The cavern stank of blood and smoke, but no time was given to breathe.
As the last echo of the beast's death cry faded, new chains slithered down from the ceiling like serpents, their iron links clinking with hungry rhythm. They coiled not around wrists this time, but around ankles, sinking into flesh with barbed hooks that made every survivor stagger as they fastened tight.
Yorin gasped in pain, nearly collapsing until Draven caught his shoulder and steadied him. The boy's face was pale, his lips trembling from exhaustion and blood loss. Draven leaned close, whispering low enough that only Yorin could hear.
"Don't collapse now. That would be a waste."
The Overseer's mask shimmered back into existence high above, luminous against the shadows. Its voice poured down, dripping with cruel mirth.
"You thought it finished? Fools. The Hollow does not grant victory—it only feeds upon your suffering. The beast was your gate. Now, walk through the door it left behind."
The chains pulled tight, dragging the six survivors forward. Seraphine squealed in delight as she stumbled along, her partner crying out with each hook that tore deeper into his ankles. Gorath cursed, wrenching forward with raw strength, dragging his Silent Veil partner along whether she wished it or not.
The stone floor shifted beneath them, slabs rearranging into a stairwell that descended into black. A wind rose from below—cold, dry, reeking of rot and rust.
Draven narrowed his eyes. Another stage. No pause. They want us bleeding, broken, driven mad. They want the weak to consume themselves.
The chains yanked again, forcing them into the abyss.
The stairway spiraled downward into a cavern lit by a pale crimson glow. The ceiling was a lattice of iron bars, and beyond it shapes writhed—shadowed things with too many limbs, scraping claws across the iron as though desperate to be let in.
At the cavern's center rose a circular pit lined with spikes of bone and rusted steel. The air shimmered with heat and stench.
The Overseer's voice reverberated, smooth and sharp as a knife.
"Enter the Hollow Pit. Chains at your feet, blood on your hands. Six enter. How many climb out? That is yours to decide."
The ground shifted, tilting them toward the pit's lip. They had no choice but to stumble forward, forced by the chains into the arena below.
The instant their feet hit the floor, a roar split the cavern.
Figures emerged from hidden gates—twelve of them. Not chained beasts this time, but disciples like themselves. Or rather, failed disciples. Their flesh was scarred, eyes glazed with madness, teeth filed down to points. They wore the remnants of sect robes in tatters, their chains rusted into their bones.
The Overseer's laugh slid through the air.
"The Hollow never wastes. Those who fail, I recycle. Their flesh serves as trial, their madness as lesson. If you falter, this is your fate."
The failed disciples shrieked, surging forward with inhuman strength, dragging their rusted chains like weapons.
Yorin froze, horror etched across his face. "They… they were us…"
"Not anymore," Draven said coldly, yanking him back as the first maddened disciple lunged with a chain-whip strike that split stone.
Seraphine shrieked in delight, hurling herself forward with her dagger. She used her chained partner as a shield, ramming him into the oncoming foe so she could slice at its throat. Blood fountained as her partner screamed, caught between both blows.
"Dance, dance, dance!" she cackled.
Gorath bellowed, his axe crashing into two of the failed ones at once, hacking through rusted chain and flesh alike. His Silent Veil partner flickered behind him, cutting throats with surgical precision whenever his strikes left openings.
The pit erupted in slaughter.
Draven pulled Yorin with him, weaving between the chaos. He struck only when certain—one thrust through a throat, one slash across a wrist to disarm. His focus was survival, not spectacle. Every strike precise, every movement economical.
But the failed disciples were relentless. One lunged at Yorin, its teeth snapping for his face. Draven shoved Yorin aside and drove his blade through its skull, ichor splattering hot against his cheek. He did not even flinch.
Yorin gasped, trembling. "Why… why do they keep pushing us? Haven't we proven enough?"
Draven's eyes flickered to the Overseer's mask above. It gleamed with silent laughter.
"Because enough does not exist here," he murmured. "There is only more."
A shriek cut across the pit. One of the failed disciples had torn Seraphine's partner's throat open with its teeth. The Bellhound boy gurgled, thrashing as his blood sprayed across the stone. Seraphine only laughed louder, using his collapsing body to pivot herself into a killing slash that gutted her attacker.
"Dead weight at last!" she sang, dancing through blood.
The survivors dwindled to five.
The Overseer's voice coiled through the pit, dripping approval.
"Yes. Yes. The strong rise, the weak rot. Feed the Hollow with your choices."
The failed disciples pressed in harder. Draven's ankle-chains burned as they tightened, forcing him to fight with limited movement. He adapted, using the weight of the chains to trip and snap, twisting them around enemy limbs to drag foes off balance before delivering killing thrusts.
Beside him, Yorin's panic began to give way to grim rhythm. His chant faltered but rose again, the syllables weaving faint shadows of restraint around their foes. It slowed them just enough for Draven's blade to find purchase.
"Better," Draven muttered.
The carnage spiraled higher. Gorath's axe grew slick with gore. The Silent Veil girl bled from three wounds but still moved like a wraith. Seraphine twirled, her laughter unbroken even as blood soaked her hair.
One by one, the failed disciples fell.
When the twelfth collapsed, twitching in a pool of its own filth, silence returned. Only five figures remained standing: Draven and Yorin, Gorath and the Silent Veil girl, and Seraphine, alone and grinning amid corpses.
The Overseer's mask loomed lower, its smile stretched wide.
"Five. Five knives sharper than before. Five threads wound tighter. The Hollow smiles upon your ruin."
The ankle-chains slackened, sliding free. Blood dripped from every survivor, every breath ragged.
But the Overseer gave no reprieve.
"The Pit closes. The Gate opens. March."
Stone ground open at the far wall, revealing yet another passage, dark and yawning.
Draven exhaled slowly, his blade dripping. Yorin sagged against him, barely able to walk. The others glared at each other across the field of corpses, suspicion burning hotter than exhaustion.
Five knives indeed. Each one honed sharper with every forced trial.
Draven's gaze flicked once more to the Overseer's mask. You forge us in fire, but fire leaves only ash. I will decide who burns.
And he stepped forward into the next darkness.