Vera soared across the sky, the wind lashing against her skin like a wild current—tugging at her clothes, needling her senses—but never quite managing to overwhelm the sheer force of her momentum.
There really wasn't much else like it.
She got a little too caught up in the exhilaration of it all again, veering slightly off course, but within half an hour of leaving the estate, her Breaksteps carried her to the easternmost ridge of Duskfall Vale. There, she landed atop a jagged outcrop overlooking one of the many passages leading out of the valley—a wide, forked canyon that split into multiple winding trails threading through the mountains.
In the game, this had been a mid-to-high-level grinding spot, with mobs scattered along the trails for easy farming. But now, as far as she could see, the entire area was silent. Still. Devoid of life.
She figured that was probably a result of this world no longer being dictated by spawn timers or aggro radii. The beasts and creatures here likely behaved more like real fauna, which meant they'd be guided by instinct and habit rather than scripted patterns.
Still, it might've been more than that.
The Hollowmaw Sentinels Caldrin had mentioned were supposed to be the most dangerous creatures in the region. If they'd begun prowling in force, it wouldn't be surprising if everything else had fled… or been devoured.
You might expect to see them in that case, but Sentinel-class monsters had notoriously extensive patrol routes in the game. Some could cover half a zone on their own.
Which might've raised the question of how she planned to actually find one.
But honestly? That part felt easy.
Stillwake shimmered into her hand with a whisper of metal, and she shaped a pale sigil into the air before her.
Mark of the Stillbound Veil.
From the glyph, near-invisible threads of Resonance unraveled outward, spinning into a widening radial web. At first, the strands only brushed the area immediately around her. But as the sigil-scars on her hands flared to life and she funneled more power into them, the threads surged forward, sliding through stone, across sheer drops, and into the winding gullies and dense overgrowth in the valley below.
Tiny presences pinged back into her awareness—small animals, insects, maybe some birds—but she ignored them, pushing the Mark further and expanding its reach.
It soon exceeded the range she'd used back at the estate when searching for Caldrin. Still, she kept feeding it Resonance, even as she began to actually feel the slow but steady pull on her reserves. Thankfully, it wasn't anything too draining. Nowhere near what Hollow Reach had cost her crossing the entire valley.
Eventually, she sensed it.
Something large. Heavy. Unmoving. Hungry.
It sat deep in the canyon ahead. She couldn't gauge the exact distance, but it was well beyond the midpoint of the passage.
Mentally marking the location, Vera let Stillwake fall through the air.
Mark of Hollow Reach.
Reality split without drama.
She appeared beneath a looming stone overhang, the canyon stretching wide before her in a slow, curving bend. Shafts of sunlight filtered weakly through the canopy above, streaking down between errant branches and fractured cliff ridges.
The presence she'd sensed was just ahead. Maybe a couple hundred meters, just past the next bend.
And now that she was here, she could feel it more clearly. The oppressive weight of stillness. Not a feral tension, but more like the overly distinct lack of it.
She was reasonably certain that meant she'd found her target. And it didn't appear to have noticed her yet.
Perfect.
Time for final preparations.
First up: loadout swap.
Stillwake stayed, of course—but her casual gear didn't.
With a smooth motion, she shrugged off her outwardly travel-worn mantle and let it fold in on itself before vanishing into the Vaultring's dark shimmer. In its place, she drew out the Umbral-etched Lamina, which was an obsidian-black piece of fabric, stiff with reinforced lining and marked by rugged traceries like lightning frozen in steel. It was slightly heavier than what she'd gotten used to in the past day, but not unfamiliar. It sacrificed a bit of balance and speed in exchange for a significant resistance boost to soulrend effects.
Next came the Ossenguard Greaves. She stepped into them one at a time, the locking mechanisms hissing faintly as they sealed around her legs. Hardened alloy over impact-absorbent mesh. They looked functional and durable, and despite their apparent bulk, were decently optimized for movement. Most importantly, they granted her stagger resistance along with an overall modest stat boost.
Her hands were soon covered with the Challice Wrathbinds, the lacquered bands pulsing as they latched on. Faint red-gold sigils sparked along the surface, then shimmered down along Stillwake's hilt as if syncing with the halberd's sigils.
Interesting.
She pulled her hair back and fastened the Circlet of Quiet Flame into place, the three dark-gem points flickering softly as they settled just above her brow. The ambient noise around her seemed to dip somewhat, her perception sharpening in its absence. At the same time, she felt how her Resonance grew more anchored, which she supposed was the interference resistances at work.
Then came the Mantled Aegis.
She had to brace herself as she summoned it. The chestplate was thick, layered with sigil-threaded reinforcement and carved from pure godsmarrow that radiated with a low thrum. She typically never used this gear piece—a bit too clunky for her taste—but it absorbed impact shocks and helped the channeling of Fifth Seal Marks, which could prove useful here.
The moment it locked against her frame, she could feel the difference. Like someone had widened the conduit between thought and invocation. It took a couple of shoulder rolls to work out the stiffness, but it wasn't as unwieldy as she'd feared.
Finally, she added a few rings and trinkets she normally avoided for aesthetic reasons—a dull copper band that boosted raw strength, a slightly garish pendant that cut RP cost on movement Seals by twelve percent. Things like that.
Her usual getup was fine for roaming, mapping, or idle duels. She wore it because she liked its simple, clean look. While no piece in that loadout was below Mythic, most sat at the lower end of that range. The only Legacy-tier items were Stillwake and her armband, the Oathbinder's Coil—both fixtures in nearly all her builds.
For serious combat, she had multiple dedicated loadouts depending on the fight. Her current setup added two more Legacy-tier pieces: the Mantled Aegis and the Circlet of Quiet Flame. Not her most powerful build overall, but likely the best one for this opponent.
Hollowmaw Sentinels usually didn't call for this level of prep, but this wasn't just another mini-boss rotation. This was her first real engagement in a world where failure might actually mean something.
Next came the buffs.
From her Vaultring, she summoned and uncorked a Resonant Phial of Ashwake—good for flat RP regen—and downed it in one go. The liquid was bitter, almost metallic, and it made her grimace as a warmth settled into her core. Seconds later, she felt something in her chest steady.
Then came an Elixir of Echo-Skin, coating her veins with a flicker of ambient warding, followed by a sprinkle of Palebinding Dust over her boots. Not flashy, but the consumable was useful for further boosting her stance against heavy stagger effects.
She cracked open a Veilshade Capsule for good measure. A translucent black haze clung to her armor like mist. It wasn't foolproof, since the effect would break the moment she attacked, and it wasn't meant for higher-level opponents, but on the off chance it bought her even a few seconds of unspotted movement, it was worth it.
She tapped her knuckle twice.
One of her Mythic rings, Silent Concord—earned from the Trial of Echoforms—activated. It let her pre-cast and store the invocation of up to seven Seals of Marks. She queued up a Mark of Hollow Reach and a Mark of Ashen Slip, just in case she needed to make a quick escape.
A quick inventory check confirmed her Echophials and Emberphials were fully stocked, for if she needed bursts of RP and health restoration.
She had enough to drown a small household.
With that, she was ready. In fact, she felt like she could take on a dragon.
Vera moved forward, rounding the canyon bend cautiously, then stopped.
The Hollowmaw Sentinel hunched at the far end of the bend, half-shrouded in stone shadows and streaks of light. Massive—easily four meters tall—its body was a grotesque lattice of blackened bone-plate and pale, marrow-slick protrusions. The silhouette was vaguely human, but wrong in every important way: arms too long, legs jointed backward for lunging. In the center of its chest, nestled like a parasite, yawned a vertical, fanged maw, pulsing with sickly amber light. Like a throat frozen mid-scream.
A low, guttural groan seeped from its core as it turned. No eyes. No face. Just an endless, gaping wound of Resonance.
Vera tightened her grip on Stillwake, then shot forward.
Breakstep.
She became a blur of motion, aiming low along the canyon floor.
The Hollowmaw Sentinel noticed—and reacted—faster than it had any right to with that body. It uncoiled from its crouch with a violent twist, one elongated arm slamming down like a piledriver to intercept her.
She didn't stop.
Riftwheel Twist.
The Second Seal Form took over. Vera pivoted sharply, halberd slicing the air in a tight arc, a burst of wind and red-hot dust spiraling out as she redirected.
The Sentinel's blow smashed into the ground where she'd been an instant earlier, exploding in a steaming crater that shook the canyon walls.
A shockwave rippled out. Vera grunted, riding the edge of it, skidding wide and catching herself with Stillwake's haft braced into the stone.
Alright, then. So it had some teeth.
The Sentinel lunged, chest-maw flaring, and swung its other arm in a savage, sweeping arc.
This time, Vera met it.
Binding Coil.
Stillwake spun in her grip, a vortex of shimmering force bursting outward. The Sentinel slammed into it and jolted to a halt, feet scraping against stone, caught in the swirling pressure. Step by step, it forced its way forward.
Vera watched with some interest.
That gave her a good baseline for the strength of that Form. She'd actually put decent force into that one.
She poured more Resonance into the vortex. The Sentinel staggered back half a step.
That was enough for her.
The vortex collapsed as she launched herself skyward, Crescent Severance igniting. Ten flickering lunar afterimages trailed behind as she descended, the blade cutting wide in an overhead cleave.
The Sentinel raised its arms, but the strikes tore through, bone-plate and blackened mass scattering. It reeled but didn't fall.
Vera landed already shifting into a Third Seal Form.
Hollow Piercing.
A brutal forward thrust. Stillwake's crown drove between its ribs—if they could be called that—and Resonance spiderwebbed from the impact. The chest-maw convulsed in a silent shriek.
The Sentinel flew back, gouging deep furrows in the stone before slamming both fists into the earth. It rose in a stagger, maw flaring—and a low Resonance pulse rolled out, more felt than heard. Vera's center of gravity lurched, like her soul was being dragged toward a bottomless, whispering chasm.
Then… nothing. The pull broke. She didn't even slow.
She exhaled through her nose.
Had that been… soulrending?
Frankly, it was underwhelming.
Something in her wanted to laugh. To scoff in quiet contempt. If that was its best trick, she felt inclined to show it the real deal.
Stillwake twirled once in her hands, blade flashing in a tight, fluid spin. Four clean, angled cuts split the air, each marked by a ghostly flare of gray light. A sigil unfurled in the wake of the last stroke, like a wound torn upon existence.
Mark of Withering Hollow.
A not-insignificant amount of Resonance drained from her.
The Sentinel stilled.
Its maw trembled.
A silent shudder rippled through the air, twisting reality like pressure underwater. No visible wound. No flare of impact. Just a quiet distortion as the creature's entire form began to convulse.
Its limbs jerked once. Twice.
Then they began to splinter.
The pale light in its chest guttered and died.
It collapsed.
Vera blinked.
Did she just… one-shot a level 225 mini-boss with a single Fifth Seal Mark?
She'd expected to weaken it. Maybe cripple it and finish it with a follow-up. But not end it outright. Soulrend, in the game, was far from a finisher. If it went unresisted, it debuffed stats and halved regen. That was it.
Then again… this wasn't a game anymore.
She rocked lightly on her heels for a few seconds.
Then clicked her tongue in mild annoyance.
That was far too anticlimactic. She shouldn't have used a Fifth Seal so early.
Stillwake hummed quietly in her grip as she reached inward again, pouring Resonance into a second Mark of the Stillbound Veil. Threads of power spiraled through the terrain—and there. Another presence further down the canyon. Bigger. Heavier.
Vera smiled.
"Round two," she murmured, and started moving.