Karev moved through the shadowed corridors of the Red Dome like a hunting cat, each step placed with care so that even the softest sound faded into the stone. His cloak brushed the walls in a low whisper, and for a moment it felt as though the fortress itself was breathing around him.

  He had marked the building earlier that evening while making his usual rounds, noting its entrances, blind corners, and the pattern of passing guards. At first he had meant to wait, to return another night with more preparation. Yet as the hours passed, he realised delay would only give the corruption inside these walls more time to grow. Whatever sickness had taken root within the Red Dome was spreading too quickly for caution.

  Behind him, the Red Dome rose like a blood-dark crown at the heart of Sadnon. From afar it looked grand and unshakable, a symbol of order and strength. Up close, however, Karev saw the cracks beneath the polish. The guards were too rigid. The wards flared too often. The atmosphere carried a tension that had nothing to do with discipline and everything to do with fear.

  To the outside world, the Red Dome was the seat of the Valiants, champions who defended the realm from horrors beyond mortal sight. Officially, they stood between civilisation and destruction. They were praised as heroes, trusted without question.

  Karev knew better.

  He had seen the events prior to their “rescues.” Villages torn apart by creatures that did not belong to this world. Beasts dragged screaming through rifts between realms and released upon innocent towns. The chaos that followed was then crushed by the Valiants, who arrived as saviours. Fear kept the people obedient. Terror made the order necessary.

  That cruelty alone was enough to blacken any soul. Yet what Karev had uncovered went even further. Cloning Ragelers, shaping their wild and violent essence into human bodies, and sending them into cities as spies was a crime against both magic and nature. It was not merely wicked. It was blasphemous. Such work drew power from realms even the Lord Valiant had declared forbidden.

  Karev slipped into a narrow alley beside the marked building. It was a simple two-storey structure, no different from the other quarters at a glance. He paused in the shadows and listened. Beyond the inner walls of the Dome, Sadnon murmured softly as night markets closed and tavern songs faded into the dark. Here, within the Valiant district, the silence felt forced and unnatural.

  Closing his eyes, Karev stretched out his senses. He searched for hidden wards, threads of light that might snap at a trespasser, or the faint shimmer of listening spells. He found nothing. Either the one inside was careless, or dangerously confident.

  Climbing the wall was easy for him. His gloved hands found steady holds in the rough stone, and he moved upward with practised ease. He reached a narrow ledge beneath a lit window and peered through the grimy glass.

  Inside, a young man sat hunched over a crowded desk. Papers and strange tools lay scattered around him. A hovering lamp cast a sickly yellow glow across the room. The man’s long blond hair hung loose over his shoulders, and his Valiant robes were stained with dark patches that looked very much like dried blood. He muttered as he turned the pages of a heavy book filled with complex symbols and tightly written notes.

  Even from outside, Karev recognised the markings. Replication diagrams. Essence-binding spells. This was not basic study. This was advanced and dangerous magic.

  A new Valiant would normally be cautious, careful not to touch spells that could twist flesh or tear the soul apart. Yet this one worked alone in the middle of the night, studying knowledge that senior magisters kept sealed behind heavy wards. Karev’s suspicion sharpened. How had he gained access to such texts, and why risk using them in secret?

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  When the young Valiant rose and stepped into another room, Karev gently eased the window open. The hinge gave a faint creak, but no alarm sounded. He slipped inside and moved gently to quiet his movements.

  The room felt wrong the moment his boots touched the floor. Shelves bent under the weight of glass vials filled with swirling liquids that changed colour as though alive. Detailed drawings of dissected Ragelers covered the walls, each marked with notes about stabilising their unstable cores. At the centre of the chamber stood an altar carved with twisted runes that made Karev’s stomach tighten.

  This was not approved research. It was reckless ambition.

  Footsteps echoed from the hall. Karev moved quickly behind a tall bookcase, blending into shadow. The young Valiant returned carrying a small locked chest. He placed it carefully upon the altar and whispered a spell. The lock clicked open with a soft hiss.

  Inside, resting on black velvet, lay a shard of dark crystal. It pulsed with deep, endless darkness, like a piece of night torn from the sky and trapped in stone. Karev felt his breath catch.

  A Void Shard.

  Legends said such relics came from ancient wars long forgotten. They could strengthen magic by drawing power from beyond the veil between worlds. Yet every tale agreed on one truth: they slowly destroyed the soul of anyone who used them.

  The young Valiant lifted the shard. He murmured strange words, testing the flow of a ritual he had not yet performed. The air thickened as the shard vibrated softly, its power humming through stone and flesh alike.

  Karev’s thoughts raced. A Void Shard could explain everything. It could hold a Rageler’s unstable essence steady long enough to copy it, reshape it, and force it into human form. It explained the rumours of strangers in Sadnon whose eyes flashed wrong in candlelight. It explained how the impossible had become real.

  But how had this young Valiant obtained such a relic? The Truther order had declared all Void Shards destroyed centuries ago. This was not simple curiosity. It suggested hidden allies and a conspiracy buried deep within the Red Dome itself.

  Karev’s hand moved slowly to the knife at his belt. If he could take the shard, or at least confirm it beyond doubt, he would hold proof strong enough to shake the entire order. He shifted his weight, preparing to act.

  But then… a sudden cold swept through the room. Dark smoke gathered near the altar, curling upward into a tall column of shadow. Karev froze, his instinct warning him to remain still.

  From the smoke stepped another figure, cloaked and hooded. The lamplight bent around them. “It is done,” the newcomer whispered, their voice muffled but strangely familiar. “The next batch is ready for the city.”

  The words struck Karev hard. This was not a single experiment. It was a system. Cloned Ragelers in human bodies were already prepared to move through Sadnon.

  “Good,” the young Valiant replied calmly. “I will inform Hamon of this development.”

  At that name, Karev’s pulse quickened. Hamon was no minor figure. If he was involved, then the corruption reached high into the leadership of the Valiants.

  The cloaked visitor nodded and dissolved back into smoke, leaving only a lingering chill.

  The young Valiant closed the chest around the Void Shard and left the room with the box, likely to deliver his report. Only then did Karev allow himself a slow breath.

  The shard was the key. It was the tool that made this horror possible, the bridge that allowed beasts to walk as men. If Karev could trace where it came from, he might uncover the entire plot.

  He slipped back out of the window into the cool night air and climbed down the wall with quiet ease. When his boots touched the ground, he looked once more at the plain building.

  The hunt had changed. He was no longer chasing rumours. He was hunting proof of a conspiracy that could flood Sadnon with hidden monsters, which was against the Valiants current plan for this section of the empire.

  And if Hamon truly stood behind it, then Karev’s enemies were not only creatures from beyond the veil, but powerful men within his own order.