Nihil didn't return the way he came.
He couldn't.
The moment he carved his name into the black stone, the chamber behind him, along with the masked figures, vanished like smoke in wind. One blink, and they were gone. As if they'd never existed.
Only the name remained.
Burned into his skin now, invisible to the eye, but he could feel it under his bones.
Not a tattoo. Not a mark. A truth. Etched into the echo of his existence.
He walked forward.
The stone corridor twisted like a serpent, deeper into the buried marrow of the world.
Hours passed. Maybe days.
Time here bent. Broke.
His hunger faded. His thirst dimmed.
Not because he no longer needed them,
But because something else had begun to feed him.
The Echo.
The Whisper of Ash.
At first, it was a flicker, like an itch behind the ear, or a sound he couldn't quite hear.
Then, one moment while walking, the world… blinked.
Silence.
Total and absolute.
The drip of water, the rustle of air, the hum of the old world, all vanished.
He stopped mid-step, breath caught in his chest. Not fear.
Awareness.
His heartbeat made no sound.
He tapped his foot.
Nothing.
And then, it returned. The sounds of the tunnel rushing back like water through a broken dam.
He stood there for a long time.
And then he whispered to no one, "So that's what it is."
He climbed.
The passage ended at a hatch, a rusted door at an angle, half buried in stone.
He pushed it open.
And for the first time in months, maybe years…
He saw the Surface.
Not the sun. That was long dead. The sky above was covered in a dome of flickering, cracked glass. Clouds of smoke drifted through broken towers. Machines groaned in the wind, lifeless but twitching with old power.
He was in a forgotten quarter of the upper city, one of the Wastes. No guards. No nobles. Just dust, machines, and ghosts of a world that no longer ruled.
He stepped into the street.
It smelled of rust, oil, and the faint sting of ancient fire.
But he was not alone.
Voices.
Down the avenue, a group of three moved silently. They wore coats of fine grey silk, scouts from a noble house.
Armed.
They hadn't seen him yet.
But he saw them.
And more importantly, he saw what they were dragging.
A boy. Shackled. Bleeding. Barely older than Nihil had been when he lost Lira.
He froze.
Old memories stirred.
Warm hands. Whispered promises.
Her voice, no, gone. He couldn't remember her voice anymore.
Only the weight of betrayal.
He moved without thought.
Closed the distance quietly.
Stepped into an alley as they passed.
Then,
Silence.
The Echo wrapped the world in a cold hush.
His footsteps vanished.
Their breaths disappeared.
By the time the first scout turned, it was too late.
A broken pipe in Nihil's hand, stabbed through the throat.
The second didn't even scream.
Didn't hear his own bones break.
The third ran.
But silence still clung to the world.
And in the absence of sound, fear was louder than any scream.
When it ended, the boy still knelt on the ground, staring.
Nihil approached him.
Unshackled his wrists.
The boy whispered, "Who are you?"
Nihil said nothing.
He looked toward the cracked sky. Toward the ruined towers above.
Then back down at the boy.
"I'm no one."
"But I'm the reason you're not dead."
He walked away.
Not to be thanked.
Not to be remembered.
Just… to keep climbing.
Because one rescue didn't matter.
Not when a world of chains still waited to be broken.