The silence after the explosion felt unnatural—too clean, too hollow. Dust fell like grey rain, drifting over the broken hall where Eiryn stood alone, breath sharp and burning in his chest. Blood soaked the collar of his shirt. His vision flickered with static. Every breath scraped his ribs like glass.
But he didn't care.
"Riven…?"
He whispered the name like a prayer swallowed by smoke.
The air still hummed with the aftershock of Riven's collapse. Where he had stood minutes earlier… only a smear of silver light and cracked stone remained. His body had been taken—no, absorbed—by the swirling fractures in the floor, pulled somewhere deeper beneath the city.
Somewhere the cult called The Hollow Below.
Eiryn swallowed hard. "You promised you wouldn't disappear again…"
His fingers trembled—not from fear, but from the echo of the Helunsntion surge that had burst out of him when Riven's consciousness slipped away. The Manifestation he had forced open—The Pale Lantern—still flickered faintly around him, threads of soft white glow drifting like fireflies.
Its aftertaste burned.
Its price still lingered.
He felt it in his bones, in his skull, in every fragile thought he tried to gather.
Then—
A whisper crawled across the ruined hall.
Not yours.
Not yet.
Eiryn froze. The voice wasn't human. It wasn't even external. It came from a place beneath his memory—lower, older, hungry.
A Helunsntion echo.
The walls around him trembled, dark veins spreading along the stone like ink. Something deep underneath shifted. A pulse. A throb. A heartbeat that didn't belong to any living creature.
The Vein.
It was waking up.
A distant grinding noise echoed through the hall. The cracked floor split a little wider, dust falling into the dark. Something glimmered far below, like eyes reflecting light.
Eiryn backed away, forcing breath into his lungs. "I don't have time for this. Riven needs—"
A hand grabbed his shoulder.
He spun, ready to strike—
—but stopped.
"Easy."
The voice was calm, steady.
A woman in a black trench coat stood in front of him, her hair tied back, her expression unreadable. Shadows clung to her like a second skin.
He recognized her.
Ashara Veylan.
The ex-cult strategist. The one who betrayed the Silver Mind Order years ago. The one who supposedly died in the Siege of Harrow.
"You're alive?" Eiryn whispered.
Her eyes flicked around the hall. "Barely. And if we stay here, you won't be."
Eiryn shook his head. "Riven—he's—"
"Taken," she finished. "And if we don't move, the Vein will take you too."
The floor below them lurched, stone cracking like a skull splitting open. A wave of cold pressure swept up, making the lights flicker out, plunging the hall into faint grey glow.
Ashara grabbed Eiryn's wrist.
"Move."
He didn't argue.
—
They ran through the collapsing corridors, each step sending shards of stone falling behind them. The air grew colder. The shadows stretched longer. The hum of the Vein echoed through the walls like whispers trying to crawl into their minds.
Eiryn stumbled, clutching his chest. "My Manifestation… it's still unstable."
"Of course it is," Ashara muttered. "You opened it too early. And without a tether."
"Riven was my tether."
"I know."
They burst through a broken archway and into an abandoned subway tunnel. The overhead bulbs flickered fitfully, buzzing like angry insects. The tracks were half-buried under rubble.
Ashara slowed, checking the shadows. "We're safe for now."
Eiryn doubled over, hands on his knees, breath sharp. His vision wavered. The Pale Lantern flickered around him again—glowing threads leaking from his skin.
Ashara snapped her fingers in front of him. "Don't let it drown you."
"I'm trying," he gasped.
"Try harder."
He forced the glow down. It faded reluctantly.
Ashara's expression softened, but only a fraction. "Eiryn… the Vein reacted to you. That shouldn't be possible."
"I don't understand it either."
"You will," she said quietly. "And you won't like what you learn."
Before he could ask what that meant, she motioned for him to follow.
"We're going to someone who knows where Riven was taken."
"Who?"
Ashara's jaw tightened.
"Someone I hoped I'd never see again."
—
They walked deeper into the tunnels, the air growing thicker and colder. Strange symbols scratched into the walls pulsed faintly, glowing with sickly green light.
Eiryn shivered. "Cult markings?"
"No. Older."
"How old?"
Ashara didn't answer.
They reached a metal door half-buried in rust. Ashara knocked three times—sharp, precise, rhythmic.
For a long moment, nothing happened.
Then bolts slid back.
The door creaked open.
A hunched, thin man with glowing red eyes stared out. His hair was white and wild, his skin stretched too tight over his bones. But his presence felt enormous, like a shadow made of intelligence and exhaustion.
Dr. Varin Kaelor.
The Veinologist.
The only surviving researcher of the Helunsntion origin experiments.
"Ah," he rasped. "The boy who shouldn't exist."
Eiryn stiffened. "Excuse me?"
Varin's smile was unsettling. "Come inside before the whispers find you."
Ashara nudged him. "Don't argue. Just move."
Eiryn stepped inside.
The door slammed shut behind them.
—
The room was lit by dozens of flickering monitors and jars of glowing liquid. Papers covered every surface—maps of the city, diagrams of brain structures, sketches of eyes formed from swirling ink.
Eiryn swallowed nervously. "You've been studying… this disease?"
Varin corrected him sharply. "It's not a disease. It's a memory parasite. And you…"
He pointed a trembling finger.
"You are the first case in history where the parasite attached to someone naturally."
Eiryn froze.
Ashara sighed. "Varin—slow down."
"No," Eiryn said softly. "I need to hear this."
Varin shuffled closer. "Most people who acquire Helunsntion become empty vessels—broken minds projecting warped illusions. But you, boy… your mind didn't collapse. It adapted. It evolved."
Eiryn swallowed. "Why?"
Varin's gaze darkened.
"Because your childhood was never normal."
Something in Eiryn's chest tightened.
"No," he whispered. "Don't."
Ashara placed a hand on his shoulder. "Eiryn, listen."
He shook his head. "I don't want to remember."
"You need to," Varin said. "Or the Vein will force it out of you itself."
The lights flickered violently.
Something in the walls groaned.
Eiryn's breath hitched.
The Pale Lantern flared behind him.
And the memories he had buried—deep, deep in the locked places of his mind—began to rise like corpses pushing up through the soil.
—
He was standing in the old house again.
The cracked window.
The broken chair.
The heavy footsteps in the corridor.
His mother's voice—
Eiryn—don't open the door. Promise me—
He opened it.
A shadow filled the doorway.
Its eyes like black water.
Its voice echoing inside his skull—
You see me.
You always have.
He stumbled back, clutching his head.
Varin's voice echoed distantly: "His Manifestation is reacting—!"
Ashara grabbed his arms. "Eiryn, focus on my voice!"
But he was sinking too fast—
The shadow leaned down, whispering into his child self's ear—
You are mine.
—
A hand slapped him.
Hard.
He gasped, jolting back into the room.
Ashara's face was inches from his. "Stay with me!"
Varin checked the monitors. "The Vein spike is rising—they'll find him!"
Eiryn blinked through tears. "I… saw it again. The shadow. The one from my house."
Varin nodded grimly. "Your first Manifestation. The forbidden one. The one the cult wants."
Ashara moved in front of him. "Eiryn. They didn't just take Riven."
His heart froze.
"What… what do you mean?"
"They took him," she said quietly, "to lure you. Because they believe you're the only one who can open the Primary Vein."
The room vibrated.
The walls pulsed with dark light.
The Vein was calling for him.
Eiryn stepped back in horror. "No. No—please—this can't be happening—"
Ashara grabbed his face in both hands, forcing him to look at her.
"Listen to me."
Her voice was firm. Sharp. Unshakable.
"You are not their weapon."
"You are not their prophecy."
"You are not what they think you are."
"You decide what you become."
Eiryn's breath trembled.
Ashara's grip softened. "And right now… you decide whether Riven lives or dies."
The monitors began flashing warning signals.
Varin shouted: "THE VEIN IS OPENING!"
A crack split the floor.
Black light surged upward.
Whispers filled the air.
Eiryn's eyes widened.
Riven's voice echoed faintly from the darkness:
"Eiryn… run…"
He didn't run.
He stepped forward.
Toward the opening Vein.
Toward the darkness.
Toward Riven.
His Manifestation flared behind him—
THE PALE LANTERN.
But it wasn't soft this time.
It wasn't gentle.
It wasn't quiet.
It roared like a dying star.
The Vein responded, pulling him in.
Ashara shouted his name.
Varin screamed warnings.
But Eiryn only whispered:
"Hold on, Riven."
The floor shattered.
The world fell away.
And Eiryn plunged into the Vein, swallowed by the swirling abyss of memories, shadows, and forgotten truths—
Descending toward a place no human mind was meant to reach.
Descending toward the Hollow Below.
Descending toward Riven.
Descending toward the truth—
Of who he really was.
And what he was meant to unleash.