Something started humming in the air. Not a tune or melody, more like a fever bubbling behind your ears. Wet and crooked, like an organ left out where it rots. The moss along the walls curled in on itself, growing pale and shriveling from what it heard. Even those dull, glow-faint plants hanging overhead wilted away as if they wanted to whisper, "Too much." The stones around us began to sweat an oily yellow juice, thick enough to make our boots slide, pools gathering over the grooves between slabs. It felt like the place was clearing its throat, getting ready to tell us something ugly.
A shape crawled out of the darkness. It didn't walk. Not even shuffle. It kind of climbed out, limbs bent at wrong angles, like someone hollowed out a puppet of wax and propped it upright. Shreds of ceremonial robes stuck to its arms, limp and soaked, drifting in the air with the weight of old sorrow. Its skin looked tight, waxy, like stretched plastic waiting to snap. And then there was the face. No real face. Just a liquid surface, a mirror in motion, swirling with reflections that weren't ours. A kid's laughter twisted by fear, an echo of the last gasp someone took, a shattered crown left behind in dust. That mirror wasn't showing itself. It was showing us our own ghosts.
Then we heard the voice. Not voice as in audible, more like a presence sliding inside your skull. You will suffer unformed. Welcome.
At that, the walls seemed to clench, bending toward us like ribs collapsing. The air got heavy and pulled tight. I felt my spine knot. And then everything jerked loose. Like we'd been camping on a ship's deck during a storm and the whole world snapped sideways.
The creature lunged. Not at us, but at the shape of reality itself. The corridor buckled, ceiling tiles cracked and clattered like sugar glass, then snapped shut again before we could say what happened. A spiral staircase blossomed out of the floor then disintegrated into a swarm of pale moths that tumbled into oblivion. Red sigils flared on the walls, sticky and raw like open wounds that hadn't learned to bleed yet.
Dax didn't hesitate. He swung his fists, roaring with something deeper than intent, more like grief or hatred. But the thing bent space around his punch—like he punched at air and the air squashed his knuckles before he even connected. Something shoved his guts through his spine. He went down with a sound I'll never forget. Half-cried, half-groaned.
Ezreal dove beside Dax and called out, "Don't punch it like it's got honor or bones. Anchor it! Pin it!" His voice edged with panic, but his hands glowed violet. He slammed both palms on the floor and unleashed a rough dome of shield energy. It shimmered, wavered, but stayed in place. Just barely.
The Graveborn writhed. It had mouths all over its torso, jagged with teeth, ropes of flesh draped around. They snapped like they were chewing on memories, on nothing. Those empty maws spat things we'd each said in nightmares. Someone forgot me, someone broke me, someone said you will sing. Each voice came forward, carried by the cracks in our shields like steam off a kettle.
Caylen pressed his hand to the barrier, his lute strapped behind his shoulder, and muttered, "It's pumping from that pit." He pointed at a sunken hole in the ground, runed around with unfamiliar lines, ancient and deep. The pit's rim breath expanded, sucked air in, flexed like a wound trying to close. "Look—its chest pulses as if it chews on whatever's down there."
I figured out what he meant. The pit wasn't feeding it. Not really. It was a wound the creature was gnawing at to remember what it was, to anchor itself.
Then Thimblewick growled against the back of my neck. He bristled and locked his gaze on the thing. I felt his tension catch in my gut. Threads of magic around us felt frayed, wool pulled apart mid-weaving.
Dax was already stepping forward, plastered forehead and hands bleeding but determined. "Distraction. Give me a damn line." The old muscle memory hit me—I should have caught him. I didn't. He shoved through the shield like it didn't exist.
He pulled that hammer loose, the head glowing like a dying star. As soon as he passed the barrier, the screams hit him. Now, they weren't just noises—they were knives. He didn't freeze.
He dropped the hammer into the ground. The shockwave roared out, raw and ragged. The creature bucked with so many mouths it looked like it could choke on itself. One of the tendrils shot toward Dax. He ducked, rolled, came back with the hammer smashing into its ribs. Black ichor spat across the stones. That stick-slow gut-churn stuff pooled beneath his feet.
"Now!" he yelled, voice snapping.
I dropped the shield. Ezreal sparked more sigils, twisting the air around into tighter shapes. The entire floor pitched up, then shrieked. Chains erupted out of the broken stone, living shadow chains, wrapping around the creature's limbs. It screamed in ways no mouth, no mind, no body should scream. The chains rattled as the mouths chewed them like rotten fruit.
Caylen didn't wait. He stepped up, fingers flying on the lute. He didn't strum a note exactly. He tore one out—like a wound in song, a crack in the sky.
The Graveborn jerked. It twitched as if startled. For a breath it froze, caught between screams. One of its limbs twitched, then paused.
"Its name," I said through clenched teeth. "We need to give it a name. A name it can't spit back at us."
Ezreal's face was hard, cold. "Then say it."
I stepped forward. Blood welled from fingertips, dripped hot and slow, painting the air with acrid red threads. Runes behind me spun in bloodlight. I could taste the magic on my tongue, metallic and sour, but I held on.
"You were sorrow," I started, my voice low and shaky, but every word found weight. "You were thrown away. You were a song that lost its singer."
Then I held out my hand. A blade bloomed in the air, thin and sharp and silent. No sheen or glow—but it shimmered on the edge of light, like moonlight trapped under glass.
"I name you Dirgehusk."
The creature's screech tore through the monument. Not from agony—but from rage and rejection. It curled into itself. The runes in its chest flared bright. Then the pit erupted. It vomited up flame and memory.
The ground under us split open like rotten fruit. The pit snapped shut after it swallowed Dirgehusk. The walls collapsed inward. Even memories peeled like wet wallpaper. Ezreal slammed up another shield. I lunged to catch Caylen before he dove in after the creature.
Then the chamber shook. I thought we were done for—
—and then the rift slammed shut.
Rubble. A witch's hum of wrong magic. Silence thicker than stone.
Caylen dropped to his knees, body shaking. He whispered, "He was right there. I saw him…"
Ezreal backed off, trembling. "He's not gone," I said, voice thin. "Not yet."
His eyes found me, burning with panic and hope. "Where is he?"
I peered into the empty pit, saw where the darkness pooled. "Somewhere older than death."
Silence pressed against us like damp cloth. Caylen wrapped his arms around himself, face pinched. "He went in alone."
Ezreal pressed a hand to his chest. "He always does."
Thimblewick chirped, alert, nodded his little head toward the corridor behind us. Something moved.
The catacombs exhaled. Magic that had rattled like a live wire faded back to an echo.
"He disturbed it," I said. "Or worse… woke it."
Ezreal asked low, "Woke what?"
I didn't have a word. There wasn't one.
Then a laugh rang out. Quiet, small, off in the stone. A child's giggle, wrong and wet, as if mold had learned how to speak.
"One fell… Three remain."
Thimblewick hissed. I felt the good pity us soften away, leaving tension in its place.
Ezreal reached a hand for magic. Nothing came.
The giggle slipped away like smoke.
I stared down the tunnel. Darkness pooled at the edges, teeth showing.
"It's hunting," I said flat, "Not Dirgehusk. Something else. Something it woke by breaking that pit."
Ezreal's throat clicked. "Then what the hell was Dirgehusk?"
I met his gaze. The weight in my gut sat heavy. "A herald."
We turned and kept walking. Quiet. Bruised. Half-knowing that time didn't own us here anymore. That light didn't mean safety. The corridor bent, walls whispering names we couldn't speak.
But we moved forward.
The catacombs kept letting us in.
The air thickened again. Not a breeze. More like centuries breathing on us. Sea-salt and metal, rot with deep roots we couldn't see. Every breath tasted like secrets around dinner.
Stairs dipped deeper. Stone slick as if soaked in sweat, or sweat made from older things. Runes lined the walls but mostly crumbled. No torches here. Just pale green lichen glowing as if clinging to life after surrender.
It wasn't light shining. It was stone breathing.
Ezreal leaned low, voice soft. "This is still magic… old, aware magic. It sees us."
He held up his hand—then lowered it. Even his infernal-marked eyes looked tired.
Thimblewick perched quiet. Nothing moved.
Dax's absence was a ghost in the tunnel. Pressure where he should have been. A memory kicked inside us.
"We keep moving," I said, voice rough. My throat was thick, but I forced it out.
We passed under a broken archway. I paused, fingertips on the runic stones. They were crooked Draconic but disturbingly older. Corrupted.
"They are not warnings," I said. My voice echoed. "They are prayers."
Ezreal whispered so low I could almost miss it. "What do they say?"
Ash stung at my tongue. "We caged it with names, and then forgot them. We earned what's coming."
Caylen snorted—more bitter than humor. "Lovely. Let's walk right toward it."
The hall twisted, veins wrapping inside each other, labyrinth fake. Alien green vines bent at walls, blue stalks that hissed, fungus like spiderwebs that twitched when we breathed. Every shadow breathed too slow, too wide. Not alive. Not dead. Just waiting.
Time started losing its shape. Took left turns when we thought we were walking straight.
The idea of surface felt farther away than ever.
We kept stepping forward.
We had no choice.
The corridor ended, but only to open into more places that didn't belong. Magic still pulsed in walls, lichen glowed on ceilings like alien constellations, and the corridors didn't feel built. They felt grown, as if we'd traveled into a memory made physical, not carved.
Behind us our footsteps echoed too long, like our own thoughts trailing behind. We didn't speak. No one asked for facts or comfort. We just moved deeper.
In this place words felt like trespasses, but not saying anything felt like losing pieces of yourself.
Yet we pressed on.
The surface didn't call. Not here. Not anymore.
We walked into the dark with our wounds and our hope.
Because there was nowhere else to go.
That moment broke something inside us. Not a revelation. Just a knowing that this place would stop at nothing until it found what it wanted. It had already found Dirgehusk, but what else was waiting? We couldn't sober ourselves from that question.
So we went on. Deeper in. Step by step. In a tunnel that breathed. A memory that held its breath.
And maybe the day would come when we'd look back at this and call it the beginning.
Or call it the end.