The pit gates groaned open, spilling Kairo and Igron into a canyon of smoke and shifting shadow. The air here was colder — not from mercy, but from the absence of anything living.
Igron walked ahead, hands in his tattered cloak, speaking as though reciting scripture.
> "Hell is not one place, Kairo. It's a kingdom of kingdoms — each a wound that never closes. You've seen the Pits of Agony. That was only the first taste."
They passed jagged cliffs where chains hung like dead vines. In the distance, something massive was screaming — not from pain, but in the deep, slow rhythm of something that had been screaming for centuries.
Igron's silver eye caught Kairo's.
> "Up there is the Plateau of Hunger. No food, no water, only the scent of rotting feasts that vanish when touched. Further east? The Valley of Teeth. Nothing there but mouths — the ground, the sky, the stones themselves — all teeth."
Kairo stayed silent, absorbing each word like a soldier memorizing enemy terrain. But then, in the smoke ahead, something shifted.
For a heartbeat, he saw her.
Ashbel.
Her eyes wide with terror. A shadow behind her, tall and grinning, claws reaching. The air thickened in his chest, and for a moment his fists clenched so hard his knuckles cracked.
The vision vanished, replaced by the dull red haze of hell.
> "You saw something," Igron said, watching him closely.
Kairo's voice was low. "Not something. Someone."
Igron gave no comfort, only a crooked smirk.
> "Then pray you don't end up in the Hall of Echoes. That's where memories get eaten… slowly."
They walked on.
The path narrowed, forcing them between walls of flesh pulsing with a heartbeat too slow to be human. Every thud seemed to echo in Kairo's skull, and every few steps, a faint whisper of Ashbel's voice slipped through the beat — pleading, sobbing — before fading into the dark.
By the time they reached the jagged gates of the next circle, Kairo's jaw ached from grinding his teeth.
Igron stopped, looking up at the towering figure guarding the entrance.
> "Welcome to the Colosseum of Freedom, Kairo. The only way forward is to win. And the only prize… is survival."