Date: February 12, 542 years since the Fall of Zanra the Dishonored.
The dust raised by the fall of the colossal stalactite settled slowly, covering the ruins of the amphitheater in a grey shroud. In the ensuing silence, the sound of his own labored breathing seemed deafening to Kaedan. The young man lay on his back, unable to move even a finger. His Unbreakable Armor had completely dissipated, leaving behind only a phantom heaviness in his muscles and a burning pain in his chest.
Kaedan turned his head. A few meters away, the Chimera's legs protruded from under the rubble—lifeless obsidian blades, no longer a threat. The gigantic stone spike, summoned by Iskon's will, had sunk so deep into the earth it seemed like a new column supporting the vault.
"We survived..." the thought pulsed in Kaedan's head slowly and heavily. "But at what cost?"
The young man tried to sit up, and the world immediately swam before his eyes. His regeneration worked at its limit, extracting the last crumbs from his Vessel to mend his cracked ribs. He felt his inner power, which had become frighteningly dense during the expedition, now barely flickering, like an ember in a cooling hearth.
Olaf sat nearby, leaning against the remains of a column. His shield, split in two, lay beside him. The knight looked as if he had aged ten years in one hour: his face was grey, his gaze unfocused. "I am a Warrior of the Order," Olaf thought, looking at his trembling hands. "I've been through hundreds of skirmishes. But this... this wasn't a battle. This was a meat grinder. If it weren't for those two, Bert and I would just be stains on this floor."
Bert, whose left arm was tightly bandaged with strips of cloak, groaned softly, half-conscious. His fracture was complex, and even a Warrior's accelerated recovery couldn't handle such an injury instantly. He felt like a burden, and this thought burned him more than the wound.
Kaedan finally managed to rise to his knees and crawl over to Iskon. The leader of their small group lay motionless, his face deathly pale, and a dark crust of blood caked on his lips.
Iskon's sharp intake of breath made Kaedan flinch. The young man's eyes flew open, and for the first second, pure, untainted agony was reflected in them. Iskon tried to raise his hand, instinctively reaching for his sword, but only weakly scratched his fingers against the obsidian chips.
"Easy," Kaedan placed a hand on his shoulder. "It's over. The Guardian is dead."
Iskon stared at the ceiling for several minutes, restoring his breathing rhythm. His Scaling Spirit, which had performed the impossible, now echoed in every cell of his body with a burning, pulsing pain. The young man's joints felt as if they were filled with broken glass—the price for instantaneously changing the mass of a huge object was colossal.
"Fool... what a fool I am," Iskon closed his eyes, analyzing what had happened. "I nearly burned my Vessel to the ground. My energy was on the verge of annihilation."
Despite his physical weakness, his mind continued to work with cold calculation. He recalled every movement of the Chimera, its speed, and that incredible density with which it had spewed waves of force.
"That monster... it wasn't an ordinary Pillar," Iskon swallowed the blood pooled in his mouth with difficulty. "I've seen Pillars in the Order, I fought Tork. But this creature... it was at the peak of its rank. Its structure was perfect. If the Temple hadn't given me the chance to use the scale of the ceiling, we wouldn't have defeated it. This was an opponent at the Pillar level, above any veteran I knew. And we defeated it, being only Warriors."
This thought brought Iskon a strange, bitter satisfaction. He felt his Vessel, expanded to its limit during the final burst, beginning to slowly fill with new, even more refined power. It was a painful expansion, but it was necessary.
"We need to... move," Iskon rasped, trying to sit up.
"Rest first," Kaedan cut him off. "Bert can't walk, you can barely breathe. If we meet another such 'Pillar' in five minutes—we're dead."
Iskon wanted to object, but the weight of his own body convinced him better than any words. He felt Kaedan's energy, though depleted, still pulsing nearby, creating a zone of strange, stony calm. At that moment, Iskon realized for the first time that without this "slow wall," without this stubborn young man, his own sharp blade would have broken long ago.
"The Chimera..." Iskon looked at the pile of rubble. "There should be a core in its body. If we can extract it, it will cover all our costs. But for now... give me ten minutes."
The group fell silent in the shadow of the fallen stalactite. Four Warriors, battered and bloodied, sat amidst the ruins of ancient grandeur. They had overcome the first barrier of the Pyramid of Scales, and the price of this victory had forever changed them. Kaedan looked at his hands, feeling something new maturing under his skin. He knew their path to the Central Axis would cost even more, but now he believed their detachment was capable of bearing even the weight of the Temple itself.
Somewhere deep in the pyramid, a quiet, vibrating hum sounded—the Temple of True Equilibrium registered the death of its guardian and began to restructure the labyrinth.