Lucian gazed at the vast cityscape before him, and for a moment, a faint headache came over him.
Nokron, Eternal City was enormous. It was nothing like the game's version, where the path was guided clearly by collapsed buildings and conveniently placed debris forming bridges to cross. Here, the sheer scale of the ruined city was overwhelming, and there were no obvious roads to follow.
In this sprawling maze of stone, finding the correct way forward on his own seemed nearly impossible.
Most of the structures had been pulverized by ancient destruction, reduced to uneven ruins where no foothold could be found.
Even the buildings that still stood intact bore the marks of devastation—massive meteorites were embedded deep into their walls and rooftops.
Those meteors were the very weapons that once destroyed the Eternal City, summoned down from the void by Astel, the Naturalborn of the Void.
The Eternal City's scale was astonishing. Judging from its scope, this district likely served as a residential area—once home to hundreds of thousands of people, perhaps even more.
But Lucian's goal lay far beyond. The hidden domain of the Black Knife Assassins—the so-called Night's Sacred Ground—was located elsewhere, separated both in distance and in function from this outer city.
Standing by a shattered window, Lucian scanned the endless ruins.
At last, he caught sight of something faint in the far distance—a weak orange glow flickering amidst the violet haze of the eternal night.
With no other landmarks to guide him, that distant light would have to serve as his compass.
Still, Lucian did not rush toward it. Instead, he began descending the stairway of the building he stood upon, intending to reach the ground.
He was curious. What truly lay at the very bottom of Nokron's abyssal depths?
But after descending several floors, he found that the lower levels were heavily damaged—walls caved in, corridors choked with debris, all veiled by the thick purple fog that obscured everything.
Lucian leapt out of a window and landed on a neighboring building.
This one was better preserved. Inside were clear signs of former life.
Furniture lay toppled across the floor, shattered utensils scattered amid a sea of dust.
Among the debris were clay tablets etched with strange, ancient symbols—texts Lucian could not understand.
He picked one up. The moment he did, he noticed something strange: everything in this place seemed frozen in time.
Aside from the physical damage caused by the city's fall, none of it bore any sign of decay or erosion.
Everything—every cup, every shard, every piece of furniture—shimmered faintly beneath a layer of silvery light.
At first, he thought it was due to the material, but upon closer inspection, that theory fell apart. There were too many different types of objects made of varying materials—wood, clay, metal—yet all bore the same silver sheen.
Lucian frowned thoughtfully. It reminded him of something—an item from the game known as Silver Tear Husk.
Its description mentioned that its dew carried a "mysterious" power.
In Elden Ring, "mystery" or "mystical" power was no mere flavor text—it implied a tangible, transformative force.
Perhaps, beneath this false night sky of Nokron, that same mysterious essence had spread through the air, coating everything in its silvery stasis.
And there was another strange difference.
The previous building he had explored was sized for ordinary humans—but this one was not.
Though the architectural style was identical, the proportions inside were drastically different.
The ceilings soared high overhead, the doors and windows were massive—built for beings three or four meters tall.
So this part of Nokron might once have belonged to another race entirely.
Yet, despite the abundance of ruins, there was one thing completely missing—something that should have been everywhere.
There were no bodies. Not a single corpse.
Puzzled, Lucian continued downward.
This building's staircase remained mostly intact. Though parts were damaged by fallen meteors, it was still possible to descend by jumping between platforms.
Along the way, Lucian peeked into several rooms, but again found no remains of life—only relics of the Nox civilization's daily existence.
Perhaps, he thought, these could be excavated later for study.
Eventually, he came across the first living thing he'd seen in the city.
A writhing, silver mass.
It slithered across the floor of a room—an amorphous blob of liquid metal, pulsing faintly with life.
The moment it noticed him, the silver mass reacted.
Its liquid form reared upward, coalescing into a sharp spike—and thrust toward him.
Lucian sidestepped easily and caught the spike with one hand.
It felt hard—like solid steel—but beneath the rigid shell, he could sense liquid movement.
He clenched his hand tighter, and with a single squeeze, the spike snapped in two. Silvery fluid splattered across the floor.
With a casual flick, Lucian shook the fluid off his hand—it had almost no stickiness.
The silver creature pulled back what was left of its spike, reshaping its body for another strike.
Lucian didn't rush. He wanted to observe.
The Silver Tear seemed incapable of pain. It extended another spear-like limb and lunged again.
This time, Lucian slashed his hand through the air—a blade of wind shot forth, cutting the creature cleanly in half.
But the blow had little effect. The two halves quivered and quickly flowed back together, merging into one.
So, it had resistance to slashing attacks.
Lucian changed tactics. He plunged his hand directly into the writhing mass.
The creature immediately hardened its entire body in defense—but it was already too late.
From within Lucian's palm, a miniature storm erupted, blasting the creature apart. Silver droplets splattered across the room.
When the air settled, nothing stirred.
He searched through the remains, but found no core.
As he recalled, these "Silver Tears" were the weakest of Nokron's living constructs—low-level mimetic beings, capable only of minor shapeshifting.
They could harden parts of their body for attack or defense, but nothing more.
More advanced variants could wield lightning.
And at the pinnacle stood the Mimic Tears—creatures capable of perfectly replicating other living forms, even their power.
To Lucian, that was the true prize.
Within each Mimic Tear lay a Larval Tear, a rare core used in the secret art of "rebirth."
The Queen of the Full Moon had used that art to give birth to her frail, short-lived children—imperfect rebirths born of an incomplete ritual.
The key to completing that ritual was the Amber Egg she clutched—the gift Radagon had given her, which contained the Great Rune of the Unborn.
By channeling the Great Rune's power through Larval Tears, one could restore the rebirth ritual's perfection.
But Great Runes had to be restored at Divine Towers to regain their strength—and the Great Rune of the Unborn had no such tower.
Thus, the Larval Tears served as a substitute—a material through which its dormant power could be awakened.
If he could find some here, he would finally be able to prepare the body he intended to create for Melina.
Lucian stepped over the puddle of silver remains and continued descending.
A few floors lower, he reached an impasse.
The lower levels were completely submerged in water.
From the window, he saw it—a vast, silent sea.
The Eternal City was drowned.
The water stretched endlessly, smooth as a mirror, reflecting the shimmering false stars of the cavern ceiling.
Once a radiant city of life, now only a dead silence remained.
Beneath the still surface, countless bones lay scattered.
Time seemed frozen—the disaster eternal.
Every skeleton lay in the exact moment of their death, forever preserved in the depths.
They had perished with their city, their history buried together in this sunken tomb.
Lucian studied them.
Some were crushed by falling debris, others sliced cleanly in half.
These were not meteor casualties.
No—the cause was clear. These were the work of Astel's younglings.
It seemed that when the Eternal City was destroyed, not only the adult Astel had descended, but many of its offspring as well.
The meteors had wreaked havoc, yes—but not enough to erase the city from existence.
The true destruction came from the slaughter of its inhabitants.
Among the countless skeletons, Lucian noticed several that were enormous—five or six meters tall.
Not human, nor Nox, nor Nightfolk.
Perhaps the descendants of giants—the same kind of beings whose remains adorned the ancient thrones.
It all suggested that while the Nox civilization had once been powerful, they lacked supreme strength.
If they had possessed true might, they would not have needed to create Mimic Tears in their search for a "Lord of Night."
Nor would they have fallen so completely to Astel's wrath.
Maybe their champions had died, or vanished. And in desperation, they turned to artificial gods.
Lucian frowned. The theory fit. The "Black Knife" assassins, the Night of the Black Knives—it all aligned.
Perhaps their strongest warriors had been taken by the Fingers, leaving their empire defenseless.
Regardless, the Nox's technology was still impressive.
Even in the game, the Mimic Tear had saved Lucian's life countless times.
Now, however, he had to find a way across.
The city's lower levels were flooded; he could no longer walk.
So he would have to leap between buildings.
Lucian took aim at the nearest structure—and jumped.
Then again, from window to window, rooftop to rooftop, making steady progress toward the orange glow.
He hadn't gone far when he spotted something through a shattered window ahead—a pale skull, massive, its back turned toward him.
A pair of enormous mandibles framed it.
Astel, hung suspended upside down, motionless.
It seemed to be asleep.
Lucian's lips curved slightly. What luck.
So there was still one left here.
Quietly, he crept closer, step by step.
When he reached its back, he summoned the Starscourge Greatsword from his spatial disk—one blade in each hand—and swung.
The twin swords bit deep into the creature's stony spine.
Astel screeched, awakening in agony, writhing violently.
Instinctively, it summoned gravity magic, trying to repel the embedded blades.
Lucian answered by unleashing the sword's skill—Starcaller Cry.
Gravity flared along the blades, clashing with Astel's own power.
The spell failed.
And with one final surge, the creature's massive head was cleaved from its body.
Lucian seized it before it fell and dragged it inside, as the body plummeted into the water below with a thunderous splash.
He laid the enormous skull before him and began dismantling it.
The pale, bony shell was useless; he shattered it easily and extracted two things of value—deep blue crystalline eyes and a pair of heavy mandibles.
Those mandibles contained the essence of gravitational lightning, perfect for crafting a weapon like the Fallingstar Beast Jaw.
He continued onward, slaying two more Astel younglings and several lurking Silver Tears along the way, collecting materials as he went.
It wasn't difficult, though the conscious Astels required a few minutes each to subdue.
At last, he arrived at the source of the orange light.
It was not a campfire, but the lanterns embedded along the stone walls of a colossal well shaft that pierced both heaven and earth.
If he remembered correctly, the path to the Night's Sacred Ground lay near such a well.
He approached, peering along the massive structure—and there, built into the wall of the cavern, he finally spotted it: a faint golden shimmer.
A Site of Grace.
Leaping across the broken ruins, Lucian landed within the ancient structure and reached the glowing mark.
But he was not the first to arrive.
There, soaked to the bone and dripping wet, stood Blaidd.