The entrance to the Ashen Crypt gaped like a wound on the hillside. It exhaled a chill that smelled of things best left buried—damp earth, regret, and the slow decay of forgotten vows.
It was the sort of dramatic entryway that screamed adventure for some wide-eyed Neophyte. For Zane, it just screamed tedious.
He yawned.
"This is an E-rank undertaking," Elara Valerius announced. Her voice, usually a crystalline melody, was filed to a sharp edge.
She stood silhouetted against the dying sun, a perfect statue of silver armor and righteous indignation.
"The cleansing of the Ash Rebellion's lingering taint. A simple matter. Your presence," she paused, her gaze sweeping over his frayed tunic and the rust-kissed hilt of his sword, "is a complication I did not request."
Zane ran a thumb over the cheap iron. It felt coarse, unreliable. Perfect.
"They pay by the hour, Herald."
A flicker of something—annoyance? disbelief?—crossed her features before being smoothed away into flawless composure. A true product of The Sanctum.
She was an A-rank Ascendant, a rising star, shackled to a man the System had unceremoniously branded with the mark of failure. He could almost feel the phantom weight of her [Aegis of Judgment] probing him, searching for a spark of power, and finding only cold ash.
Predictable.
AURA's voice, a seamless whisper of logic in the chaos of his mind, delivered its report. [Analysis: Necrotic saturation exceeds Sanctum archives by 127%. Standard Light-based consecration will be... inefficient.]
Inefficient. Zane almost smiled.
*Now that's a polite word for it.*
He stepped past her into the maw of the crypt. "Well, don't let me hold you up. Lead the way."
Inside, darkness swallowed the light. The narrow passage felt tight, claustrophobic.
Faded markings covered the damp stone walls. They weren't runes of power, but something far more potent: stories. Crude, desperate carvings of figures breaking chains, raising fists against armored titans.
This place wasn't a dungeon. It was a gravestone for a revolution, a joke carved in stone.
The whispers started then. Not wind, but a sound woven from pure resentment.
"Steady," Elara commanded, more to herself than to him.
A globe of pure, unwavering light bloomed in her palm, pushing back the oppressive dark.
"Ash-Wraiths. Souls anchored by the weight of their own rage."
As if summoned by her words, three smudges of darkness tore themselves from the walls. They were vaguely human, things of smoke and fury, their only solid features the burning embers of their eyes.
Elara didn't hesitate. "Holy Purge!"
A lance of brilliance struck one Wraith. It convulsed, its form dissolving like smoke in the wind. Yet, it didn't vanish. It simply thinned, recoiling into the shadows, diminished but infuriatingly intact.
"Impossible," she breathed.
Her power was the hammer meant to shatter such darkness.
Zane, for his part, put on a masterclass in incompetence. He lunged, his footing "slipping" on a patch of damp moss. His sword, swung with all the grace of a falling tree, passed harmlessly through a Wraith's smoky shoulder.
"Stand down, fool!" Elara snapped. Her light flared as she prepared another spell.
But his stumble wasn't a misstep. It was a calculation. The heel of his boot had ground against a specific flagstone, one bearing the nearly erased sigil of a forgotten house—the very house that had led this doomed rebellion.
A tremor, quieter than a heartbeat, pulsed through the floor. It wasn't magic. It was memory. For a fraction of a second, the ancient, binding oath that chained these souls to their prison wavered.
The Wraiths froze, their forms flickering like faulty illusions.
It was all the opening Elara needed.
"Sacred Judgment!"
This time, the light was absolute. This time, there was nothing left but settling dust.
She turned to him, her breathing controlled, but her eyes held a storm of confusion.
"Your clumsiness... was fortunate."
Zane offered a weak smile, leaning against the wall for effect. "My one true talent."
They moved deeper. The air grew heavier, thick with the ghosts of battle cries.
Elara found her eyes drawn to the details now—a shattered shield here, a tattered banner there. The dry facts of her history lessons were being rewritten before her eyes with the ink of tragedy.
They emerged into a vast cavern. In its center, a larger, more defined figure was coalescing from the shadows. It wore the phantom impression of plate armor and clutched a greatsword of pure night.
AURA's analysis was swift. [Commander-class Echo identified. It serves as the anchor for all remaining entities. Logic dictates severing the anchor is paramount to mission success.]
"Their chieftain," Elara stated, her voice tight. "Its presence corrupts this place. Stay back. This is a battle you cannot fight."
She became a comet of silver and gold, charging forward.
Zane, however, did not retreat. He meandered along the chamber's edge, his gaze tracing the narrative carved into the walls.
*He wasn't looking for a weakness. He was looking for the punchline.*
Light and dark crashed together in a symphony of violence. Elara was magnificent, a storm of righteous power. But for every blow she landed, the crypt itself seemed to breathe life back into the Chieftain's Echo.
"Betrayal..." the Echo's voice was a gravelly chorus of a hundred dying screams, "...must be answered..."
Just as Elara's light began to dim, Zane spoke. His voice was calm, almost conversational, yet it cut through the din of battle.
"Your oath wasn't to vengeance. It was to protection. You swore to shield the bloodline of House Valerius."
The Chieftain froze mid-swing. Its burning eyes swiveled to Zane. Even Elara faltered, her head whipping around.
Zane gestured with his chin to a section of wall he'd "accidentally" brushed against, clearing away the grime. The carving beneath showed a knight, kneeling, pledging his sword to a woman. A woman wearing the unmistakable crest of House Valerius.
*Elara's house.*
"The Sanctum's history is... edited," Zane said softly. "They weren't rebels. They were a vanguard, sold out by the very lord they swore to protect in exchange for a seat at the victor's table."
The color drained from Elara's face. "Heresy."
But the Chieftain's Echo was shuddering, its form flickering violently.
An ancient loyalty was at war with an equally ancient rage. The dark power holding it together became its undoing.
"Now would be a good time, Herald," Zane called out, a hint of theatrical urgency in his tone.
Shaken but not broken, Elara reacted. She gathered the last of her reserves, not for an attack, but for something else entirely.
"Sacred... Absolution."
The light that bloomed was not a weapon. It was a release.
It washed over the tormented spirit. The rage, the hate, the centuries of pain—it all melted away, leaving only the translucent figure of a proud knight.
He gave Zane a solemn, grateful nod, and then he was gone.
Silence. Utter and complete.
The mission complete notification chimed in Elara's vision.
*An irrelevant distraction.*
She turned to Zane, who was casually trying to get a smudge of grime off his tunic.
"How?" Her voice was barely a whisper. "That truth... it is a secret locked in the deepest vaults of The Sanctum. No one should know."
Zane looked up from his task, meeting her gaze. For the first time, she saw past the F-rank facade, past the lazy smile.
She saw something ancient, something tired, and something terrifyingly intelligent.
He gave her a lopsided grin.
"I read a lot. Must have been my lucky day."