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[Underground - Day 31]
The air was heavy.
Too heavy to breathe, without tasting iron and blood.
Leya pressed her ear to the cold wood overhead, she climb through by nails digged in wall of basement.
Elen helped her, " Hey you heard something?" He asked.
"Nothing" she replied with a shushed tone.
Then, she knocked once.
Twice.
Waited.
Elen joined her. His fists were weaker than hers now, but he still tried.
The sound thudded up through the hatch, then died in the damp silence.
"Again," Leya whispered.
Her voice was barely a breath — sound meant punishment here — but her eyes burned.
They knocked in a rhythm now. Not random. Not frantic. A pattern.
If anyone was out there, they would know it wasn't rats.
It was human.
It was them.
The others watched from their corners — hollow-eyed shadows.
For a moment, no one coughed, no one whimpered.
Everyone listened.
And then—
A faint shift.
Not from inside.
Above.
A step. A pause.
The grain of the wood groaned.
Someone had heard.
Leya's hand clenched tighter. She didn't smile, but her knuckles turned white with the force of hope she refused to name.
Then silence.
The knocks had been their only gamble.
Three slow. Two fast. Repeat.
It wasn't a code, but they knocked as if it might mean something —
as if someone out there might understand desperation in its rawest form.
Among the group, huddled near the wall, a boy sat apart.
Clean-face,blonde shiny hair, though dirt clung to his cheeks now.
Posture straight despite exhaustion.
He wasn't from here — everyone could tell by the way his eyes didn't dart like prey, but studied the room like a commander.
Leya noticed him first.
Or maybe he noticed her — it was hard to say.
When she passed the stale bread piece down the line, his fingers brushed hers, brief and unshaken.
His gaze lingered, not on her face, but on her hands — pale, raw from scraping the stone floor.
Then he gave the bread back.
"You need it more," he murmured, voice carrying a strange weight for a boy their age.
She didn't answer, but something in her chest tightened.
Not pity. Not gratitude. Something else.
In this place, where everyone was fraying apart, he was… steady.
Like the stone pillars that hadn't yet crumbled.
And then — the sound.
Footsteps. Voices. A command.
Someone was here.
For the first time in weeks, all of them — even the quiet boy — looked toward the door.
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[Outer Grounds – Elias's POV]
The signal reached him as a whisper — coded words from the scout at his side.
Elias didn't stop walking.
He adjusted his blindfold and picked his silver hair from back, tying as a ponytail.
He didn't shout, his voice was firm yet commanding.
"Knights, with me."
Though the order was quiet, but the men moved as if it had been shouted. Armor barely brushed, boots barely touched the ground. They knew when silence mattered more than speed.
He had just crossed the outer line when three of his people stepped into his path.
"My lord—" one began, voice taut. "It's dangerous. You don't know what's—"
"I know enough," Elias cut in.
No sharpness. No raised tone.
Only certainty.
"You've just returned , you are not fully healed ye—" another tried, desperation leaking through.
He placed a hand on the man's shoulder. Not heavy — steady.
"If it were your children down there, you'd want me to move before the next breath left your chest."
The man's throat worked, but no reply came.
Elias didn't linger.
He didn't lecture.
Kindness was in the brief squeeze of his hand, the calm in his eyes — but he was already stepping past them.
"Form up," he murmured to the knights. "We're going in quiet. And fast."
" Be safe" a sweet yet firm voice echoed. Allurania who kept silence until now said. Her expression genuinely worried about him
Elias looked at her and nodded with a tiny smile.
The rest of the camp watched him go — some with worry, some with awe — but no one called him back.
When Elias moved with that kind of resolve, the only thing anyone could do was follow.
He was gone, his stride unbroken, his presence leaving the air charged behind him...
'Please be safe' The only thought echoed in the mind of everyone present there, just towards different person.
Elias transported on his horse as white as snow — Snow.
His childhood companion.
The one of them, who missed him the most.
Elias went in front of him joining their forehead. They stood for few second, before Elias hopped on his back by the help of saddle.
Elias looked behind, though blindfolded and silent. Everyone understood his command and followed him.
Then.... Whoooshhh!!!!
The scroll around them glowed and they vanished.
People faded in the back, worry still evident on their faces, while their hands clasped together praying for everyone's safe return.
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{On the other side — In basement}
Everyone was sitting still as always but this time there was a little hope in their hearts.
They all were praying to escape from here but....
A new sound followed — not the slow, deliberate tread of rescue, but the sharp, clipped rhythm of boots that knew exactly where to go.
Too many.
Too precise.
Elen's lips formed her name, but no sound came.
The boy in the corner didn't move — his eyes narrowed, weighing the shift in the air.
The latch scraped.
Light knifed down the stairwell, blinding after weeks of dark.
They came fast — the masked men in black with pale gloves, and behind them, the one with the ledger and in white suit.
He didn't shout. He didn't need to.
The men in black, dragged the kids.
Their hands dragged children by the arms, ignoring cries, ignoring the ones who clawed at the floor.
It wasn't chaos.
It was a culling.
Leya reached for Elen, but another hand was already on him, wrenching him backward.
She heard his gasp — and then the wet choke as something struck him in the throat.
He didn't make another sound.
The smell hit next — chemical, sharp, clinging.
It wasn't the scent of rescue.
In the blur of motion, she saw the girl — the one with braids and the soft voice — standing behind the man with the ledger.
Her eyes didn't meet anyone's.
She held a paper, signed, and the pale gloves never touched her.
The blondey in the corner was grabbed — but not struck.
One of the masked men muttered something low and urgent to the ledger man, and the grip loosened.
The boy's posture didn't break; he simply moved where they pushed him.
And the girl—Stella, who had betrayed them, looked at them with no expression.
She didn't look guilty.
She didn't look relieved.
She just looked… done.
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