Pushing the heavy table aside, they slipped out of the lab, the heavy door clicking shut behind them, sealing away their brief sanctuary. The silence of the science building was absolute now, a tomb-like quiet that felt profoundly wrong. Dressed in their fire-retardant lab coats and goggles, they looked like ghosts haunting the abandoned halls.
They descended the main staircase cautiously, their makeshift weapons held at the ready. The Foucault pendulum still lay shattered in the lobby, a monument to a world where the laws of physics were the only ones that mattered. Kai led them through the broken glass doors and back out into the open air.
The campus quad was a hellscape. The air was thick with greasy, black smoke that stung their eyes and throats, and a fine layer of gray ash coated every surface, muffling their footsteps. The fire consuming the library wasn't a clean burn; it was a hungry, angry conflagration that crackled and roared, spitting embers into the hazy sky. The heat washed over them even from a hundred yards away.
"Stay low, use the planters and benches as cover," Kai ordered, his voice tight. "We cross to the main statue, then make a straight run for the entrance."
The quad was a wide, open expanse—a killing field. To their left, near the humanities building, a pack of Gutter Scuttlers was feasting on something Kai didn't want to identify. They were too far away to be an immediate threat, but it meant the campus was actively being patrolled.
They darted from a large concrete planter to an overturned bench, their movements swift and silent. Kai constantly scanned the area with Observe, his mind sifting through the data.
[Gutter Scuttler (Feasting)]
[Level: 2]
...
[Carrion (Non-Hostile)]
He pushed the disturbing images from his mind, focusing on the path ahead. They were halfway across, closing in on the large bronze statue of the university's founder, when a new notification popped into his vision, stark and terrifying.
[Ashen Stalker (Stealth Mode)]
[Level: 7]
Kai froze, throwing an arm out to stop Elara and Ben. "Down!" he hissed.
They dropped behind the statue's thick granite plinth just as something blurred past where they had been standing. It was fast, a gray, indistinct shape that moved with a liquid grace that was utterly silent. It was quadrupedal, long and thin like a greyhound, with skin that perfectly matched the ash-covered ground. Its head was a smooth, featureless ovoid, except for a single, large, crimson eye that glowed with malevolent intelligence. It was hunting.
"What was that?" Elara whispered, her voice trembling.
"Level 7. Ashen Stalker," Kai breathed, his knuckles white on the hilt of his saber. "It's in stealth. It's circling us."
Ben peeked around the plinth. "Its camouflage is remarkable, adapting its skin pigmentation to match the ash. We can't fight what we can't reliably see."
"Then we blind it," Kai said, an idea sparking. He looked at Elara. "Get a smoke bomb ready."
She nodded, pulling one of the foil-wrapped packages from her belt.
Kai watched the faint disturbances in the falling ash, trying to track the creature's silent movements. He saw a flicker of motion near a row of hedges. "There! It's over there. Elara, on my mark, throw the bomb between us and the library steps. Create a wall of smoke we can run through."
He drew one of the acid vials from his satchel, its contents sloshing ominously.
"Ready?" he whispered. They both nodded. "Now!"
Elara lit the fuse with her lighter and hurled the package with a perfect arc. It landed with a soft puff on the ashen grass. A few seconds later, it erupted, spewing a thick, choking cloud of white smoke that billowed outwards, creating an opaque curtain between them and the library.
At the same moment, the Stalker, startled by the sudden eruption, broke its stealth. Its form solidified as it hissed in anger, its single red eye fixing on them.
"Go!" Kai yelled. Ben and Elara plunged into the smoke screen without hesitation.
The Stalker lunged, not after them, but at Kai. It was unbelievably fast. Kai didn't have time to aim. He just threw the acid bomb at the space in front of the monster. The glass vial shattered on the flagstones, and concentrated hydrochloric acid splashed upwards.
The creature shrieked, a high-pitched, tearing sound of pure agony. The acid had hit its legs and underbelly, its perfect camouflage melting away into sizzling, smoking ruin. Its crimson eye burned with hatred as it writhed in pain, momentarily crippled.
Kai didn't wait to see more. He turned and sprinted into the wall of smoke, his goggles protecting his eyes from the worst of the irritant. He burst through the other side, finding Ben and Elara already at the base of the wide, stone steps leading up to the library's entrance.
They had made it. The grand, columned facade of the building loomed over them. The massive oak doors had been splintered and smashed inwards, and the inferno raging in the east wing cast a flickering, hellish orange glow from within the smoke-choked darkness of the entrance hall. A deep, guttural roar echoed from the fiery depths.
The Wayfinder in Kai's pocket was vibrating intensely now, its pull undeniable. The next Echo was in there. In the heart of the fire.