The deeper he went, the warmer it got. It wasn't the comforting heat of a hearth or the burning sting of mana; it was a suffocating, wet warmth rising from the bowels of the earth. The air in the Old Mines tasted of sulfur, stagnant water, and the metallic tang of ancient, oxidizing copper.
Draven moved silently, his boots stepping carefully over rotted rail ties and rusted mining pickaxes that lay abandoned like the bones of some prehistoric steel beast. Behind him, far back near the surface, a dull vibration shuddered through the rock walls. Thump. A pause. Thump.
It wasn't a heartbeat. It was the sound of heavy machinery moving through snow and stone. The Inquisition hadn't just stopped at the collapsed entrance. They were digging. Or perhaps, they were using something worse to breach the rubble.
Draven paused, leaning against a cold wall slick with condensation. He closed his eyes, letting his awareness expand into the darkness. The mana stimulants he had taken earlier were fading, leaving behind a jagged, throbbing headache. The world, which had been vibrant and sharp, was beginning to blur at the edges. But something else was compensating for the loss. His new Trait: [Mana Eater].
It was subtle. The walls of the mine were veined with low-grade mana crystals—useless for mining, but enough to emit a faint, ghostly luminescence. Draven could feel his skin drinking from the air, sipping the ambient energy like a man dying of thirst licking dew off a leaf. It kept him awake. It kept the exhaustion in his legs at bay.
He opened his eyes. In the pitch black, his irises glowed with a faint, predatory blue light. "Keep moving," he whispered to himself. His voice sounded flat, dead in the heavy air.
He followed the old rail tracks. They spiraled down, twisting deeper into the mountain's roots. About two hundred meters down, the tunnel changed. The narrow, claustrophobic shaft widened into a natural cavern, reinforced by ancient wooden scaffolding that groaned under the weight of the rock above.
Draven stopped. He smelled it before he saw it. The scent was distinct, cutting through the sulfur and mold. Unwashed bodies. Cheap, sour tobacco. The grease of cooked meat. And underneath it all, the sharp, acidic stench of fear.
He wasn't alone in the dark.
Draven crouched low, blending into the shadows of a recessed alcove. He peeked around the jagged corner of the rock face. Ahead, in the center of the widened cavern, a small fire burned. It was a smokeless coal fire—a soldier's trick to avoid detection. Around the flickering light sat six men.
They were a sorry sight. Their armor was the standard-issue chainmail of the Northern Alliance, but the sigils of the White Wolf had been scratched off with knives or stones. Their cloaks were ragged, stained with mud and blood. Their beards were matted, their eyes wide and twitchy. Deserters.
They had built a crude barricade across the tracks using overturned mine carts and pile of rubble. It was a choke point. A toll booth for anyone trying to go deeper.
"Did you feel that?" one of them whispered. He was a skinny man, clutching a heavy crossbow as if it were a holy relic. "The ground shook again."
"Shut up, Jorin," another man growled. This one was huge—a slab of muscle with a shaved head and a beard braided with iron rings. He sat on a crate, sharpening a massive battle-axe with a whetstone. Scrape. Scrape. Scrape. "It's just the mountain settling. The ice shifts. It happens."
"It didn't feel like ice," Jorin insisted, his voice cracking. "It felt like... like heavy boots. Giants."
"There are no giants here," the big man spat. "Just us, the rats, and the ghosts. And if any ghosts come, we bleed them too."
The other four men murmured in agreement, but their hands didn't leave the hilts of their swords. They were on edge. They knew the penalty for desertion was death by flaying. They were trapped between the war above and the unknown below.
Draven watched them for a long moment. He analyzed the tactical layout. Six targets. One crossbow. One heavy melee (the leader). Four standard infantry. Barricade provided heavy cover. If he rushed them, the crossbow would have a clear shot before Draven could cover the thirty meters of open ground. If he tried to sneak past, the loose gravel would give him away. Agility 14 was high, but it didn't make him invisible.
He needed a distraction. Or better yet, he needed to turn them into a resource.
Draven stood up. He didn't draw his sword. He didn't hide. He stepped out from the shadows, walking straight down the center of the rail tracks, his boots crunching deliberately on the gravel. His grey mage robe billowed around him in the draft. His hood was up, casting his face in shadow.
"Who goes there!" Jorin shrieked, swinging the crossbow around. The bolt was nocked and ready. The other five men scrambled to their feet, kicking over their stools, weapons drawn in a chaotic clatter of steel.
"Hold!" the leader roared, stepping in front of his men. He raised his axe, pointing the blade at Draven. "One more step, stranger, and I'll split you from crown to crotch!"
Draven didn't stop. He walked until he was exactly twenty paces away—the effective range of a nervous crossbowman in low light. Then he stopped. He stood with his hands loose at his sides, completely relaxed.
"I need to pass," Draven said. His voice wasn't loud, but in the acoustic chamber of the cavern, it carried a strange, resonant quality. It was the voice of someone who expected to be obeyed.
The leader blinked, taken aback by the calmness. He squinted at Draven's robe. "A wizard?" the leader scoffed, a cruel grin spreading across his face. "Well, look at this, boys. A stray spell-caster wandering in our hole. You look clean, wizard. Too clean."
"He's got a sword," one of the men noted, pointing at the Northern Cavalier Saber on Draven's hip. "That's an officer's blade."
The leader's eyes narrowed. Greed replaced caution. "So he does. Stole it, probably. Or maybe he killed a Lieutenant." The leader took a step forward, puffing out his chest. "This is a toll road, wizard. You want to pass? You pay. The sword. The robe. And whatever gold you have in those pockets."
Draven slowly lowered his hood. The firelight illuminated his face. It was pale, gaunt, smeared with dried blood and soot. But his eyes... his eyes were terrifying. They didn't blink. They stared through the leader as if he were made of glass.
"You are focusing on the wrong thing," Draven said softly. He raised a hand and pointed a finger back toward the dark tunnel he had just walked through. "Do you know why I am here?"
The leader frowned. "Because you're lost?"
"Because I am running," Draven corrected. "And whatever is chasing me... it just breached the main entrance."
As if on cue, a vibration shuddered through the floor. Stronger this time. Dust fell from the ceiling, hissing as it hit the fire. THUMP. It was closer.
The deserters shifted uneasily. Jorin lowered his crossbow slightly, looking toward the darkness behind Draven. "What... what is it?" Jorin asked.
"The Inquisition," Draven lied. It wasn't technically a lie, but he twisted the truth to make it sharper. "Three Death Squads. Silver Knights. They aren't looking for me anymore. They found you."
The color drained from the faces of the men. The Inquisition. The bogeymen of the North. Stories of what they did to deserters were told around campfires to scare recruits straight. They didn't just kill; they purified. They erased.
"Bullshit!" the leader yelled, though his voice wavered. "Why would High Command send Inquisitors for six grunts? We aren't that important!"
"No," Draven agreed coldly. "You aren't. But you are in the way. They are sweeping the tunnels. Protocol 7: Eradicate all biological life to secure the perimeter." Draven took a step forward. "I can hear them. The metal boots. The suppression fields. They are five minutes away."
"He's lying!" the leader shouted, panic turning into aggression. "He's trying to scare us so he can slip by! Kill him! Take the sword and we'll leave!"
The leader charged. It was a clumsy, angry charge. He raised the heavy axe high, telegraphing the blow. He relied on his size and Strength to crush opponents. Against a normal mage, it would have worked. Draven wasn't a normal mage.
Draven didn't draw his sword. He waited until the axe was beginning its downward arc. Then he moved.
To the deserters, he seemed to blur. One moment he was there; the next, he was inside the leader's guard. Draven sidestepped the axe blade by inches. The wind of the swing ruffled his hair. He planted his foot and drove his fist into the leader's solar plexus. Strength: 16.
It wasn't a punch; it was a hydraulic ram. The air exploded out of the leader's lungs with a sickening whoosh. The chainmail crunched inward, ribs cracking audibly. The giant man folded in half, his eyes bulging. The axe clattered to the floor.
Draven didn't stop. He grabbed the back of the leader's head with one hand and slammed his face into the stone wall of the tunnel. CRACK. The leader crumpled to the ground, blood pooling around his head. He twitched once, then went still.
Silence fell over the cavern. The other five men stood frozen, mouths open. Their leader—the strongest of them—had been dismantled in two seconds. By a man wearing a robe.
Draven stood over the body. He slowly wiped his hand on his robe. He looked at Jorin, the crossbowman. "You can shoot," Draven said calmly. "You might even hit me. But before you can reload, I will break your neck."
Jorin's hands were shaking so hard the bolt rattled against the mechanism. "What... what are you?" Jorin whispered.
"I am the warning," Draven said.
Suddenly, a sound cut through the silence. Not from Draven. Not from the deserters. From the tunnel behind them.
Screeeech. It was a mechanical, grinding noise. Like metal claws dragging on stone. Then, a voice echoed down the shaft. It was amplified, filtered through a helmet, stripping it of all humanity. "Heat signatures detected. Sector 4. Moving to engage."
The deserters froze. The reality of Draven's lie hit them. It wasn't a lie. "They're here," one of the swordsmen whimpered. "The Silver Knights. They're actually here."
Draven looked at them. "You have a choice," he said. He pointed to the tunnel that led deeper into the earth—the unknown, dark path behind their barricade. "You can stay here and try to explain your desertion to the Inquisition." He paused. "Or you can run. Run deep. Make noise. Make them chase you. Maybe, if you are fast enough, you lose them in the labyrinth."
It was a cruel calculation. If they ran, they would trigger traps. They would draw the monsters of the deep. They would distract the Inquisitors. They were canaries in a coal mine. And Draven was sending them into the gas.
The sound of heavy, rhythmic footsteps grew louder. CLANG. CLANG. CLANG. Panic broke the stalemate. "Run!" Jorin screamed. He dropped the crossbow and scrambled over the barricade. "Go! Go!" The other four men didn't hesitate. They threw down their heavy packs, their loot, even their secondary weapons. They sprinted into the darkness of the lower mines, screaming, pushing each other, their torches casting wild shadows.
Draven watched them go. He didn't run with them. He waited.
He quickly knelt by the fallen leader. Efficiency. Always efficiency. He checked the pockets.
Pouch of Gold: Useless.
Heavy Iron Key: Taken.
Black Powder Grenade: A crude explosive in a rusted casing. Dangerous. Draven smiled and tucked it into his belt.
Then, Draven moved. He didn't go deeper immediately. He climbed up. He scaled the side of the cavern wall, digging his fingers into the cracks of the rock, pulling himself up to a high shadowy ledge that overlooked the rail tracks. He lay flat on his stomach, pulling the grey cloak over his head to blend in with the stone. He slowed his breathing. He pushed his Will down, suppressing his own mana signature as best as he could.
He waited.
Thirty seconds later, the light changed. The warm, yellow glow of the deserters' dying fire was washed out by a harsh, clinical white light. Three figures walked into the cavern.
They were tall. Much taller than average men. They wore full plate armor made of a seamless, silver metal that seemed to absorb the shadows. The armor hummed with a low frequency. They didn't carry torches. Their helmets had glowing visors—single horizontal slits of red light that scanned the room like barcode readers. The Inquisition Pursuit Unit.
They moved with perfect synchronization. No wasted movement. The one in the lead stopped by the deserter leader's body. He didn't touch it. He just looked at it. "Subject deceased," the Inquisitor's voice echoed. "Blunt force trauma. Rib cage shattered. Cranial fracture."
"Analysis," a second Inquisitor said. His voice was identical to the first.
"Strength estimate: High. Precision: High. Not a standard engagement." The lead Inquisitor turned his head. The red visor swept across the room. The beam passed over the barricade. It passed over the scattered supplies. It passed over the ledge where Draven was hiding.
Draven stopped breathing. His heart hammered against his ribs, but he forced his muscles to remain completely flaccid. The Inquisitor paused. Did he see him? The red light lingered on the rock face for a second. Then, it moved on.
"Multiple heat signatures fleeing south," the third Inquisitor reported, looking at a device on his wrist. "Heart rates elevated. Panic state."
"The Wolf is using decoys," the lead Inquisitor stated. Draven felt a chill. They knew. They weren't stupid. "Pursue the group. Eliminate all targets. If the Wolf is among them, he will reveal himself when cornered."
"Affirmative."
The three Silver Knights stepped over the dead leader. They moved toward the barricade. One of them simply walked through a wooden crate, his armor shattering the wood without slowing him down. They accelerated. It wasn't a run. It was a power-assisted stride that covered ground at a terrifying speed. They vanished into the darkness of the lower tunnel, chasing the sounds of the screaming deserters.
Draven lay on the ledge for a full minute after they were gone. He listened to the fading sounds. He heard a distant scream—Jorin, probably. Then the sound of a mechanical thrum, followed by silence.
The canaries were singing. And dying.
Draven exhaled slowly. He slid down from the ledge, landing softly on the gravel. He looked at the dark tunnel where the hunters and the prey had gone. Most people would run the other way. But Draven knew there was no other way. The entrance was blocked. The only way out was through.
And the safest place to be was in the blind spot of the predator. Right behind them.
He adjusted his sword belt. He checked the grenade he had looted. His Will: 14 pulsed, eager for the violence to come. Draven stepped over the barricade, following the silver trail of death into the deep.
[ Achievement Unlocked: Cold Heart ] [ Use others as bait to ensure survival. ] [ Reward: +1 Will ]
Draven saw the notification and didn't even smile. Will: 15. He walked into the dark.