Chapter 61 – What Lies Beneath
Part 1: The Sound Beneath the Bones
The Hollow had gone silent.
Not the quiet of sleep or peace.
The quiet before something old and buried shifts in its sleep.
Ariz moved first, stepping through a narrow break in the old wall. The air was cold, not from temperature, but from something deeper. Memory. Pressure. Age.
Luceris followed, whistling softly, twirling his blade. Serika walked beside him now, her steps quiet, calculated. She didn't look at Ariz often—but when she did, it lingered longer than before.
They came upon a downward slope. No path, no markings. Just a gaping wound in the earth, its mouth filled with violet mist and fractured stone teeth.
Serika stopped.
"I don't like this," she murmured.
"Then we're close," Ariz said, already walking.
Luceris rolled his eyes. "Why does everything you say sound like a proverb before death?"
They descended.
The deeper they went, the heavier it got.
The Hollow whispered.
But this time, not to Ariz.
To the stones.
To the system.
To something older than language.
At the base of the descent, the ground widened into a circular chamber. Obsidian pillars leaned toward the center like crooked fingers. There were no bones, no beasts.
Just silence.
And at the center—
A sarcophagus. Carved in a language no longer spoken. Covered in shadow script only one in the room could read.
Ariz stepped forward.
[System Notification]
∎ Legacy Signature Detected: Umbrakin Echo Tomb∎ Do you wish to unlock the Remnant Trial?
Warning: Memory Fractures May Emerge. Host Preparedness – 46%
"Yes," Ariz whispered.
The sarcophagus opened without sound.
Inside lay no corpse.
Just a mirror.
Black as oil. Smooth as glass. Humming.
And when Ariz looked into it—his reflection did not stare back.
It spoke.
"You are late," the reflection said, voice layered in echoes. "But the world is still breaking. And there is time."
The chamber began to shake.
Serika grabbed his arm, voice sharp. "Ariz—"
He didn't turn.
He stepped into the shadow of the mirror—
And vanished.
Luceris swore. "What the hell just—"
Then the ground split.
And from beneath the stone, something crawled out.
Not a beast.
A figure.
Wrapped in chain and ink. Its face a tangle of iron threads. Its limbs made of kneeling bones.
It looked at Serika.
Then at Luceris.
Then it whispered.
"Who wakes the throne that bled the sun?"