Gray let out a broken whisper, his voice hoarse and cracked.
"K—Korr?"
His vision blurred in and out, his head still pounding from being slammed into the ice. The figure before him shouldn't have been able to stand. Not like this. Last he remembered, Korr had been pale, shivering, half-frozen and barely able to move. Yet now… he wasn't just alive, he was renewed.
Fresh. Stronger.
Embers clung to Korr's skin, tiny motes of orange fire trailing from his shoulders and arms as if his body itself was breathing flame. For a heartbeat Gray wondered if he was hallucinating. But when Korr moved, when the earthshaking sound of metal colliding with flesh echoed through the chamber, Gray knew it was real.
Korr's hand, half-hardened to glinting steel by Vyre, snapped forward. He grabbed the massive axe by its head, and with a growl he ripped it free of the monster's grip. The haft cracked under his strength, splintering down the middle. He tossed the ruined weapon aside like driftwood.
Then his other fist came forward.
Gray saw veins glowing blue across Korr's arm as Vyre surged through his muscles. Metal spread up from his knuckles, turning his hand into a half-forged gauntlet. The punch landed square on the monster's chest.
The impact boomed like thunder.
The burly man staggered back, then went flying, his body slamming into the far wall. Cracks spread through the ice around him.
Gray blinked weakly, breath ragged. His body refused to move, his broken leg screaming every time he tried to shift. For a moment, he thought he would black out entirely. But then, out of the fog, another figure appeared beside him.
'Adel...'
Her steps were silent, her body shimmering with a violet haze that broke apart like smoke with every movement. Embers also clung to her frame, dimmer than Korr's but still pulsing faintly across her skin. Her amethyst eyes locked onto his face. She crouched low, inspecting him.
"Why would you even try to fight something like that? You really are stupid..." she asked, her tone sharp but not without concern.
Gray opened his mouth but only managed a rasp. Adel sighed and shook her head. Mist rolled off her shoulders, and in the next breath her body seemed almost intangible. She hooked an arm under his and, with that strange ephemeral strength, dragged him back toward the edge of the chamber.
Gray slumped against the wall, pain stabbing through his ribs. His vision swam, dizziness gnawed at his balance, and the broken leg throbbed so violently he couldn't tell if he wanted to vomit or scream. His head pounded with every heartbeat. With every breath he took he could almost feel his core churning to absorb and purify Vyre.
Yet he forced his eyes open, forced himself to stay conscious.
He wasn't going to pass out. Not now.
Another shadow emerged, Orrin, his strong frame carrying Aurelle slung over one shoulder. Aurelle hung limp, unconscious, a streak of blood running from his temple down to his jaw. Orrin lowered him beside Gray, his own breath heavy but his voice steady.
"You saved us," Orrin muttered, setting Aurelle gently against the wall. His own body was dusted with glowing embers as well. His grip on the spear in his other hand was iron.
He turned to look at the half unconscious Gray and smiled.
"We'll get out of here alive. I swear it."
Gray tried to answer but managed only a shallow nod.
Then, through the mist of firelight and blood, his eyes caught movement further down the chamber.
Lira.
She was no longer wore the same appearance as before. Her blonde hair had been burned away, replaced by a vivid blaze of orange strands that flickered like fire itself. Her golden eyes, once warm, now shone a deep , furious, molten red. Flames crawled along her arms and shoulders, her every step melting the frost beneath her boots. She wasn't just resisting the cold. She was burning it away, with small, thin threads of fire spreading from her body and clinging to others like a spiderweb.
The memory flashed in Gray's mind unbidden: that monster tribal leader who had nearly been killed by Lira.
Back then, she had done something similair. It was as if she was...burning her very body to produce stronger flames.
"Is this… what's keeping them warm?" Gray thought, his chest aching with every shallow breath. "She's sharing her fire-affinity Vyre to keep them from freezing?"
But she was also doing another thing.
She was burning her own body to make herself stronger.
He gritted his teeth and refused to let the haze of exhaustion claim him. He had to watch. He had to see.
The burly monster staggered back to its feet, blood dripping from its jaw. Its axe was gone, its body torn, but it still radiated killing intent like a storm. The drowned that littered the chamber stirred too, their mangled limbs twitching as regeneration began to knit them back together.
Lira's voice cut through the air. Sharp. Commanding.
The group moved instantly.
Adel darted forward, twin daggers gleaming with faint violet trails, cutting clean lines through the drowned. Each slash was too fast to follow, limbs falling before the creatures even realized they had been struck.
Orrin roared, his spear thrusting with enough force to crack the ice. He skewered one drowned clean through the chest, then swung the weapon sideways, slamming three of them against the ground in a brutal sweep.
Renn however, stayed at the back, his breath clouding in the frozen air, fingers aching against the icy bowstring. Each time a drowned tried to reform, he loosed an arrow, splitting their limbs apart before they could fully mend. His hands shook, not from the cold but from the weight of knowing one mistake could mean Gray and Aurelle, who were defenseless, being overrun. Still, his aim held true; every shot bought them seconds, every arrow striking clean through pale flesh and sinking into the ice with a hiss. For the first real time. He wasn't just watching. He was helping and fighting.
And at the center, Korr and Lira faced the burly man together.
The beast charged, its roar shaking the chamber, swinging the splintered axe haft like a club. Korr met him head on.
The strike slammed into his metal-forged arm, and for a heartbeat it looked as though the impact might crush him. But Korr held. His boots dug furrows into the ice, his teeth gritted.
"Not this time," he growled.
His other fist snapped up in a brutal uppercut. The monster's jaw shattered instantly, half of it dangling grotesquely from torn flesh.
Lira was there in the next instant. Her runed sword burned with searing fire, the air hissing as the edge cut clean. She carved through the beast's chest as though slicing paper. Blood sprayed, sizzling as it struck the flames.
Gray blinked hard. The wounds weren't sealing as fast. The ice that usually closed around the monster's injuries struggled against the heat.
The beast roared, staggering. It raised a hand toward its mangled jaw as if in disbelief. Korr sneered. "Shut up." He kicked forward, his heel slamming into its ribs. The sound of snapping bone echoed, and the beast staggered sideways.
Lira spun, her blade flashing once more. This time she cleaved the remaining jaw clean off. The ruined lower half of its face fell to the ground with a wet thud.
The monster shrieked, not with pain, but rage. It swung wildly, its massive hand smashing into Korr's chest and throwing him back. Drowned surged toward him, icy, skeletal hands wrapping around his arms.
The beast leapt, abandoning its human-like movements for something more feral, more monstrous. But before it could land, a spearhead whistled through the air and buried itself in its side.
The beast fell crashing, but before it could recover Orrin ripped the weapon free and rolled clear as the beasts roar bellowed. Adel appeared in its shadow, twin daggers plunging into its back. She twisted, cutting upward.
It spun to crush her, but she vanished, leaving only a purple mist.
The others pressed in. Korr freed himself from the drowned with a savage kick, then slammed his metal fist into the beast's ribs. Adel reappeared, cutting shallow lines across its shoulder. Orrin drove the spear low into its thigh, pinning it momentarily. Lira finished the assault, her burning blade carving a deep gash across its arm.
The monster roared, retreating up the frozen steps toward the altar. Blood poured down its chest. Its movements were jerky, unsteady.
Gray's heart thudded. His gaze shifted from the beast to the massive bowl atop the altar. His lips parted in a dazed murmur.
"Is it… going to pray?"
The thought chilled him. Pray to what? Or to whom?
But before he could dwell, a new sound cut through the chamber.
Wet. Squirming.
Gray turned his head toward the entrance.
A drowned stepped through. Thin. Headless. Its entire body a patchwork of scars and wounds, every inch lined with symbols of injury that should have killed it a hundred times. But each line had healed. Over and over again.
Recognition slammed into him.
That was the same drowned Aurelle had fought. The same one he had cut apart.
Gray's voice cracked. "H—How? How did it track us here? Hell...how is it even alive?"
His hairs suddenly stood up, he spun back toward the altar. The beast was gone. Only a froth of bubbles rose from the liquid inside the bowl, breaking the surface in slow, heavy bursts.
Gray's chest tightened, dread clawing up his spine.
Something was wrong.
Something was seriously wrong.