The last embers of the campfire were fading with the morning light. The Djinn looked like they were sleeping, their massive chest rising and falling with slow, heavy breaths. But I kept my eyes on them, tracking every subtle twitch.
"I still can't find an opening," Mnex murmured in my mind, his voice low and sharp. "No physical or magical weaknesses. If it has a flaw, it hides it too well."
"We can't linger here any longer," I muttered under my breath, still watching the Djinn. "Fine then, show us the way. Where's this cave of yours? Let's get you out."
My words cut through the morning silence. Jideon looked up, frowning. "I don't think that's a good idea. We can't just follow it into some unknown cave."
Gareth's face openly showed fear. "Not just bad, downright insane. Following that thing? Madness!"
I turned to them. "Then here's how we do it. Gareth, you head back. Tell them what we found. The river's widest point is here, they should know that. Jideon, you go with him."
"No," Jideon replied immediately. "I'm coming with you. Leaving this creature alone with just you… not happening."
Gareth opened his mouth to argue, but his shoulders sank. "Fine," he said, clearly unhappy. "But if this ends badly, I warned you."
Through the morning mist, the river's rumble still reached us. We packed up in silence, Gareth kept glancing toward where the troll had been, while Jideon never let go of his spear.
The Djinn hadn't spoken through any of this. They just watched us with those gold-lit eyes, wearing a faint smile that felt less like amusement and more like… this was exactly how they wanted things to go. Maybe they were never really asleep in the first place.
When Gareth finally turned his back and rode off with the horses, the three of us set out. The Djinn rose with ease, threw the rough cloth from their shoulders, and without looking back, strode north as if they had been the leader all along.
"Follow me," they said. Their voice was calm, but carried the weight of command.
I narrowed my eyes. "Too relaxed," Mnex whispered in my mind. "Either it's leading us into a trap, or it's planning to drop the act once we're deep enough in."
We walked deeper into the forest, the trees thinning just enough for glimpses of the river's branching streams. At every fork, the Djinn moved without hesitation, picking the right trail. But I noticed something else, wherever he passed, bird calls cut off instantly, and the rustling of small creatures in the underbrush vanished.
Is that… normal? I asked inwardly.
"Not normal," Mnex replied. "That's the kind of reaction nature has to something it either fears… or reveres. Neither is good for you."
From time to time, the Djinn glanced back at me, each look short but deliberate. The golden shimmer in their eyes was visible even in the morning light. Whether they were gauging the terrain or my reaction, I couldn't tell.
The land began to change. The soil grew harder, patches of dry earth replacing grass. Jagged rocks jutted up between tree roots.
"This isn't natural," Mnex observed. "The topsoil's long gone, stripped down to bare rock. That means this place is either ancient… or something happened here."
I'm not sensing any mana, I thought.
"Neither am I… but if something happened long ago, the mana might have already bled back into the land."
The Djinn finally spoke over their shoulder. "From here, the paths get fewer. We follow the rocks."
Why are they taking us toward the rocks?
"Caves tend to be in rocky areas," Mnex said. "Makes sense. But keep sharp, those same areas make perfect ambush sites."
Jideon broke the silence. "How long will it take?"
"With your pace… three more days," the Djinn said with a faint smile.
"Three more days?" Jideon echoed, clearly unhappy. "We're walking like this the whole time?"
The Djinn's gaze hardened. "I can carry you, if you like."
Jideon shrugged but didn't let go of his spear.
We kept conversation to a minimum until the morning of the second day. The air had grown colder, and the mist lingered well into late morning. At one point, the Djinn stopped and bent toward a rocky outcrop, running a finger along a narrow crack before bringing it to their tongue.
What are they doing? I whispered to Mnex.
"Tasting it. Some creatures can tell how long a place has been untouched just from the flavor of the stone."
And what did they learn?
"If it were useful to us, it'd have said something. The fact that it hasn't… tells you enough."
By afternoon, we entered a narrow gorge. Sheer walls of rock rose on either side, the sky reduced to a thin strip above. Our footsteps echoed, every sound bouncing back threefold.
"Be careful here," Mnex warned. "Sound calls both friend and foe."
The Djinn stopped at the gorge's end. "We camp here tonight," they said. "Tomorrow we enter the borderlands. After that, reaching the cave will be… easy."
I narrowed my eyes. "Easy?"
In the shadows, the golden glow in his eyes deepened. "Easy for me."
Mnex muttered in my mind, "And probably not for you."
Even as we prepared camp, my gaze kept drifting to them. They sat quietly in a corner once the fire was lit, but their eyes still found me often. Whether that was trust… or something else entirely, I couldn't yet decide.
And then it hit me, our real test had already begun, long before we reached the cave.
The cave's mouth loomed ahead like a black wound in the earth. No wind stirred from within, no drip of water echoed out, almost as if even the air refused to exist there. In the troll's body, the Djinn stood at the entrance and looked back over their shoulder at us.
"Be careful inside," they said. "This is… more than just a pile of stone."
Mnex shifted uneasily in my mind. "I can't tell if it's being honest or setting us up. If it's a trap, why warn us?"
I don't know… and I'm not sure I want to guess.
The moment we stepped in, the first thing I felt was the heat. Outside, it had been a cold morning, but here the air was heavy and hot, burning the back of my throat with every breath. The Djinn raised one massive hand, golden light threading through the cracks in their skin. The glow spilled across the walls, making the carved shapes ripple with strange shadows. I swallowed hard. That light came from them, not from me. With a flex of my fingers, I summoned a flame in my own palm. The warm firelight pushed back the edges of darkness, steadier than the Djinn's alien glow. Maybe it was pointless… but I trusted my fire more than theirs.
I placed my hands on the cave wall and sent out a quiet pulse, tracing the ceiling above. The faint echoes came back, fractured and scattered. Mnex marked them in the back of my mind, filing the weak spots away. He didn't share details, only murmured: "As I've told you before, when the right time comes, I'll tell you, and we'll have an edge."
The walls were nearly black, veined with dark gray, and in some places they were carved, or scratched, with shapes that meant nothing to me.
"Looks like the kind of drawings you see from the first humans," Mnex commented, trying for a mocking tone, though I could hear the tension beneath it.
The Djinn walked ahead, but their steps occasionally faltered, subtle, yet noticeable. It was like their control over the troll's muscles wasn't quite perfect.
"Not full control," Mnex noted immediately. "That's our opening. It's been slipping now and then since the journey started, but it's worse here."
We descended deeper. The floor rose and fell in uneven slopes; in one stretch, the drip of water echoed, while in another there was nothing but absolute silence. Eventually, the Djinn stopped and pointed forward.
"There," they said. "The chamber with the seal."
The deeper we went, the hotter it became. A faint red glow bled from the walls, growing stronger as we approached the chamber. In its center lay a massive stone block, half-buried in the ground and covered in intricate symbols. Scorch marks blackened the surrounding floor.
"If you free me from here…" the Djinn began, but Mnex's voice cut in sharply. "Don't listen. Follow the plan."
I glanced at Jideon. He gave a small, silent nod. Cold energy began to gather in my palms, sharp and biting.
The Djinn noticed, their eyes narrowing. "What are you doing, Henry?"
"Being careful," I said, my voice cold to match the magic in my hands.
I unleashed the ice, sending a wave around their legs. Instantly, their movements faltered, the troll's knees locking under the sudden chill. For a creature born of fire, it was like venom freezing through their veins.
"Stop!" they roared, the sound shaking the chamber. "Not like this…"
I shifted to earth magic, threading in a pulse for extra force. The ground shuddered, cracks racing up the cavern walls. A massive slab I'd marked earlier tore free from the ceiling and came crashing down toward them.
They tried to move, but the ice had stolen their speed. The rock slammed onto their shoulders, forcing them to the ground. The impact rattled the entire chamber.
I stepped forward, sword in hand, its weight and cold steel sharper in my grip than ever before. Beneath the slab, the Djinn looked up at me, golden light in their eyes flickering, half fury, half… hurt.
"Henry…" their voice rumbled like a distant storm. "You don't have to do this."
"I do," I said. "Because I can't trust you."
For a moment, silence filled the chamber, broken only by a faint hum from somewhere deep within the cave. I tightened my grip on the blade, breath shallow, but my arms froze. The Djinn's eyes found mine, golden glow flickering, almost… pleading. I couldn't move. My chest locked.
"Henry…" Mnex urged, sharp in my mind. My knees shook. And in that heartbeat of hesitation, a shadow swept past me. Jideon's spear drove clean through the troll's thick neck, with unflinching precision. Instead of blood, a rush of smoke and sparks burst out as the head rolled to the side of the fallen slab.
The body convulsed once, then stilled. The golden glow vanished from the eyes, leaving only empty black sockets. The smoke drifted upward, curling toward the seal in the center of the chamber.
The massive stone shuddered as the dark vapor seeped into its carved lines. Gold and black light flickered across the surface. The Djinn's voice came, not from the body, but from the air itself:
"I truly did love you…"
The words were heavy, dragging through the air. "You humans… you really are selfish. And treacherous."
With a final flash of light, the seal closed. The glow faded, leaving only the cold, lifeless stone.
I stood there, unmoving, sword still in my hand, my breathing harsh. Jideon stepped up beside me, resting a hand on my shoulder. "It's over," he said.
But Mnex's voice was anything but calm. "Over? Are you sure? That seal was broken once, it can be broken again."
I turned toward the cave entrance, the faint daylight spilling in from far away. Slowly, we began to walk out, our footsteps echoing through the silence. When the cold air hit my face, it didn't ease the burning weight still lodged in my chest, nor the image of the Djinn's last look.
Had I betrayed him? Or done what had to be done?
And if they truly meant those words… maybe they weren't wrong.
The midday sun cast its light over the rocks as we stepped out, but the cave's cold shadow still clung to our backs. The air felt clearer, yet the weight inside me remained unchanged. The Djinn's last words echoed in my mind, keeping pace with every step I took.
Jideon was silent, spear in hand, his gaze distant. Whatever questions churned in my head, he had his own, written plainly across his face.
"You should collapse the entrance completely," Mnex suggested. "That way, no one else can come along and pull the Djinn out."
I didn't answer, just stared at the jagged mouth of the cave.
Mnex pressed on. "Sending a being that strong back into a seal doesn't destroy it. You know that, don't you?"
I know, I thought. But I didn't say it out loud. I wasn't in the mood to have that conversation.
Finally, Jideon spoke. "I think… this was the right call." His tone, however, sounded more like someone trying to convince himself.
"Maybe," I said. "Or maybe we just punished someone for telling the truth."
Drawing on mana from my inner world, I blended it with pulse and earth magic, forcing the rock to cave in. Right or wrong, if I had betrayed the Djinn, I still wasn't about to give them the chance to come back for revenge.
We turned toward the river path for the journey home. The trail narrowed, shadows of the trees closing in over us. For the first time since the Djinn's presence had vanished, birdsong returned to the forest. But even that natural chorus didn't settle the unease inside me.
As the clearing where we had camped came into view across the river, I imagined Gareth waiting there. If we still had our horses, the trip would have been easier.
For now, all I wanted was to walk far enough into the quiet of the night to drown out the echo of my own unrest.