blink. "And yet it happened."
A distorted hum filled the chamber as the shadows on the walls trembled, reacting to the tension like living things. One of the hunters reached out and touched the bone table, letting the runes on his armor flare with a sickly green shimmer.
"We knew the prophecy would stir eventually," he rasped. "But we expected signs. Patterns. Echoes in the ley lines. Not… this."
The leader leaned back, metal creaking. "The fault is ours. We underestimated him."
A silent pause followed.
Heavy.
Suffocating.
The sort of silence that suggested the darkness itself was listening.
The cloaked hunter finally spoke again, but there was something… different in his tone now. A shaking. A hesitation rarely found among the Astryx.
"What of Earth?" he asked. "Are we still proceeding with the convergence?"
The leader's jaw twitched under his mask. "Earth is still the objective. Its core energy is stable. Its inhabitants unaware. And its defenses weaker by the decade." He cast a glance around the table. "We cannot afford delay."
"But the boy—" another started.
"—the boy," the leader cut in sharply, "is now a priority. His awakening changes everything."
The shadows twitched.
A low thrumming began to vibrate through the chamber floor, like something enormous shifting beneath them.
"The elders died because they thought they could contain him," the leader said. "We will not make the same mistake. We will approach the situation with precision."
His voice dropped to a colder, darker register.
"We track him."
"We corner him."
"And when the moment comes… we rip the truth from his spine."
Several hunters nodded.
One did not.
The red-eyed woman cocked her head slightly. "What if he chooses Earth?" she asked. "The breach between realms is unstable. If he finds a geothermal line there… he may grow beyond our reach."
The leader's fists tightened so hard the metal shrieked. "Then we force him to choose otherwise."
"And Earth?" she pressed.
A long, deliberate silence.
Then—
"Earth will burn," he said simply. "After we harvest what we need."
The shadows shivered in excitement.
But then the chamber shifted.
Every hunter stiffened.
A ripple—subtle but unmistakable—passed through the walls, warping the room like a heat mirage. The bone table cracked down the middle, just slightly.
The cloaked hunter whispered, "Did you feel that?"
The leader's mask turned slowly. "Yes."
"It came from the mortal realm."
Another ripple struck — this time stronger, and the ground vibrated as though something massive had slammed into the barrier between worlds.
The red-eyed woman stood abruptly. "That was not normal fluctuation. Something crossed."
The cloaked hunter's tone trembled. "A creature?"
"No," she murmured, her fingers tightening. "Something far worse."
The leader stood, towering above them all. "Locate the source of the disruption."
The shadows around the chamber twisted violently, reshaping into clawed silhouettes that vanished into the walls like smoke sinking into cracks.
When they were gone, the leader spoke again.
"Earth will be our battleground sooner than expected. Prepare the gate."
The hunters rose — slowly, ritualistically — until only their leader remained seated, staring at the broken table.
"…the boy," he muttered beneath his breath. "Why now?"
For the first time, a faint trace of… not fear… but unease… crawled through his voice.
He leaned back.
The shadows leaned in.
And far, far away…
Somewhere in the mortal world…
A faint echo responded.
The same echo that had cracked their chamber.
The same echo that made the runes on their armor flicker.
A whisper.
A pulse.
A calling.
Sabre.
The leader exhaled.
"This changes everything."
The chamber lights dimmed to nothing.
And the scene ended in absolute, swallowing darkness.
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