Iskander
The spiral door sighed open before me, not swinging, but unfolding like a petal yielding to an unseen breeze.
I stepped through, leaving the soft violet luminescence of the Shell Room behind. The transition was stark. Cool, sterile air from the nautilus chamber met a deeper, damper chill that carried the faint scent of ozone and something else… ancient dust, perhaps, or the metallic tang of long-dormant machinery. Who knows...
The light from behind me cast long, distorted shadows that stretched into the absolute blackness ahead, illuminating only the first few meters of what laid beyond.
What I found myself in was an intersection. Three corridors branched off, each constructed from the same seamless, pearlescent, shell-like material as the room I had just left.
The architecture felt organic yet precise, the walls curving upwards into impenetrable shadow far above—impossibly high, vanishing beyond the reach of the weak violet light.
This wasn't a natural cave system; it was designed, but by minds operating on a scale I couldn't fathom. The sterility was broken, however. Scattered haphazardly along the corridor I chose to explore first were remnants of occupation.
Tables, sleek and alien in design, laid overturned. Chairs, seemingly molded from the same pearly material, were strewn about. Various objects littered the smooth floor: cylindrical containers, flat crystalline slates that might have been tablets, styluses of unknown material.
It wasn't destruction; it was abandonment. A sudden, hurried evacuation frozen in time. The air hummed with a profound silence that felt less like absence and more like a held breath.
"Sylvia," I murmured, the sound swallowed quickly by the oppressive quiet. Then a spark ignited in my mind, a nickname that felt right, a spark of irreverence in this solemn place presented itself on my tongue.
"Dragon mama… were the Relictombs actually inhabited by someone? Before… whatever happened to them?" My fingers brushed the cool surface of an overturned table. It felt strangely warm beneath my touch, vibrating with a subtle energy I wasn't sure I could identify as aether or mana.
"No, child," her voice echoed softly in my mind, a warm counterpoint to the chilling surroundings. "Unfortunately, they weren't suitable… not for safeguarding any of the..." She hesitated, the pause thick with unspoken reverence and sorrow. "...the makers of the Relictombs, the Ancient Mages who built them."
She settled on the term, imbuing it with capital letters in my perception. She'd been cagey about them, these architects of the impossible. Only fragments: beings of immense aetheric knowledge, creators of this labyrinthine reality. Their fate was a shadow clinging to her words.
The weight of her pause pressed on me. "What happened to them?" I asked softly, picking up a notebook-like object. Its cover was flexible metal, cool and impossibly thin.
Inside, intricate, flowing symbols I couldn't decipher covered pages that felt like solidified light. Nearby, writing instruments laid scattered all around. The scene was jarringly familiar yet utterly alien at the same time—a laboratory, an office, but one designed by gods... no they weren't gods, they were not too different from humans like me.
Sylvia said only Asuras were considered gods and rhe Ancient Mages were surely not Asuras. However the mundane juxtaposed with the impossible deepened the unease coiling in my gut.
"They are no longer in this world." The finality in Sylvia's voice was absolute, a tombstone slammed shut. It wasn't just information; it was grief, sharp and personal. The guilt I'd sensed earlier coiled tighter around her words. She knew them. She couldn't save them. The thought struck me with chilling certainty. A question for another time, when the shadows weren't so deep.
"I see..." The words felt inadequate. I tilted my head back, straining my enhanced vision, but the ceiling remained a void, a black ocean suspended overhead. The violet light from the Shell Room was a fading beacon behind me, its reach pitifully short.
"Sylvia," I whispered again, the darkness seeming to press closer, "is this… scenery… familiar to you? Is this what the Relictombs usually look like?" Was I walking a known path, or stumbling into an anomaly within the anomaly? Her earlier warnings about the Relictombs's capricious nature echoed.
"Unfortunately, I have no knowledge of this place, child. Sorry." The apology was automatic, tinged with her inherent sadness.
"Jeez, Sylvia," I countered, forcing a lightness I didn't entirely feel, pushing back against the encroaching dread for her. "Don't apologize. Just having you here, talking… it's more than I ever dreamed of back in that cage that was my former self."
It was true. Her presence, even spectral, was a lifeline, a connection in this terrifying, exhilarating void. And crucially, she was my anchor, the voice of caution whispering against the intoxicating siren song of my newfound freedom and power. Without her, I might have charged headlong into the abyss, drunk on newfound capability.
"Relictombs can take all kinds of shapes," she reiterated, her tone shifting subtly, perhaps sensing my need for grounding. "They are divided into countless zones, each unique, governed by its own strange logic. This…" Her voice trailed off, encompassing the abandoned intersection, the impossible height, the scattered artifacts of the vanished Makers. "...is just one fragment.
"Got it." The word was a breath. Adventure laid ahead, yes, but so did the unknown, the potentially lethal unknown. The thrill was still there, a live wire humming under my skin, but it was tempered now by the profound silence, the evidence of flight, the sheer scale of the unknown.
The corridor I'd chosen stretched before me, a tunnel swallowed by purest night. The violet light faded to nothingness just a few paces in. Blindness. Utter, suffocating blindness. My other senses screamed into overdrive.
The cool air on my skin, the faint vibration through the naked sole of my feet, the scent of ozone and dust—they became my map. But most potent was my hearing. Gifted with this body's impossible capabilities, it was like having sonar woven into my consciousness.
I focused, pushing aside the rush of my own blood, the subtle hum of the walls themselves. And there it was: beneath the silence, a distinct, rhythmic thrum. Deep, resonant, mechanical.
A generator? Had the Ancient Mages harnessed forces akin to electricity? It wouldn't surprise me. Beings who bent space and time could surely master electrons. Or perhaps, as Sylvia suggested, the Relictombs themselves generated anomalies—a kindergarten one zone, a fusion reactor the next. The possibilities were dizzying, terrifying, and utterly fascinating.
Guided by the sound and touch, I moved deeper, arms outstretched like a sleepwalker, fingers brushing the cool, seamless walls. Recklessness warred with nascent caution. The thrill of exploration, of feeling my way through the dark with senses I'd never possessed, was intoxicating.
Every step was a defiance of my past helplessness. The thrum grew louder, a basso profundo vibration in my bones. Was it powering something? Lights? Some remnant of the Ancient Mages' work? Hope, reckless and bright, flickered.
Then, I stopped dead.
At the far end of the corridor, where it likely met another intersection swallowed by darkness, two points of light ignited. Not reflections. Not bioluminescence.
They burned. A malevolent, smoldering crimson, like embers fanned by hellfire. They hovered in the void, unblinking, fixed directly on me and only me.
Instinct, primal and screaming, overrode thought. Run. Not a decision, but a biological imperative shrieking through every nerve ending of my stolen demigod body. I pivoted on the ball of my foot, a move executed with the terrifying grace and speed this vessel granted—a move my old self could never have conceived.
As I spun, a sound tore through the silence. Not a roar, not a growl. A screech. It was the sound of rending metal magnified a thousandfold, blended with the agonized shriek of a dying star. It vibrated in my teeth, in my skull, a physical assault that promised only annihilation. It came from the depths, yes, but more accurately, it felt dredged from the very fabric of nightmare.
I ran. Not blindly, but with a desperate, hyper-focused awareness. Back towards the fading violet light, a lifeline flickering in the distance. Behind me, the darkness erupted. Heavy, thunderous stomps shook the floor, the impacts traveling up my legs like seismic shocks.
They weren't the lumbering steps of something massive and slow. They were rapid, terrifyingly agile, erupting into pursuit. Each footfall was a localized earthquake, cracking the seamless floor where it landed. And with the sound came the pressure.
It wasn't physical weight or an object pressed on my shoulders. It was worse. It was a suffocating, unnatural force slamming down on my shoulders, my spine, my very soul. Like gravity itself had turned hostile, malevolent. An invisible elephant? No. A tyrannosaur crafted from pure dread, standing on my essence, trying to crush my will, to pin me in place for the horror behind.
It was psychic, aetheric—a crushing wave of predatory intent designed to paralyze prey. It clawed at my mind, whispering surrender. The air thickened, becoming syrup to wade through. My magnificent new body, moments ago a vessel of boundless freedom, felt suddenly leaden, each stride an agonizing battle against the invisible tide.
Fear, cold and sharp, finally pierced the adrenaline-fueled recklessness. This wasn't an adventure; this was a predator, ancient and alien, honed by the Relictombs themselves. And I was prey. But the core of me, forged in years and years of defiant struggle against a failing body, ignited.
No. I wouldn't be crushed. I wouldn't be meat. The pressure was immense, a physical manifestation of terror, but I gritted my teeth, pouring every ounce of stolen power, every scrap of Iskander's indomitable will, into my legs. I pushed. The invisible weight resisted, screaming for me to stop, to lie down, to die.
Exploiting the minimal light and my desperate momentum, I became chaos incarnate. As I passed the scattered detritus of the Ancient Mages, I didn't hesitate. With a strength that surprised even me, I grabbed an overturned table—surprisingly heavy, humming with latent energy—and, without breaking stride, hurled it backwards like a discus. It sailed into the darkness behind me.
A moment later, a splintering crunch echoed, followed by a guttural snarl of irritation. Not pain, not impediment—just annoyance. Like swatting a fly. I grabbed a chair next, flinging it with desperate force. Another crash, another infuriated shriek that vibrated the walls. Useless. Utterly useless. But it was action. It was defiance. It was buying milliseconds.
I didn't need light to understand the scale of the nightmare gaining on me. The sheer presence of it filled the corridor. The thunder of its steps vibrated in my marrow. The heat of its breath—a stench like ozone and rotting meat—washed over me in waves as it closed the distance.
It was colossal, its form barely contained by the titanic corridor. It wasn't just in the darkness; it was darkness given form and hunger. And it was looking down on me. I could feel the weight of its crimson gaze, the contempt of an apex predator for insignificant, scurrying life. A creature ripped straight from the most grotesque, body-horror fueled nightmare Alfred had ever subjected me to.
Yet, beneath the terror, beneath the crushing pressure, the cold sweat on my brow… a spark refused to die. Adrenaline, yes, but also… exhilaration.
This was life! Raw, terrifying, immediate! Facing oblivion not from decay, but from a monstrous challenge! If I died here, mere hours into this impossible second chance, it wouldn't be in a bed. It would be running, fighting, spitting in the eye of the indifferent universe that had cursed my first life!
"Child!" Sylvia's voice cut through the maelstrom in my mind, sharp with pure, undiluted terror. Helpless, but her fear for me was a tangible thing, a lash of maternal urgency. It struck a chord deeper than the monster's pressure. Don't you dare die!
It galvanized me. The Shell Room's violet light was close now, a sanctuary glowing maybe thirty yards ahead. The creature was closer. I could almost feel the displaced air as one massive, clawed limb swept towards my back.
With a guttural cry ripped from the depths of my being, I clenched every muscle fiber in my legs, pouring every drop of stolen power, every ounce of Sylvia's fear-turned-fuel, into one final, explosive leap.
I launched myself forward, not just running, but projecting myself towards the open spiral door like a human arrow. My target: the recessed spiral on the wall beside the opening. Slam it shut before the nightmare followed me in.
Mid-air, propelled by desperation and impossible strength, I twisted. Reckless. Fearless. Needing to see. To know the face of the horror trying to end my story before it began.
The glimpse seared itself into my brain. 'Oblong' was an understatement. It was a blasphemy against form. Jet-black, absorbing the feeble violet light rather than reflecting it, making it a living silhouette.
Vaguely humanoid, but stretched and distorted as if viewed through cracked glass. Legs like obsidian pillars, taller than me by several times, propelled it with terrifying speed. A torso disproportionately small, yet radiating dense, brutal power. Arms—massive, corded with muscle like black braided cables of steel—ended in claws that weren't claws, but whirring, serrated rotary blades, teeth gleaming like shattered obsidian.
The head… a nightmare cylinder, elongated and tapering to a point. No eyes were visible except those twin crimson furnaces burning with mindless hunger. Where a mouth should be, rows upon rows of jagged, crystalline fangs spiraled inward. And flicking between them, not a tongue, but a barbed, spiked chain-mace, dripping with viscous shadow.
But it wasn't the mace inside the thing's mouth that struck.
As I twisted, eyes wide with horrified fascination, I saw the tail. Thick as my torso, armored with overlapping black plates, tipped with a cruel, hooked spike like a scorpion's sting amplified for a god. It lashed out with whip-crack speed, a blur of darkness against darkness.
I had no time to react. No time to dodge. The impact was catastrophic. It felt less like being hit and more like being caught in a localized explosion. The hooked spike slammed into my side with the force of a meteor strike.
Agony, white-hot and all-consuming, exploded through my ribs, my organs, my very self. The breath was blasted from my lungs. I was hurled sideways like a ragdoll, bones screaming in protest, the world becoming a nauseating blur of violet light and jet-black terror. I impacted the wall opposite the Shell Room door with a sickening, bone-jarring crunch that echoed like a gunshot in the confined space.
I slumped to the floor, gasping, stars exploding behind my eyes, the coppery taste of blood filling my mouth. Agony was a shroud, heavy and suffocating.
Through blurred vision, I saw the monstrous shape crouch, filling the doorway entirely, those crimson eyes fixed on me with predatory intent. It gathered itself, muscles coiling like obsidian springs, ready to surge into the Shell Room and finish its prey.
Then, the spiral door reacted. With a sound like a sigh of cosmic relief, it began to spiral shut. Fast. Seamlessly. The creature roared—a sound that shook the very foundations of the space—and lunged. A massive, bladed claw scraped against the closing spiral with a shower of sparks and a shriek of tortured material, but it was too late.
The pearlescent sections interlocked with finality. The crimson eyes, burning with frustrated fury, were the last thing I saw before the door sealed completely, plunging the corridor back into absolute darkness, punctuated only by the fading, enraged roars vibrating through the wall.
Silence. Blessed, fragile silence, broken only by my ragged, wet gasps and the frantic drumming of my heart against my bruised ribs. The unnatural pressure vanished, leaving me feeling strangely light, yet crushed by the aftermath of pain.
"Child! Child! Are you okay? Can you hear me?" Sylvia's voice was frantic, laced with a terror I hadn't heard before, cutting through the haze of agony.
I managed to move. Every nerve shrieked in protest. I lifted a trembling hand, slick with something warm and wet—blood, my blood, greyish in the violet light—and forced my thumb upwards. A weak, shaky gesture.
Alive. It hurt to breathe. It hurt to think. Pain radiated from my side in pulsing waves, deep and ominous. Bruises, maybe cracked ribs… it felt like more. But pain? Pain was an old acquaintance.
This body screamed its protest, but it wasn't the familiar, grinding agony of decay; it was the sharp, vital scream of damage inflicted while living. A testament to survival.
"Child! Don't get up too fast!" Sylvia's voice was firm now, layered with deep maternal concern that brooked no argument. "You need to rest! Assess the damage! Please!"
The command in her tone, the sheer worry, was a balm. My reckless energy, the defiant adrenaline, finally bled away, leaving exhaustion and profound, bone-deep ache in its wake. The room swam. The violet light seemed to pulse in time with the throbbing in my side.
Fighting the pull of darkness felt impossible. I yielded, letting my head rest back against the cool, smooth floor of the Shell Room. The scent of my own blood, sharp and metallic, mixed with the sterile air.
A shaky, bloody smile touched my lips. The pain was immense, a universe contained within my ribs. But beneath it, thrumming like a counterpoint, was a sensation so profound it brought tears to my eyes—tears of pain, yes, but also of pure, unadulterated awe.
"I never felt so alive..." The words were a whisper, barely audible, scraped raw from a throat that had tasted terror and iron. They held the wonder of movement after paralysis, the ecstasy of survival against impossible odds, the terrifying, glorious price of true freedom.
The darkness behind my eyelids wasn't the void of sickness; it was the embrace of hard-won rest after a battle fought and narrowly won. The last thing I registered was the cool press of the floor and the fading echo of Sylvia's relieved sigh in my mind before oblivion, warm and demanding, claimed me.