Corvis Eralith
The oppressive silence of the dungeon's lower chamber was broken only by the rhythmic scrape-scrape of my mana-infused pickaxe against the vein of shimmering mineral in front of me.
Each chip of the cerulean mineral, crucial for stabilizing the mana-conductive matrix of the future Barbarossa's blade, vanished into the depths of my storage ring.
Sweat stung my eyes despite the cool, damp air. Months of this—descending into these lightless, beast-infested guts of the world, scavenging, hiding. The weight wasn't just the kilograms of ore accumulating; it was the isolation, the constant, gnawing awareness of the price on my head. A prince turned quarry, mining the bones of the earth to forge a weapon for a war that wasn't even started.
Scrape. Another chunk. Berna, a silent, shaggy monolith beside me, shifted her massive head, ears twitching. A low, almost imperceptible rumble vibrated in her chest. My own senses, honed by paranoia and Beyond the Meta, flared an instant later.
Movement. Approaching. Subtle mana signatures vibrating through the stone floor, the faintest displacement of stale air. I froze, the pickaxe hovering mid-swing.
Romulos materialized beside Berna, a spectral smudge against the rough-hewn wall. "Seems we have company, Corvis," he murmured, his voice a dry whisper only I could hear. His spectral eyes gleamed with morbid curiosity. "Well? Are you going to kill them?" The question was casual, chilling.
Very fun, I shot back mentally, the sarcasm a brittle shield against the sudden surge of adrenaline. My mind raced, options flickering like dying embers: fight? Flee? Hide?
This dungeon had been picked by me precisely because it was recently raided and still awaited its reset, stripped of obvious valuables, a ghost town for adventurers. Yet, here they came. Five distinct mana signatures bloomed in my sight thanks to Beyond the Meta like colourful stars in the grey void of the dungeon.
Three pulsed with the swift, cutting clarity of wind; one resonated with the deep, grounding thrum of earth; the last… neutral, controlled, like still water without any precise elemental affinity. No immediate aggression, but caution was a luxury I couldn't afford. Disguise. It was the safest gamble.
They might know Prince Corvis Eralith's face from wanted posters, but a boy with a giant bear? That might just be strange enough to overlook.
I triggered Against the Tragedy. Mana surged through the uniform's fabric, weaving a complex, shimmering aura around me – the illusion of a functional core, a low-level solid red perhaps, unremarkable, but present. Hiding the corelessness was paramount. Simultaneously, Beyond the Meta sharpened the world into stark greyscale mana-flow.
The approaching signatures resolved: five figures, moving with cautious purpose, not hunting stealth. Relief warred with tension. They weren't specifically here for me. Probably, hopefully.
Then Romulos chuckled, a dry, rasping sound. "Oh, look who we have here." Recognition sparked in his tone.
The first figures rounded the bend in the tunnel, torchlight casting long, dancing shadows. Leading, scanning the chamber with sharp eyes, was Adam Krensh, his posture tense, hand resting on the hilt of his spear. Beside him, solid and dependable, Durden Walker stood as the tank of the party like usual. Behind them, moving with lethal grace, Jasmine Flamesworth's keen gaze swept the chamber, landing instantly on Berna. Angela Rose, ever watchful, flanked Helen Shard, whose calm authority seemed to radiate even in the dim light.
The Twin Horns.
You knew them? I mentally hissed at Romulos.
He shrugged, a fluid, dismissive motion. "Art mentioned them. Annoyingly persistent. At least," he added, a ghost of a smirk playing on his lips, "they're not bounty hunters."
Berna didn't wait for my command. She took a single, deliberate step forward, placing her immense bulk squarely between me and the newcomers, her head lowered slightly, a deep, warning growl rumbling from her chest like distant thunder. Her green eyes, fixed on Adam, held no malice, only unwavering protectiveness.
Don't see him. See only me. That was probably what was happening in the Guardian Bear's mind.
"A bear?!" Adam's voice cracked with surprise, his spear pointed in front of him. The torchlight glinted off the steel. "Is this type of mana beast supposed to be here?" He looked wildly at Helen, his knuckles white on his hilt. The unexpected presence of a creature so large, so seemingly mundane yet utterly out of place in this dungeon context, clearly rattled him.
"Adam, calm down," Helen's voice cut through the tension, firm and steady. Her eyes, however, never left Berna, assessing the massive Guardian Bear with a veteran's calm calculation. "It doesn't seem aggressive. Or at least… not yet." Her gaze flickered past Berna, trying to pierce the gloom where I stood, partially shielded.
"Are you going to hide behind your bear for long, Corvis?" Romulos whispered, amusement lacing his tone. "This is getting delightfully awkward."
Adam wasn't dissuaded. Suspicion hardened his features. "Isn't it a bit suspicious? A giant bear, just… here? Maybe this is the beast that took out the team we're looking for!" He gestured emphatically with his torch, casting frantic shadows. "They vanished scouting this sector!"
Rescue mission? The realization clicked with a sickening finality. My tongue pressed against the roof of my mouth, a bitter taste flooding it. Of course. I'd chosen a supposedly safe, picked-over dungeon. But safe for miners didn't mean safe for scouts.
People were missing.
And here I stood, a fugitive prince with a massive, inexplicable bear, in the exact location of their disappearance. Suspicion wasn't just likely; it was inevitable.
Romulos materialized closer, leaning insouciantly against a jagged outcrop of rock near me. "I guess," he murmured, his voice dripping with dark amusement, "that's just your luck."
His spectral form seemed to drink in the palpable tension—Helen's steady scrutiny, Adam's jumpy fear, Jasmine's sharp, analytical eyes darting between Berna and the shadow where I stood, Angela's watchful stillness, Durden's grounded readiness.
My heart hammered against my ribs, a frantic counterpoint to Berna's deep, protective growl. The fragile disguise felt paper-thin. The minerals in my ring felt suddenly heavy, a symbol of a project that might end before it truly began, buried deep in the Beast Glades alongside my freedom. The air crackled, thick with unspoken questions and the terrifying potential for violence born of misunderstanding.
Stepping out from Berna's immense, protective shadow felt like shedding armor. The high collar of my uniform scraped against my jaw as I tilted my head down, hiding as much of my face as possible hoping they wouldn't recognise me. Berna rumbled a low protest, a vibration I felt through the stone floor.
"Berna hasn't hurt anyone," I stated, forcing my voice steady, aiming it past Adam's drawn spear towards Helen's calmer gaze.
Durden's deep, grounding voice cut through the lingering tension. "Excuse Adam. He tends to wear his nerves on the outside." He offered a small, reassuring nod, his eyes—weathered but kind—sweeping over my youthful frame and the towering bear.
"Are you an adventurer sent down here too? That's one hell of a bond you've got." His tone held genuine respect, tinged with a veteran's recognition of a powerful connection. My age was impossible to hide completely, but perhaps its vulnerability could be a shield.
Jasmine Flamesworth's sharp, assessing eyes watched me, a silent reminder that youth hadn't barred her own path into danger—she wasn't much older than me when she joined the Twin Horns if I wasn't wrong.
Adam flushed, the torchlight revealing his embarrassment as Angela pinched his cheek with playful, yet pointed, reproach. Helen stepped forward, her leader's calm radiating like a ward.
"Apologies for startling you and your companion," she said, her voice firm but not unkind. "We're searching for a party that vanished scouting this sector two days ago. Have you seen any sign of them? Or anything… unusual?"
I shifted my weight, the grit grinding under my boot. "Ehm... I was just here collecting minerals," I admitted, gesturing vaguely towards the pickaxe still lying near the mineral vein. My voice sounded too young, too thin in the cavernous space. "I chose this spot because... well, I thought it'd be empty."
Adam, still red-faced but regaining some composure, frowned. "This is no place for kids," he said sternly, his earlier suspicion replaced by gruff concern. "You and your bear should head back up. Now." The paternal warning, however misplaced, held a sliver of unexpected warmth.
I opened my mouth, perhaps to argue, perhaps to agree and flee before I was recognised—but the words died before they formed.
The tremor wasn't loud. It was a deep, visceral thrum that shuddered up through the soles of my boots, rattling loose pebbles on the cavern floor. Berna's growl instantly deepened into a savage snarl, hackles rising like spines. Instinct screamed and Beyond the Meta snapped into action.
The world didn't turn grey; it screamed. The comforting structure of ambient mana vanished, drowned by a sickening, invasive tide. Dozens—hundreds—of corrupted mana signatures erupted onto my senses. Not from the tunnels the Twin Horns used.
They bloomed like cancerous flowers within the solid rock walls themselves, seething masses of vile purple energy twisting and clawing their way towards the chamber. It wasn't beasts in the walls. It was the walls becoming beasts.
Cold terror washed over me, sharper than any dungeon chill. My voice ripped from my throat, raw and desperate, shattering the stunned silence: "BRACE YOURSELVES!" I whirled, pointing a shaking finger not at the entrance, but at the seemingly solid rock surrounding us.
"THEY'RE COMING FROM THE WALLS!" The sheer, impossible horror of it echoed in the widening eyes of the Twin Horns as the first cracks, glowing with that same sickly purple light, began to spiderweb across the chamber's stone skin.
The world dissolved into a cacophony of snarls, shattering stone, and desperate shouts. My warning cry was swallowed by Berna's earth-shaking roar and the horrifying crunch as sections of the dungeon wall and ceiling collapsed inward, disgorging a tidal wave of corrupted mana beasts—gnolls.
Their eyes burned with sickly purple light, their matted fur slick with unnatural ichor, and their hyena-like laughs were a maddening chorus of pure malice.
I drew my dagger, its familiar weight cold comfort. Against the Tragedy hummed against the skin of my forearm, a thin shield of reinforced mana flowing through my uniform, the only barrier between me and rending claws. Beyond the Meta painted the chaos in stark, terrifying greyscale. Dozens of those pulsing purple signatures surged, a seething tide obscuring the Twin Horns, filling the newly enlarged cavern with writhing, snapping death.
"The situation is pretty dire, Corvis!" Romulos' voice sliced through the mental din, disembodied and unnervingly calm. "You need a trick up your sleeve, or this is your tomb!"
Fuck you, Romulos! The thought was pure, desperate venom. Berna was a whirlwind of destruction beside me, massive paws sheathed in conjured rock slamming down, crushing gnoll skulls like rotten fruit. Her earth magic surged, raising jagged walls of stone to shield our flanks, but the gnolls flowed around them like a fetid river.
She was power incarnate, an Asuran relic weathering a storm. But I was chaff. Without a core, without a true bond with her, I was just… me. A liability she couldn't fully shield.
A weight.
Explosions of wind magic erupted somewhere in the chaos—the Twin Horns fighting for their lives. The air crackled with spent mana, thick with the coppery tang of blood and the cloying stench of corruption.
Two gnolls broke through Berna's defensive sweep. Claws raked across my forearm, tearing fabric and flesh. Fangs snapped near my throat. I twisted, Falling Down activating with a sharp slap of my palm against a gnoll's flank. The localized gravity well yanked it off balance, its lunge becoming a stumble.
Berna's following paw turned its chest to pulp. But the other gnoll's claws found my thigh. White-hot agony lanced through me. Warm blood soaked my pants leg, slick and terrifying. Another glancing blow scraped my ribs. Each wound was a sapping drain, stealing strength, clouding focus. My vision swam at the edges.
Berna's furious roar, vibrating the very air, was the only thing anchoring me to consciousness. The blood loss was a cold tide rising. These weren't bandits or low-tier beasts; their corrupted strength was monstrous, their numbers endless. I was drowning.
"Corvis!" Romulos shouted, an edge of something almost like panic in his voice. "Keep fighting!"
Hearing encouragement from you... is profoundly unsettling, I managed to think, the mental words thick with strain.
I drove my dagger upwards, guided by Beyond the Meta, finding the precise, flickering weak point in the gnoll's mana-reinforced hide. It pierced deep, the beast collapsing with a gurgle.
Beside me, Berna slammed two gnolls together, her rock-armored arms meeting corrupted bone with a sickening crunch. Blood and gore sprayed. I spat crimson onto the churned stone, my grip on the dagger slick with my own blood and sweat. My legs trembled.
"Berna! To the Twin Horns!" I gasped the command. The Guardian Bear became a living battering ram, ploughing through the gnoll tide, her immense strength carving a path of shattered bodies. We surged towards the flashes of wind magic.
The Twin Horns held a desperate diamond formation. Durden, a bulwark of stone and hammer, smashed gnolls aside. Adam's spear was a blur, deflecting claws and finding throats. Jasmine danced between them, twin daggers a lethal silver whirlwind, protecting Angela and Helen. Angela summoned gales to buffet attackers and guide Helen's arrows—arrows that found eyes, throats, and hearts with terrifying precision.
They held, but the strain was etched on their faces. Sweat poured, breath came in ragged gasps. Their mana signatures, flaring brightly moments ago, were noticeably dimmer, flickering under the relentless assault. They were tiring. Running dry of mana.
I leapt from Berna's back, landing heavily on a gnoll lunging for Jasmine. My left hand slammed onto its head. Falling Down. It slammed face-first into the rock with bone-breaking force. Jasmine's dagger flashed, silencing its choked snarl. "Thanks," she breathed, her voice tight but steady, a flicker of surprise in her eyes before she spun back into the fray.
"That bought seconds, not salvation," Romulos observed, his spectral form flickering near my shoulder, visible only to me. "The tide doesn't seem to diminish. You need more than tricks."
I didn't need his running commentary. It was horrifyingly clear. Berna roared, shattering another muzzle. Adam skewered a leg. Angela's wind gust amplified Helen's arrow into a lethal lance piercing three gnolls. Durden's rock shield deflected a crushing blow meant for Angela. Jasmine gutted a beast that slipped past Durden.
But every block, every dodge, every spell cast was a precious drop of energy spent. They were slowing. The diamond formation was buckling under the sheer pressure.
A flash of black fur, a stench of decay. A gnoll's claw, dripping ichor, was inches from my face, tearing through the air faster than I could react. My body, weakened, bloodied, couldn't move. Time slowed as I saw the claw reaching my face.
Then, Adam's spear shaft cracked across the beast's skull, deflecting the blow. Helen's arrow punched through its eye socket a split-second later. It fell twitching at my feet.
"Kid! Stay back!" Adam roared, shoving me roughly behind him with his free arm. "I told you this is no place for a child!" His voice held fear, not malice. Fear for me.
The words were a hammer blow. He was right. In raw power, I was a child against this tide. The dizziness surged, the world tilting. Blood soaked my thigh, my side burned, my limbs felt like lead. Against the Tragedy's hum was a strained whine. I could refuel them.
Draw on Sylvia's core, channel vast mana into their cores. But that was a stopgap. It bought time, not victory. It painted a giant target on my back for whatever controlled this corruption.
Retreat? Use Berna as a battering ram once more? Impossible. We would never get them all out through the gnoll-infested tunnels. One stumble, one break in formation, and they would be torn apart. The Twin Horns would die protecting me. Because I wasn't strong enough.
Think, Corvis! THINK! The command screamed in my mind, battling the rising tide of pain and despair. Every avenue led to death. Theirs. Mine. Berna's.
"I have an idea." Romulos's voice cut through the panic, low and chillingly devoid of his usual mockery. "But you won't like it. Like, at all."
WHAT?! The mental shout was pure, unfiltered desperation. Tell me! Now!
"Yield. Yield to my will."
Fuck you, Romulos! This isn't the time for your twisted games! Another gnoll lunged. I parried its fangs with the dagger, the impact jarring my wounded arm. Berna snatched it and hurled it shrieking into the mass.
"I am deathly serious," Romulos hissed, his spectral form seeming to solidify in my perception, eyes burning with an intensity I had never seen. "I will purge these abominations. I will use Mother's core, channeled through your Ineptrunes to bridge the gap your corelessness creates. I will wield the power Fate gave me."
What power?! I don't have anything strong enough! It doesn't matter—
"Anti-Matter, I already told you." The word slammed into my consciousness, heavy with finality. "Fate bestowed it upon me, just as they gave you Meta-awareness. The vessel doesn't matter. Asuran flesh or lesser bone, I can wield it. Through you. But it will cost you, Corvis. It will tear at you."
The implications were a cold knife in the gut. The best case? My body, already ravaged, pushed beyond its limits, crippled. Against the Tragedy failing catastrophically again, but this time leaving me a broken shell. The worst? Romulos wouldn't relinquish control. He would wear my skin like a trophy. The fear was primal, suffocating.
"That's why I haven't taken it before," he admitted, a sliver of something almost like honesty in his tone. "I need your consent. Without it, the connection is… inexistent. And without your Meta-awareness... controlling you is a waste."
Could I trust him? Trust the entity that was Agrona's son, Kezess's grandson, who saw me as a curiosity, a path to his own ends? The thought made my soul recoil.
But near me, Adam grunted as a gnoll's claw scraped his armored shoulder. Jasmine hissed as a near-miss tore her sleeve. Durden's rock shield cracked. Angela's wind faltered. Helen's next arrow flew true, but her quiver wasn't infinite. Berna roared again, a sound of fury edged with the strain of protecting too much. The purple tide pressed closer.
The alternative wasn't trust. The alternative was watching them die. Then Berna die. Then me. A slaughter born of my weakness.
The blood loss made the edges of my vision darken. The pain was a constant throb. The gnolls' laughter was a maddening dirge. Romulos's presence was a cold pressure against my mind, waiting.
There was no good choice. Only survival. Or annihilation.
A final, desperate look at the Twin Horns fighting for their lives, at Berna straining against the tide, at the sea of purple death. The weight of their potential deaths crushed the last resistance.
My voice, when it came, was a raw whisper, lost in the din, but Romulos heard it. The agreement spoken not to him, but to the abyss opening before me.
"Fine. I accept."