The chains sang through the abyss. Their iron voices rose with each clash, each scream, each body that fell and was swallowed by the dark. Yet above, on the terraces of the Eclipse Sect, there was no chaos. Only silence.
Hundreds of disciples lined the balconies that ringed the trial grounds. Outer disciples pressed shoulder to shoulder, leaning over the balustrades, their faces pale with awe and fear. Inner Disciples—those who had already survived the pit years ago—stood taller, their expressions carved in stone, as if reliving their own descent with every clang below.
The elders occupied the high dais, their robes of midnight silk trailing across steps of polished obsidian. No disciple dared whisper in their presence. Their gazes were fixed upon the pit, eyes shining with cold light, reflecting every flicker of torchfire from below.
The abyss was a mirror, and every heart in the sect was forced to peer into it.
From the highest terrace, behind a veil of woven silver threads, the Observatory loomed. Its dome was black crystal, veins of pale light running through it like cracks in glass. It did not speak with a voice, but all present felt its pressure, as if a presence leaned against the soul itself.
Now and then, faint words shimmered across the threads of the veil, glyphs of light that vanished before they could be properly read. The elders watched them, unreadable. The outer disciples could only tremble.
"The pit is restless this year," murmured Elder Varaxes, his eyes narrow. His face was gaunt, his fingers clasped in sleeves that draped like a shroud. "Do you hear how the chains groan? They hunger."
"They always hunger," Elder Ysera replied softly, though her gaze did not waver. Her silver hair gleamed against the torchlight. "But I will admit—something stirs deeper than usual. I feel it in the qi. The pit resents being disturbed."
A ripple of screams rose from below, high and sharp, only to be cut short.
Several outer disciples flinched. One girl pressed her knuckles to her lips. Another muttered, "Already? It hasn't even been an hour…"
"Fools," sneered a senior disciple nearby. "Did you think the trial would wait for them to find courage? The abyss swallows the unready first. Always."
The girl's eyes fell, shame flooding her cheeks.
But even as the crowd whispered, there was a ripple of attention that drew every gaze downward.
A figure moved across the battlefield—not with fury, not with desperate frenzy, but with a stillness that carved through chaos. His strikes were efficient, measured. When a disciple swung a chain at him, he turned the motion, made the chain his own, and struck with it before the wielder realized his mistake. He did not waste breath. He did not waste movement.
"Who is that?" someone whispered.
"Outer disciple Draven Noctis," came a reply from one of the record-keepers, his voice thin as reed-paper. "Recently ascended from the Shadow Courts. His performance has been… adequate, if quiet, until now."
Adequate. A word like dust. And yet, in that moment, the silence of the elders grew heavier.
"Not raw strength," Elder Varaxes murmured. "But calculation."
"Calculation in the abyss can matter more than strength," Ysera countered. "Look how he waits, how he lets others burn themselves. He lets the pit feed on their panic."
Across the pit, Veyra's laughter rang out again, a clarion peal that cut through the shrieks. Chains coiled and snapped around her in wide arcs, felling any who dared approach. Her followers pressed behind her, carving a swathe of destruction.
"Now that," one elder said with satisfaction, "is how an Inner Disciple is made. Dominance. Command. She bends fear itself into a weapon."
Murmurs of agreement rippled among the high ranks. Veyra's name was already written in half the ledgers.
And yet, while their eyes drank her brilliance, the Observatory stirred.
Light shimmered across its veil—fractured glyphs, barely legible, but sharp enough to sear themselves into memory:
The chain unseen outlasts the chain displayed.
The words flickered, then died.
A chill spread through the dais. Several elders shifted uneasily. The Observatory had not whispered during the trials for many years. When it did, its words were never wasted.
Ysera's gaze slid back toward Draven, whose dark figure slipped once more into shadow.
"You see," she murmured. "The pit does not admire loudness. It admires patience."
Elder Varaxes frowned, but said nothing.
In the lower terraces, among the swarm of outer disciples, arguments broke out in hushed tones.
"Veyra will sweep them all," one boy said, breathless. "Do you see how she carves through them? She's unstoppable."
"Unstoppable until someone strikes when her guard is down," another muttered. "Even the strongest bleed."
"You doubt her? You'll eat those words when she ascends. Mark me, she'll be an Elder one day."
"And what of Noctis?"
That name hung in the air like smoke. Few had noticed him before. Now, too many had.
"I don't like the way he moves," one disciple admitted. "He doesn't fight like us. It's as though he's already seen this trial before."
The debates spread, echoing from terrace to terrace. Draven's name traveled upward as surely as Veyra's laughter rang downward. In less than an hour, the abyss had birthed two currents in the hearts of the sect—one bright, blazing, obvious; the other quiet, coiled, hidden.
And all the while, the Observatory watched.
Elders exchanged looks. The Grand Elder did not move, his eyes fixed upon the chaos below, but his long fingers tightened on the rail of his throne. He, too, had seen the glyphs.
Beneath the veil, the Observatory shimmered once more.
Chains chosen are chains broken. Chains borne are chains unbroken.
The words flared, then vanished, leaving silence as suffocating as the abyss.
The elders said nothing. They did not need to.
The abyss roared on, disciples fell screaming, and the trial devoured its own.
And far below, two figures moved—one in blazing arcs of silver chain, the other in silence, weaving patience into power.
Both ascended in the eyes of the sect that night.
But only one carried the whisper of the Observatory at his back.