The pendant was an ancient jade circle, upon which a serpent was carved, devouring its own tail—the Ouroboros. Half of the serpent shimmered with a ghastly white luster, while the other half bled shadows like a living wound. The two halves intertwined in a grotesque balance, exuding an ancient, boundless aura, as though it had witnessed the birth and death of countless worlds.
A strange, unseen force lifted the pendant from the black pedestal, suspending it between the middle-aged man's weathered palms.
Kaelen reached out and grasped the hovering Ouroboros.
The moment his fingers closed around the jade, the entire cavern was swallowed by a suffocating darkness.
The pale light that had bathed the colossal chamber was snuffed out without warning, as if it had never existed.
"So... this was the source of the light," Kaelen muttered under his breath, his voice a brittle whisper. His heart pounded like a drumbeat in the void.
A single pendant had banished the cavern's ancient gloom.
Clearly, this was no ordinary relic.
He unfurled his hand slightly, and immediately, a cold, silver radiance spilled forth once more, forcing back the blackness with a trembling light that barely reached the cavern walls.
In his palm, the Ouroboros coiled and twisted, as though alive—the coolness of the jade sinking into his bones, while a slow, seeping warmth coiled through his blood and marrow, dispelling the chill of death that clung to him.
At the pendant's top, a tiny, ancient hole pierced through, worn smooth by the grinding of ages. Without hesitation, Kaelen tore a strip from the frayed hem of his cloak, fashioned it into a crude cord, and threaded it through the relic, hanging it around his neck.
The instant the Ouroboros settled against his chest, an unseen force surged forth.
A steady, comforting heat spread through him, knitting the hairline fractures in his bones, easing the grinding ache in his battered body.
It was as if the relic breathed with him—each heartbeat driving away decay and despair.
Only then did Kaelen tear his gaze away from the pendant and turn his attention back to the corpse seated atop the black throne.
There sat a titan among men—a warrior whose very corpse defied the ravages of time.
Kaelen's breath caught painfully in his throat.
"What level of monstrous cultivation must one attain," he whispered hoarsely, "to leave behind a body that even time dares not touch?"
The corpse was clad in tattered battle-robes, each thread radiating a faint aura that repelled rot and corrosion.
But the figure bore a gaping wound at the center of his chest—a hole torn open by some unimaginable force.
Blackened blood crusted around the wound, yet it glistened, half-liquid, as if stubbornly refusing to dry.
What nightmare could tear apart such a being?
At the corpse's feet lay a monstrous skeleton—its twisted frame still radiating a palpable, sickening malice. The bones, warped and cracked, were soaked in a deathly black miasma that lingered stubbornly in the stale air.
Scattered nearby were the broken remnants of ancient weapons—shards of steel that wept silent, invisible killing intent into the void.
Two broken swords lay abandoned at the corpse's side.
Even in ruin, they exuded an unbearable coldness, a sharpness that seemed to slice the very soul.
Though no swordmaster himself, Kaelen could feel it in his marrow: these were weapons forged not for defense, but for slaughter.
Slowly, Kaelen raised his eyes to the stone slab looming behind the corpse.
Upon its jet-black surface were carved ancient sigils, each stroke etched with such force that even now, they pulsed faintly under the Ouroboros' cold light.
The markings stirred something primal within Kaelen. Though the script was ancient beyond reckoning, he understood its meaning in his bones:
"Here lies Veyrith the Abyssborne, Slayer of the Dreadcoil Leviathan."
The cavern seemed to grow colder.
Veyrith the Abyssborne...
The Dreadcoil Leviathan...
Names out of myths, so ancient they had faded into fearful whispers.
The Dreadcoil Leviathan—a primordial terror of the deep, a creature whose sinuous form could coil around mountains, whose hunger had devoured gods, whose very existence warped the fabric of heaven and earth.
And here, its broken skeleton rotted at the feet of a corpse.
Kaelen's mind flashed back to the monstrous serpent that had dragged him into this abyss—its hide marked by greenish stripes.
His fists clenched until his knuckles whitened.
A descendant.
No... something worse.
Among the shattered remains, Kaelen's gaze fell upon a cracked eggshell—half-black, half-white, its surface still pulsing faintly with a residual malice.
The Dreadcoil Leviathan had left behind an egg.
Even after endless ages, that spawn had survived.
The serpent he encountered was no mindless beast—it was the heir to a primordial nightmare.
A cold sweat trickled down Kaelen's back.
Suppressing the rising dread, he knelt and gathered the two broken swords, cradling them like old friends. Even shattered, they might yet drink deeply of blood.
At the cavern's far end, the skeleton trailed off into a dark, stagnant pool.
Kaelen had just begun plotting his escape when—
Splash.
A vast, monstrous head rose from the water, its green-scaled hide slick and glistening, its sulfurous eyes blazing with boundless hatred.
The nightmare had not ended.
It had only just begun.