The Fallow Depths didn't feel like a dungeon.
It felt like a scar—ripped open and festering beneath the skin of the world.
Kael, Lyra, and Drayke stood before the massive obsidian roots that coiled like petrified serpents toward the sky. Aura in the air trembled, responding to Kael's presence, his Ashen aura drawing whispers from the earth itself. Their relics thrummed—agitated. A warning.
"This place…" Lyra murmured. "It's alive."
"No. It's listening," Kael corrected, eyes narrowing. "Let's not disappoint it."
They stepped in.
Inside, the light changed. Not darker—just wrong. Colors bled into each other like they were melting, and the walls pulsed with faint heartbeats. The deeper they walked, the more fragmented time became. Sometimes footsteps echoed before they landed. Sometimes not at all.
Drayke clenched his fists. "I hate this place already."
"We're close to something ancient," Lyra whispered. "I can feel it gnawing at my aura."
Kael stopped. Ahead, the corridor split—twelve branching paths, all identical.
"Maze-type," Drayke muttered. "Classic Eternal mindgame."
Kael's aura flared. He closed his eyes.
Ash spiraled from his skin, threading through the paths like tendrils of instinct.
Then, with certainty, he pointed left. "This one."
Lyra blinked. "How do you know?"
"I don't," Kael replied. "But my aura does."
They pressed forward.
The hallway opened into a wide chamber, and what they saw wasn't a boss… but a memory.
Dozens of corpses lined the walls, frozen in combat poses. Adventurers. Guild leaders. Even one Vanguard officer. Their bodies were intact—but hollow. Like their auras had been ripped out.
And in the center, something stirred.
It wasn't a monster.
It was a mirror.
Kael approached slowly, the reflection shifting. His own face stared back—but older. Paler. A crown of black flame etched into his brow.
The Ashen God.
"Don't," Lyra warned.
But Kael touched it.
The mirror shattered—and the pieces flew into him.
FLASH
He was somewhere else.
The world burned around him. Ash rained from a dying sky. Titans roared in the distance—Eternals, locked in battle. And at the center of it all, Kael stood alone… no allies. No friends. Just the sword in his hand and corpses at his feet.
His own voice echoed from nowhere.
"Haaah… what a strong aura."
The vision ended.
Kael staggered back into the present, gasping. The chamber was quiet again.
"What did you see?" Drayke asked.
"A warning," Kael said softly. "Or a promise."
Elsewhere – Eternal Conclave
The monolith pulsed. The veiled Eternals stirred.
"He's entered the Depths," said the winged one.
"He saw the glimpse," added the masked one. "Good. The seed takes root."
"Then release the Herald," said the tallest.
At once, a rift opened.
And from it, a monster descended—not just powerful, but designed to counter Kael. Its aura was inverted ash, its limbs forged from Kael's stolen echoes. A dark mirror of his own soul.
Back in the Depths
The air turned cold. The chamber trembled.
Then came the footsteps.
Kael turned as the monster stepped through the far gate.
It looked like him. Moved like him.
But its eyes were empty.
"I am your undoing," it said in a voice warped by ten thousand screams.
Kael's aura flared. So did his blade.
"Then let's see if you're strong enough to break me."
Drayke cracked his neck. "Time to burn something."
Lyra raised her relic, wings of light spreading.
And Kael?
He smiled.
"Haaah… what a strong aura."