The road east was long and lonely.
Lucian had never seen land like this—rolling hills carpeted in ash-grey grass, with trees twisted like they'd grown under pressure. No birds sang here. No insects buzzed. The wind carried a chill that whispered old names he couldn't quite remember but felt deep in his bones.
Laila walked slightly ahead, her staff slung across her back, boots crunching on brittle leaves. Every few miles, she'd pause, drop to one knee, and press her fingers to the soil.
Still no pulse.
"No ley-flow here either," she said after one such stop. "Three days now."
Lucian frowned. "It's like the whole world went silent."
"Or something's choking it."
They pressed on. Nights were colder the farther they traveled. On the fourth evening, they camped beneath the broken arch of what once might've been a watchtower. Lucian built the fire; Laila shaped a barrier of mist to conceal their light.
"You ever wonder," Lucian asked between bites of dried meat, "what would've happened if we hadn't fought back? If the Hollow had… finished waking?"
Laila chewed slowly, eyes on the flames. "All the time. But I don't think it was about waking. I think it was looking for something."
Lucian tilted his head. "Like what?"
She shrugged. "Maybe not a what. Maybe a who."
Lucian was about to respond when the fire flickered—not from wind, but something deeper. A pull. Like something beneath the earth had inhaled.
They both stood.
The mist barrier shimmered. Then broke.
From the trees ahead came a sound neither of them expected—music. A slow, plaintive tune played on a stringed instrument. Not a threat, not quite. But strange.
Too strange.
Lucian drew his dagger. Laila lifted her staff.
They moved toward the sound in practiced silence.
And found a man sitting on a stone.
He was old, impossibly so. His beard flowed down his chest in twisted braids, and his robes shimmered with threads of starlight. His eyes were closed as he played a harp made of bone and silver.
He stopped when he heard them approach.
"You step lightly for two who carry storms," he said, without looking up.
Lucian tightened his grip. "Who are you?"
The man opened his eyes.
They were empty sockets. No eyeballs. Just black pits that did not bleed or rot—just existed, calmly, terribly.
"I am called the Chorus," he said. "Because I remember songs no one else does."
Laila stepped forward. "What are you doing here?"
"Listening," the Chorus said. "You've come east. You've come far. But you don't know what you're walking into."
Lucian frowned. "Try us."
The Chorus rested a hand on the harp. "The Hollow you stopped? It wasn't the first. Or the oldest. It was a fragment. A finger of something buried under what the ancients once called the Underkingdom."
Laila's face hardened. "Buried beneath the ley-lines."
The Chorus smiled. "Precisely. You thought the ley was just power. But it's memory. It's blood. It's a prison. And the walls are cracking."
Lucian stepped closer. "What do you want from us?"
"Nothing," the man said, placing his harp gently on the stone. "But the Hollow knows your names now. You lit a fire in the dark. And now everything in the Underkingdom is watching to see what you'll do next."
He reached into his robes and pulled out a shard of glass—clear, humming faintly with light.
"This is a key," he said. "One of many. They were scattered to keep the prison sealed. You'll need it if you plan to go deeper."
Lucian hesitated, then took the shard. It was cold.
"How will we find the others?"
"You won't," the Chorus said. "They'll find you."
Before Lucian could ask another question, the man faded—literally. One moment he was there. The next, only the harp remained. Its strings stilled.
Laila stared at the stone. "Did that just happen?"
Lucian nodded slowly. "Yeah."
They didn't sleep much that night.
🜂
By the end of the week, they reached the edge of the known map.
Beyond the Deadbar River, no villages stood. No guides passed. The terrain here was jagged—black stone ridges and craters filled with frost. The ley-line was visible again, but it flowed wrong—like a river moving uphill. Magic flickered unpredictably. Laila's water spells refused to hold their shape. Lucian's fusion grip sparked and cracked but didn't bond.
Something in the land was rejecting them.
That night, as they camped beneath an overhang of stone teeth, they heard another sound. Not music this time.
Voices.
But not speaking.
Chanting.
Lucian sat up, eyes alert. "You hear that?"
Laila nodded, already gripping her staff.
They moved carefully through the ravine.
A circle of figures stood ahead—cloaked, barefoot, faces hidden behind cracked masks. Their hands were raised toward a shallow pool where the ley-line pooled unnaturally. Floating above the water was a second shard—larger than the one Lucian carried. But dark. Flickering like obsidian.
One of the masked figures turned.
And spoke directly to them.
"We knew you would come."
Lucian braced himself. "Who are you?"
"We are the Remnants," the figure said. "We serve what sleeps beneath."
Laila narrowed her eyes. "You want to free it."
"No," said the Remnant. "We want to understand it. And to do that… it must awaken."
Without warning, the pool exploded outward.
A creature rose—half-formed, stitched from bone and moss and sorrow. A hollowborn echo. It screamed without sound, its limbs dragging mist like chains.
Lucian reacted on instinct. Fusion surged. He took the earth into his fists and slammed the ground. The creature staggered.
Laila moved like a wave, dancing between claw-swipes and releasing a burst of pressure that knocked three of the Remnants back.
But it wasn't enough.
The shard pulsed again—and the creature grew stronger.
Lucian looked at Laila. "We have to end it."
She nodded once.
Together, they closed their eyes and reached for each other—not physically, but through that bond. That thread.
Fusion bloomed.
But not as before.
This was something new.
The ley-line itself responded. Not with power. But with memory.
They saw flashes—visions not their own. A city underground, carved in crystal. A tower built from ley-blood. A throne where no one sat.
And the words:
"When the twins of root and tide awaken, the gate shall break, and what waits will walk again."
Lucian gasped and let go.
The energy surged—pure, raw, unstoppable.
The hollowborn cracked apart.
The pool stilled.
The Remnants had vanished.
Only the second shard remained, dark but pulsing faintly now.
Laila picked it up and looked at him.
"Two shards," she said. "And a prophecy."
Lucian exhaled slowly. "We're not just trying to stop something anymore."
Laila nodded grimly. "We're walking right into it."
And far beneath their feet, the Underkingdom stirred.