Alyra was sprinting through the thick jungle, her heart hammering against her ribs like it was trying to escape.

  The explosion behind them had been massive. The plume of smoke rising into the sky said it all. Something was burning. What if Derek had been caught in it? The thought hit her like a punch to the chest, but she forced it down. No. He was the Cashnar, the Messiah chosen by Orbisar himself to save the world.

  She had to believe in him. In him and in Isabelle. She had to keep the faith… and keep running.

  Sierelith was just a blur ahead of her, constantly slipping between rain-drenched vines and trees. Water poured from the sky in endless sheets, soaking everything. Alyra’s clothes clung to her like a second skin—cold, heavy, and suffocating—while her shoes slid across the mud with every frantic step. The wind-blown plants clawed at her, like the jungle itself was trying to pull her under.

  Every time a branch brushed against her, she flinched, terrified it might be one of the undead reaching out to grab her. Those gaunt, rotting bodies with hollow, soulless eyes… they froze her thoughts like ice in her veins. She couldn’t let them in. Couldn’t think. She had to stay focused on Sierelith. If she lost sight of her now, she’d be alone. Alone in a jungle crawling with undead, with no idea where to run.

  She shoved aside a curtain of vines and burst into a clearing. Sierelith was already sprinting toward a cluster of gray stone buildings.

  “Hurry up!” the illusionist shouted.

  The downpour and thunder made it difficult to reply, so Alyra just ran after her.

  The noise also made it impossible to tell how far the undead were. Were they following them? Had they all stayed behind to attack Derek? She hated and feared both possibilities with everything she had.

  Sierelith stopped abruptly. She stood frozen in the rain before a low wooden gate, behind which sat a squat stone building.

  Alyra caught up, gasping for breath. “Why are we stopping here? We're completely exposed!”

  Sierelith was panting, her soaked hair plastered to her skull, making her look smaller, almost fragile. She raised a trembling hand and pointed at the heavy wooden door barring the entrance to the stone structure.

  Alyra frowned and followed her gaze. That wasn’t a house. Or a storage shed like she’d first assumed.

  It was… a family crypt. Her heart skipped a beat.

  Dead vines clung to the walls, and a cracked stone plaque above the door bore a strange symbol: a broken cross with a flaming eye. Underneath it, a name had been carved.

  Blackvale.

  Sierelith ran her hand over the engraving, staring at it like she was hypnotized.

  Alyra swallowed hard. This really wasn’t the place to hide. Not when the dead had a habit of rising to chase them. She scanned the area for other buildings. Homes, shops, anything.

  About a hundred meters away, a small cluster of houses stood next to what looked like a blacksmith’s forge. They could make it there in just a few seconds of sprinting. Once inside, they could wait for Derek and the others.

  She turned to tell Sierelith the plan and froze.

  Branches were shifting nearby. Figures were pushing their way through the underbrush.

  The undead were hunting them.

  It wouldn’t be long before they broke through. And if they hadn’t seen them yet, they would any second now.

  Sierelith kicked open the low gate and grabbed the crypt door.

  Alyra froze. She didn’t want to go in there. Not for anything. But the undead were coming fast, and there was no way they’d reach those houses in time. And if those doors were locked…

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  No. Sierelith was right. They had to vanish. Now. And the crypt was the only option.

  She ran to help, grabbing the heavy iron handle. After a couple of hard tugs, it gave way with a groan, just barely audible under the roar of the rain.

  They slipped inside and yanked the door shut behind them.

  It slammed shut with a deep boom that echoed through the crypt like a warning.

  Alyra froze. Her lungs locked up. Beside her, Sierelith didn’t even flinch. If any of those things had seen them slip inside, it was already too late.

  The air was wrong. Cold and still, but not empty.

  Like something was holding its breath.

  Along the walls, carved niches held vertical sarcophagi framed by crumbling gothic arches. Blue crystals pulsed faintly above each one, casting a sickly glow that painted their faces in shades of dead skin.

  That door. Those lights.

  Someone, or something, had been here recently.

  The floor was lined with uneven slate tiles, every step echoing louder than it should have. Each tile bore a name, worn down by time. But all of them ended the same way:

  Blackvale.

  Alyra looked around. The interior was larger than she’d expected. At the far end, a narrow staircase led down into a second chamber, where more of that faint blue light shimmered like mist on water.

  “The air’s completely still,” Sierelith whispered, eyes scanning every shadow. “If there’s no draft, there’s probably no back exit. We just have to hope no one saw us come in, because I don’t see any way out.”

  Alyra nodded but remained silent. With the rain and thunder raging outside, it was unlikely anyone could hear them, but she wasn’t about to take chances.

  Her soaked clothes clung to her like a funeral shroud. The crypt’s cold sank through the fabric, deeper with every breath. She wrapped her arms around herself, rubbing her shoulders to stay warm.

  There wasn’t much they could do now, except pray no undead started pounding on that door.

  She glanced around again. Maybe there was something here she could use as a weapon. A shovel, a pickaxe… anything. She’d seen people dig graves in the village before. They had to use tools for that, right?

  She tiptoed around the room, careful not to make a sound. The niches held only small trinkets: pendants, colored stones, faded dolls, and other odds and ends. All completely useless.

  They looked like... gifts. For the dead?

  She would’ve loved to get gifts like that. No one had ever given her anything.

  An inscription above the steps caught her eye. She leaned in to read:

  Aurelia and Marin Blackvale

  Our dearest little stars

  Born together, slept together

  Taken too soon, but never apart.

  Alyra gently traced the words with her fingers. It had to be two little girls. Maybe twins. Died together. Maybe their parents still left them gifts, even now.

  That was… really sad.

  Sierelith stepped up beside her and whispered, “I think we’re in the clear. If they saw us, they’d have tried to break in by now. For now, we’re safe. Best thing we can do is stay put. If the Cashnar really is who they say he is, he’ll drive the undead out of this city and come rescue us.”

  Alyra nodded. “Derek’s gonna beat them. And he’ll come for us. You can count on that.”

  Sierelith raised an eyebrow. “You mean come for you. I doubt he’d go out of his way for me.”

  “You don’t know him. I’ve heard him talk to Isabelle. He feels bad even when people who try to kill him die. He wouldn’t leave you behind.”

  Sierelith tilted her head, frowning. “Seriously? That’s… unexpected.”

  “Why?”

  The illusionist shrugged. “He walks around in that fortress of his, armed to the teeth. I figured killing was what he did best.”

  “You can be good at something without liking it. Maybe he just doesn’t have a choice. Maybe the world forced it on him.”

  Sierelith nodded thoughtfully. “Find anything while you were rummaging around?”

  Alyra shook her head. “I was looking for something to use as a weapon, but it’s just these little offerings.” She pointed at a bracelet near her foot.

  Sierelith stepped closer to take a look. “They’re for the Cult of the Dead. People leave gifts during the Long Night of the Still Sky, when the night lasts the longest.”

  Alyra’s eyebrows shot up. “How do you know that?”

  She shrugged. “I knew a guy in the same cult. They do it in secret here, since the Church of Orbisar bans it. But in the Awakened Chain, we don’t judge. People can talk freely about it. That’s why I know so much.”

  Alyra glanced around the room. “Doesn’t look very secret to me.”

  “You’re not wrong. I think Elias—the priest who ran this place—knew exactly what went on here. That’s how it is everywhere. As long as no one challenges the Church’s authority and they keep invoking Orbisar, everyone looks the other way.”

  Alyra frowned. “Isabelle would never do that.”

  Sierelith smirked. “And your precious Derek? What would he do?”

  Her face went red hot. “He’s not my Derek!”

  “Sure,” she chuckled. “Didn’t say he was. You still didn’t answer, though.”

  Alyra cleared her throat. “He doesn’t care about stuff like that. Rituals, religion… he always says it’s all nonsense.”

  “How can our Messiah not believe in religion?”

  Alyra bit her lip. “I’m just a Sprout in the Novice School of Orbisar. Maybe you should ask Uriela.”

  Sierelith smirked. “Doubt she’d be too eager to chat with me.”

  She wrung out her soaked hair like a wet rag, water dripping onto the stone tiles. “Honestly? The simplest explanation is that he’s not really the Cashnar. Which would be a shame. We locked ourselves in a crypt for no damn reason.”

  Alyra clenched her fists. Her stomach twisted. “For nothing? You dragged me into this undead-infested pit with a knife to my throat. You kidnapped me, damn it! And for what? Just to figure out if Derek is who you think he is? No one knows for sure, not even Uriela and her Seers! What the hell were you hoping to accomplish? You’re... You’re insane. And cruel!”

  Sierelith inspected her nails with exaggerated indifference. “Yeah, okay, maybe this plan was a little reckless.” She gave the crypt a skeptical once-over. “But if none of your Seers or Saints can figure it out, maybe watching him in action will.”

  Alyra dug her nails into her palms. Her stomach churned, her face flushed. “Do you even realize someone could die because of you? It’s not just us and Derek! Isabelle’s out there. So is Tunga. And who knows who else they’ll send. And it’s all your fault!”

  Sierelith raised her hands. “Hey, easy. Breathe. I didn’t bring the undead to Ebonshade. That was the Life sphere. It crashed here and shattered. I’m guessing that crazy priest Elias failed to recover it in time and bring it back to Rothmere before everything went to hell.”

  Alyra stomped her foot, face flushed with rage. “But you dragged us here!”

  Sierelith’s smile was razor-thin. “Someone had to come deal with it eventually. And frankly, your Church was taking its sweet time. I just... sped things up a little.” She flicked her hand like brushing away a fly. “Now that Derek and Isabelle are here, I bet they’ll send reinforcements. Maybe even the whole Sacred Guard.”

  Alyra clenched her jaw. She was seriously tempted to test out one of the combat techniques she’d learned at school. That punch she used to drop Tanya, wonder how it would feel to land it on this smug illusionist.

  “Come on, don’t fight...”

  Alyra blinked. That hadn’t sounded like Sierelith. Something was… wrong.

  The spy was frozen, eyes wide.

  No. That wasn’t her voice.

  Alyra’s heart started racing.

  It had been a tiny voice.

  A child’s.

  And it came from the lower level of the crypt.

  Another voice joined it. Raspier, older.

  “Yeah, Aurelia’s right… Friends shouldn’t fight like that. Come on, make up already, so we can come upstairs and play together.”