The name disappeared from the notebook.
Seraphine stared at Ayan.
"What did it say?"
Ayan closed the silver notebook.
"Nothing important."
She narrowed her eyes.
"You always say that when something is important."
"I know."
"Then?"
Ayan looked toward the dark horizon.
"Something may have awakened beneath Valenne."
Seraphine's expression changed.
For a moment, she didn't speak.
Then she stood.
"Valenne."
The word carried weight now.
Not because she had forgotten it.
Because she remembered.
The streets.
The clinic.
The smell of smoke.
Her mother's voice.
Isolde's hand holding hers.
The plague.
The people who had died.
And something else.
Something buried so deeply inside her memories that even the Memory Bloom had only revealed fragments.
Ayan noticed her expression.
"What?"
"I remember something."
"What?"
She closed her eyes.
"During the last days in Valenne..."
She struggled.
"There was a sound."
"What kind of sound?"
"A bell."
"From a church?"
"No."
She shook her head.
"It came from underground."
Ayan's expression hardened.
"Underground?"
Seraphine nodded.
"I remember hearing it three times."
"What happened after the third?"
"I don't know."
She opened her eyes.
"But Mother was terrified."
That single sentence was enough.
Ayan immediately stood.
"We need to find out what Elena knew."
Seraphine nodded.
"Then we should return to Valenne."
Mira, who had been listening from several steps away, immediately shook her head.
"Not yet."
Everyone turned toward her.
"Why?"
"Because Valenne isn't empty."
Maren frowned.
"What do you mean?"
Mira looked toward the distant mountains.
"People have been disappearing near the old roads."
"Travelers?"
"Travelers. Hunters. Traders."
"How many?"
"Enough that the northern villages stopped sending people there."
Doctor Rowan's face became serious.
"When?"
"About three months ago."
Ayan looked at Seraphine.
Three months.
That was before the Memory Bloom.
Before the Hollow.
Before Seraphine's memories returned.
Something had already been moving.
...
The next morning, they gathered in the council house.
A map of the northern territories covered the table.
Valenne sat at the center.
The old city had once been one of the largest settlements in the region.
Now...
It was little more than ruins.
The plague had destroyed most of it.
The surviving population had abandoned the city seventeen years ago.
Nobody had rebuilt it.
Not because the land was worthless.
Because everyone remembered what had happened there.
Maren placed several reports on the table.
"These are from the last three months."
Ayan read the first.
**Two hunters missing near the eastern road.**
The second.
**Caravan failed to arrive.**
The third.
**Three scouts sent to investigate have not returned.**
The fourth was stranger.
**Residents of nearby village report hearing bells beneath the earth.**
Ayan looked up.
"Bells."
Seraphine nodded.
"That's what I heard."
Doctor Rowan pointed toward the map.
"Where?"
Maren marked the location.
"Here."
Ayan stared.
The mark was almost directly beneath the old Valenne clinic.
His eyes narrowed.
"Mother's clinic."
Seraphine's fingers tightened around the edge of the table.
"That's where it started."
"No."
Ayan shook his head.
"That's where we thought it started."
He pointed toward the map.
"If something existed beneath the city before the plague..."
"Then the disease may have been a symptom."
Doctor Rowan became pale.
"Or a consequence."
Silence followed.
Mira looked between them.
"Then what are we dealing with?"
Ayan didn't know.
But he had a suspicion.
Something had been waiting beneath Valenne.
And the Memory Bloom had awakened it.
...
They left Haven three days later.
This time, the journey was different.
Seraphine remembered.
She knew the road.
She recognized the hills.
She remembered where merchants once stopped.
She remembered a small bridge that no longer existed.
She even remembered a tree that had been struck by lightning.
Every memory made the journey more painful.
But also more real.
"This used to be a market."
Seraphine pointed toward an empty field.
Maren looked around.
"There's nothing here."
"There were twenty-three stalls."
She smiled faintly.
"Mother used to buy apples here."
Ayan looked at her.
"Do you remember the seller?"
"No."
She paused.
"Actually..."
Her expression changed.
"Yes."
She laughed softly.
"His name was Jorin."
"What did he sell?"
"Apples."
"Anything else?"
"Terrible honey."
Maren laughed.
"You remember that?"
"I remember hating it."
The group continued.
For the first time since recovering her memories...
Seraphine wasn't fighting them.
She was letting them exist.
The painful ones.
The happy ones.
The meaningless ones.
Even the useless memories had value.
Because they proved she had lived.
...
They reached Valenne on the fifth day.
The ruins appeared beyond the mountains.
Broken towers.
Collapsed walls.
Empty streets.
The city looked exactly as Seraphine remembered.
And completely different.
She stopped walking.
Ayan waited beside her.
"You don't have to go in."
"I know."
She took a breath.
"I want to."
They entered.
The streets were silent.
No birds.
No animals.
Even the wind seemed weak.
Seraphine walked slowly.
"This was the eastern district."
She pointed.
"That was a bakery."
"That building was a school."
"And there..."
Her voice stopped.
Ayan looked ahead.
A collapsed stone structure stood beside the road.
The remains of a house.
Seraphine stared.
"That was my home."
No one spoke.
She walked toward it.
The front door was gone.
The living room had collapsed.
Only part of the fireplace remained.
She touched the stone.
"I remember Mother sitting here."
She smiled.
"She used to read while I practiced medicine."
Ayan stood behind her.
"What did she read?"
"Everything."
Seraphine laughed.
"She said a healer should understand more than medicine."
Ayan looked at the ruins.
"She sounds wise."
"She was."
Seraphine's smile faded.
Then she noticed something.
A small metal box lay beneath the rubble.
She crouched.
Ayan helped remove the stones.
The box was old.
But intact.
Seraphine stared at it.
"I've seen this."
"Where?"
"In my memories."
She picked it up.
"My mother kept it hidden."
Doctor Rowan immediately examined it.
"There is a lock."
Seraphine looked at Ayan.
"The key."
Ayan remembered the metal key from the Hollow.
He removed it.
It fit perfectly.
Click.
The box opened.
Inside was a collection of documents.
Letters.
Medical notes.
And one small black stone.
The moment Ayan saw it...
The Bridge reacted.
Violently.
He stepped backward.
"What is that?"
Doctor Rowan looked at the stone.
"I don't know."
Seraphine touched it.
The world went silent.
Then she whispered,
"I remember."
Everyone froze.
"What?"
She stared at the stone.
"Mother found this beneath the clinic."
"Before the plague."
Ayan's expression hardened.
"What did she do with it?"
"She studied it."
"Why?"
"I don't know."
Seraphine's breathing became uneven.
Then another memory surfaced.
Elena standing inside the underground chamber beneath the clinic.
Holding the same black stone.
A voice came from the darkness.
"Give us the child."
Elena screamed.
"Never."
The memory shattered.
Seraphine stumbled.
Ayan caught her.
"Seraphine!"
She grabbed his arm.
"It was here."
"What?"
"Something was beneath the clinic."
"What?"
She looked at him.
"Mother knew."
Doctor Rowan's face went pale.
"Then the plague..."
Seraphine shook her head.
"No."
She looked toward the ruins of the old clinic.
"The plague wasn't the beginning."
Ayan followed her gaze.
"What was?"
Seraphine whispered,
"They wanted me."
The ground trembled.
A low sound rolled beneath their feet.
Once.
Twice.
Then—
A bell rang.
Deep beneath Valenne.
**Dong.**
Everyone froze.
Seraphine's face went white.
"That's it."
Ayan stared at the ground.
"The bell."
**Dong.**
A crack appeared across the street.
Stone broke.
Dust erupted.
Something beneath the city had begun moving.
Mira drew her weapon.
Maren stepped backward.
Doctor Rowan gripped his staff.
And Seraphine...
She simply stared at the ground.
Because the memories were returning again.
A door.
A staircase.
A black stone.
Her mother standing in front of something enormous.
And a final sentence.
A sentence Elena had screamed before sealing the underground chamber.
"Do not let it learn her name."
Ayan's eyes widened.
The third bell rang.
**Dong.**
The ruins of Valenne began to shake.
And beneath the ancient city...
Something answered.
"Seraphine."