The faint light spilling through the doorway sharpened the shapes inside, and Eli's breath caught in his throat.
It wasn't a hospital.
Not a house.
Not even a workshop.
Not really.
From the outside, the building looked like an ordinary, timeworn structure—something forgotten by history and reclaimed by nature. But inside… inside was something else entirely.
"...What the hell…" Eli whispered, his voice shaking as his eyes adjusted to the dim light.
It was a lab.
Not the kind you'd see in fantasy dungeons, with glowing potions and alchemical tables. Not even the arcane research chambers Hunters sometimes discovered in old ruins.
No. This was human.
Human-made. Human-designed.
But also—wrong.
The air was thick with dust, each breath carrying the taste of metal and decay. The faint smell of ozone and oil clung to the space, stale but unmistakable.
