The corridor tightened around me as I followed the Hunter Captain downward, stone shifting from rough-hewn to sharply smooth, as if something crafted this part of the floor with intention rather than heat. The forge warmth faded behind us, replaced by a coolness that felt almost surgical. My Pulse Sense rippled outward, but the air ahead bent the vibrations strangely, as though the space wasn't obeying normal structure.
The Captain didn't check if I followed. It didn't need to. The path led only one way.
We crossed a fractured archway—and the world widened.
A massive circular chamber stretched out before me, broader than anything I had seen in the forge floors. The dome above was spiderwebbed with cracks, silver ash drifting down from its wounds in slow, drifting spirals. The entire room glowed faintly with pale-blue veins that pulsed like memory instead of light.
Nine great ribs curved across the ceiling.
Seven dimly alive.
Two shattered—dead.
The moment my Pulse Sense struck the chamber's center, it recoiled, bouncing back in uneven waves. As if the room itself pushed back.
The Captain remained just beyond the threshold, refusing to enter. Its head dipped slightly, not quite a bow—more a gesture that meant: This is not for me.
In the center stood an enormous anvil—split clean down the middle. The halves glowed faintly along the fracture lines, as though the break was fresh even though everything around it screamed ancient. Runes crawled along its base like veins embedded deep into the stone.
When I stepped onto the spiral mark carved into the floor, the anvil pulsed.
A sharp flash—brief but unmistakable.
Shadows under my skin tightened, dragging taut like instinct had seized control. Something in the room recognized me. Or mistook me for something else. Either way, my body reacted before my mind did.
My gaze drifted to the walls.
A carved shadow knelt on an anvil, its body half-formed—limbs melting into shapes not yet chosen, torso carved with lines that looked like ribs stolen from something larger. Above it, a towering figure loomed, hammer raised in one hand, chain coiled in the other.
The image didn't feel religious. It felt… technical. A process. A blueprint.
Shadows weren't born.
They were constructed.
The thought ran through me with cold clarity.
Further along the wall, nine towering shapes hovered over a dark world. Seven glowed faintly; two were cracked through the center. Chains descended from each figure onto kneeling shadows below.
Pressure built behind my sternum. A sense of limitation, of invisible hands holding down a creature that wanted to rise. I stepped back before I realized I was moving.
Even the Captain shifted outside the threshold, body angled toward the mural as if acknowledging a higher authority etched into stone.
The next wall held a massive shadow-beast, jaws open, lunging toward a humanoid figure glowing like a living beacon. But a radiant hand forced the beast's mouth shut. Runes wrapped around its throat like tightening chains.
My own throat tightened painfully.
A warning.
A future cage.
A rule older than this floor.
My claws dragged across the stone as I stepped away from the image, fighting the sensation of something gripping my neck.
Then I reached the throne mural.
A towering throne of obsidian cracked down the center. Chains dangled from the broken ceiling above it. A shadow figure slumped on the throne—torso intact, arms limp, head missing.
A chill rippled under my armor.
Something in my bones—no, deeper—recognized the posture of that broken figure.
The Captain dropped to one knee outside the threshold. Not out of respect for me. Not out of fear. It bowed to the throne.
It didn't understand why.
But instinct did.
Two pillars dominated the next wall, both split at their bases. Essence leaked from the fractures like liquid shadow. Twisted, incomplete forms crawled out, attempting to rise, collapsing again, shapes failing to stabilize.
My Pulse Sense recoiled violently.
Not out of fear—refusal.
Whatever those beings were, whatever path they represented, my instincts wanted nothing to do with them.
The last mural stopped me completely.
Most of it had been destroyed—deep gouges, scorched marks, essence-burns. Someone had tried to erase it. Desperately.
But pieces survived.
Wings—shadow wings, jagged like blades.
A tail split into multiple razor edges.
Three pairs of slit eyes.
A divine spear cracking apart in its grip.
My claws curled involuntarily.
The form carved here… looked too close to mine to ignore. Not identical. But an evolution of the same lineage.
Something ancient.
Something the gods wanted gone.
As I stepped closer, silver ash slowed in the air, drifting around me as if suspended.
Pressure folded through the chamber—walls, floor, ceiling tightening inward with a slow exhale. The anvil cracked brighter. The ribs overhead faintly glowed.
Recognition.
Or a mistake.
The Captain finally entered the hall. Its footsteps were slow, controlled. It approached the ruined mural and placed one palm on the damaged stone. A gesture without meaning in its culture—instinct preserved without understanding.
It looked at me, mask angled downward.
Acceptance.
Deference.
Or fear.
I drew back from the mural.
Behind us, the floor trembled. A new passage tore open in the far wall, spilling red light and intense heat into the hall. The air rolling from it brushed my armor like a forge bellows.
The Red Crucible.
A trial.
A rite.
And a crucible designed to break creatures weaker than me.
I stepped toward the opening.
The Captain bowed its head as I passed.