Chapter 79 – The Room of Truth
The air was thick enough to choke on.
Every rune carved into the chamber's walls pulsed like veins of molten fire trapped beneath stone. Their light rose and fell in an uneven rhythm, as if the room itself were breathing. Dust drifted down from the ceiling in lazy spirals, glowing faintly in the dark-red glow.
The coffin at the center of the chamber began to shake again.
The first tremor was subtle—a faint shiver, a shift in weight. Then the vibrations deepened, rattling the stone floor beneath Blake's boots. Thin cracks spider-webbed across the slab, and small chips flaked off the edges. Sand trickled from between joints in the ceiling, whispering down over their shoulders.
Blake's hands dropped to the hilts of his twin swords without him consciously deciding to move. The familiar weight grounded him. Toxic essence coiled in his veins like something awake and eager.
"Lysa," he said, eyes never leaving the coffin. "Get behind me."
She didn't move.
She stood a few steps to his right, cloak dusted with grit, pale hair tangled around her face. Her eyes were fixed on the shifting stone, wide but not entirely afraid—more calculating than panicked.
The lid slid aside with a sound like thunder smothered by sand.
A rasping chuckle rose from within the coffin—low, drawn-out, and dry enough that Blake's skin prickled. It sounded like a man who had laughed so long his throat turned to ash.
"Ahh… so two souls have wandered into my tomb today."
The voice did not come from the coffin alone. It rippled through the air, seeped from the walls, vibrated in their bones. Even the runes seemed to shudder in answer.
Blake swallowed, his grip tightening on the wrapped leather of his sword handles. "Yeah," he muttered under his breath. "Fantastic."
The door behind them remained sealed. No help was coming. No one even knew where they were.
It was just him, Lysa…
and whatever had just woken up.
A shadow shifted inside the coffin.
Something rose slowly, joints creaking like old wood. As it straightened, the red light caught on gray, shriveled skin stretched too thin over bone. Golden wrappings clung to its frame in cracked, fraying bands, some fused into the flesh, others hanging loose. Symbols were embroidered into the cloth in a language Blake couldn't read—sharp lines and spirals that made his eyes ache if he stared too long.
Two chains of dull silver were coiled around its torso and arms, each link etched with tiny sealing runes that hissed softly whenever the creature moved. The sound was like steam escaping from a closed pipe.
Its face was a skull given a thin layer of dried leather. No lips, just cracked skin pulled back from teeth. Its eye sockets blazed with deep amber light, like embers buried under a mound of ash.
The mummy inhaled—a horrible, rattling drag of air that sounded like it had to remind its lungs how to work.
Its gaze fell on Blake first.
"One with the scent of venom…"
The voice was a murmur and a growl at once, each word older than the dust beneath their feet.
"A poison core."
Blake's jaw clenched. Poison aura flickered around him in response, the scent of acrid venom faintly rising off his skin.
The mummy's head turned, stiff and deliberate, until those burning amber eyes settled on Lysa. It inhaled again, deeper this time, nostrils flaring as if savoring the air.
"And the other…"
A pause.
"Ah, radiant at first glance. A core of light—no."
The flames in its sockets flared brighter.
"It's Not light. I smell the darkness beneath it. You reek of the Dark Masters."
Blake blinked once. Then again.
"What's it talking about?" he asked, eyes darting to Lysa.
She took a step back, shoulders tensing. "It's lying."
The mummy's dried throat vibrated with something like amusement.
"Lying?"
Its head tilted at a grotesque angle.
"I was ancient when your masters were newborn gods. Do not insult me, little puppet."
The temperature in the room dropped. Their breath fogged faintly in the air. The runes along the walls dimmed for a heartbeat, then flared again—this time tinged with a sickly, deeper red.
Blake's instinct screamed that something in the room had just changed.
And it had nothing to do with the corpse in chains.
Silence stretched thin as wire between them.
Lysa's face was turned slightly away, hair shadowing her eyes. For a heartbeat, Blake saw the version of her he recognized—quiet, tired, always a little worn around the edges. The girl who took notes too seriously, who made dry comments at Blake's jokes but still listened anyway.
Then she lifted her head.
And smiled.
It wasn't the small, reluctant curl of lips she usually offered at someone else's stupidity. It was slow, precise. A smile with edges. The kind of smile that fit better on someone watching a fire than someone caught in one.
Her eyes darkened as he watched. The pale blue he'd seen a hundred times turned muddy, then ink-black, swallowing the light entirely. There was no glow. No reflection. Just void.
Blake's fingers tightened around his sword hilts. He took a step back before he even realized he was moving.
The mummy's laughter rattled the air, dry and delighted. Dust drifted from the ceiling in a thin veil.
"Yes," it crooned. "There it is. The mark of shadow. One of the Dark Masters has claimed you."
Blake's chest felt too tight. His voice came out rough. "You…?"
He didn't finish the sentence. The word he wanted—why?—choked in his throat and died.
He settled on something harder instead.
"You walked with us," he said. "You trained with us. You ate at our table. You were part of our family."
Lysa's smile sharpened. The air around her seemed to bleed darker, shadows clinging to her form like eager hands.
"I was never part of your family, Blake," she said softly. "I walked with you because I was told to."
Her tone held no apology. No regret. Only truth, spoken like fact.
The mummy shifted inside its chains, silver links clinking softly.
"How delicious," it murmured. "Light and darkness… now turned to blades."
Blake didn't say anything.
Something had gone very still inside of him.
Not calm. Not shock.
Just… cold.
The stillness shattered.
Blake's twin swords came free with a whisper of steel. Poison essence surged through his veins and spilled into the air, tinting it faintly green. Where a drop of condensed venom fell from his blade's tip and struck the floor, the stone smoked.
He stared at her—not as a comrade. Not even as a stranger.
As an enemy.
"Dark Masters," he said quietly. "I should've known."
Lysa studied the blades with clinical interest. "You really mean to kill me?"
"You were spying on us the whole time." His voice never rose, but the poison aura flared more violently. "You want a discussion after that?"
Her smile flattened into something colder. "Awe… poor Blake can't handle a little betrayal."
"Yeah," he said. "Looks like I gotta take out the trash now."
He moved.
Venom light exploded off the ground as he pushed off, his body becoming a streak of green-tinted shadow. His right sword came in first, a diagonal slash aimed at her shoulder. Lysa's darkness gathered around her arm in an instant, coalescing into a jagged shortblade. Metal met shadow with a screech as the two clashed.
Shockwaves rattled the coffin.
Blake's left sword followed, stabbing for her stomach. Lysa twisted, the blade skimming across her ribs instead, carving a thin line of blood. Steam rose where his poison met her skin.
Her eyes narrowed. The room's shadows thickened and lunged.
Black tendrils shot up from the floor and walls, grasping for his wrists and ankles. Blake snarled and spun, his swords drawing glowing arcs. Every tendril he cut hissed as venom ate through it, leaving holes in the writhing darkness.
She staggered. He pressed, slashing three times in quick succession.
One cut her forearm. Another clipped her thigh. The third nearly took her throat, forcing her to jerk back hard enough that she gasped.
The mummy chuckled, voice echoing off the ceiling.
"Who knew revealing darkness would be so fun."
Lysa took a longer step back, forcing space between them. Shadows gathered deeper beneath her boots, swirling like ink in water.
He prowled forward, swords low, shoulders relaxed in the way that said attack could come from any angle.
He blurred.
The next exchange happened faster than breath.
His right blade met her shadow weapon. His left stabbed for her heart. A wall of darkness sprang up in the way at the last instant—he cut through it, but the impact deflected his aim, turning a killing strike into one that ripped open her flank instead.
Lysa hissed, stumbling. Her blood hit the floor—dark, almost black in the crimson light.
Blake did not hesitate. He drove a boot into the wound he'd made, forcing more venom into her system. She went down on one knee, hands hitting the stone.
He stepped back just enough to avoid the desperate counterlash of shadow that exploded from her body, slamming into the walls and ceiling instead.
"You should of thought twice before working with the dark masters" he said.
Her breath came ragged now, but her smile returned—thin, razor-edged. "You think this is over?" she whispered. "You have no idea what you've walked into."
"Don't need to," he said. "I just know John wants them gone. That's enough for me."
He raised both swords.
Almost
He moved in for the finish.
His blades lifted high, venom burning bright along the edges. Every instinct he had pushed forward, demanding blood.
Lysa watched him with those deep, empty eyes. For a heartbeat, there was no fear there at all—only a strange, calm curiosity.
"At least," she said quietly, "you're consistent."
He brought the swords down.
Her hand flicked.
A small, black disk flashed into existence between her fingers—a coin-sized circle of pure darkness, etched with twisting runes that seemed to move if he looked at them directly. The air warped around it the instant it appeared, sounds muffling, light bending.
"Just so you know I informed Rina of Tamara." She laughed manically. "I'm going to be sad I don't get to see the aftermath." Lysa exclaimed.
Blake's skin crawled.
"Don't—!" he snarled.
Too late.
She crushed it.
The disk snapped like brittle bone. Black light exploded outward in a silent wave, swallowing her whole. The force of it slammed into Blake's chest, knocking him back a step even as he threw up a poison shield to blunt the impact.
Within the sphere of darkness, Lysa's shape blurred, then stretched, as if she were being pulled through a narrow tunnel.
Her voice echoed out of the distortion, distant and layered.
"Tell John…"
The shadows swallowed her face.
"…the Dark Masters remember him too."
The last syllable spiraled away into silence.
The darkness imploded. The warped air snapped back into place, leaving only a faint scorch mark where she'd knelt.
She was gone.
The smell of venom and cold lingered. The room felt emptier than it had any right to be.
Blake stood there, swords still raised, breathing hard. Poison essence continued to spill from him in faint wisps, his body slow to realize the immediate threat had vanished.
He lowered his blades by degrees.
His chest burned—not from exertion, but from something heavier, meaner. A weight sitting behind his ribs, heavier than stone.
"She ran," he said quietly.
Blake turned his head slowly toward the coffin.
The mummy's eyes glowed dimly in the reddened gloom. The silver chains binding it had tightened again, runes flaring with each soft hiss. Whatever brief freedom it had enjoyed when the room awakened was already closing.
He took one last look at the empty space where Lysa had stood.
The memory of her smile—sharp and real for the first time—hung in the air like a scar.