The descent began after midnight.
Torchlight flickered along the marble stairs as the class followed Professor Velmion into the underhalls. The stone underfoot felt colder with every step—like memory frozen in the walls.
"This is not part of your curriculum," Velmion said without looking back. "But knowledge sleeps here. And sometimes, knowledge dreams."
Ryn walked beside Gold, fingers twitching with nervous energy. "You feel that?"
Gold nodded. "Something's breathing. Below us."
Yvaine trailed behind, silent as always, her eyes reflecting torchlight like a beast watching from behind glass.
They stopped before an obsidian door. Velmion placed a hand on the surface. Runes flared. It creaked open with a sound like bones grinding.
Inside: a vast cavern lit by braziers of blue fire. Carvings lined the walls—gods with faces scratched out. Chains hung from the ceiling. Some still rattled.
"Welcome," Velmion announced, "to the Hollow Sanctum. Where the divine are buried and bound."
The doors slammed shut behind them.
---
Yvaine moved first.
She stepped toward a pedestal in the center of the room. A crystal orb pulsed upon it—soft, rhythmic, like a heartbeat.
"Don't touch that," Ryn warned, voice tight.
But it was too late.
Her fingers brushed the surface—and something screamed.
Not aloud. Not in sound.
But inside them.
Gold fell to his knees, clutching his head. Behind his eyes: a vision.
> A forest of mirrors.
A throne made of veins.
A girl standing in front of a god too broken to die.
He gasped as the vision shattered.
Velmion was already restraining Yvaine, binding runes coiling around her wrists.
"She opened a Gate," the professor snarled. "She doesn't even know it."
Gold stood. "A Gate to where?"
Velmion's eyes burned. "To the Hollow Tongue. The source of pactum corruption. The echo of gods devoured by memory."
Gold's voice was low. "And what do they want?"
Velmion looked at him. "You."
---
Later, after the others had been escorted out, Gold remained—alone.
The orb still pulsed on the pedestal, dimmer now, as if asleep. But he felt it watching.
A whisper crept from the shadows.
He turned.
The masked messenger stood beside the braziers, hood damp with condensation.
"You felt it, didn't you?" the figure said. "The echo. The call."
Gold didn't respond.
The messenger stepped closer. "The First Pactum is not bound by gods or mortals. It is bound by memory. And you, Gold, are a vessel full of holes."
Gold's breath caught. "What do you want me to do?"
The messenger extended a hand. In it—a stone key, black as night, carved with a spiral of wings.
"Unlock the sealed chamber beneath the Veiled Archive. Read the names carved in shadow. And decide."
"Decide what?"
"If you will become the last anchor. Or the first god."
Gold's fingers curled tightly around the black spiral key, the cold stone pressing into his palm like a silent promise — or a curse.
He emerged from the Hollow Sanctum, each step heavier than the last. The moon hung high, cold and distant, as if watching the world from another realm.
"Irethiel." His voice cut through the stillness.
She stepped from the shadows near the Academy's eastern wing, her silver hair catching shards of moonlight like threads of starlight.
"You went down there alone," she said quietly, but the sharp edge beneath her tone was unmistakable. "You know what you risked."
Gold didn't meet her eyes. "I had to. The messenger… he gave me this." He held out the key, its spiral carvings twisting unnervingly in the pale light.
Irethiel's eyes darkened. "That key is forbidden. The sealed chamber beneath the Veiled Archive is a tomb for names older than any living memory. Names that should never be spoken aloud."
He met her gaze then, steady and unflinching. "Then why show me? Why bring me here, if not to force my hand?"
Her jaw tightened, a flicker of fear crossing her usually composed face. "Because you are more than a student. You're the fulcrum of something far older than this kingdom. You are tied to the past in ways even you don't understand."
Before Gold could reply, a figure stepped forward from the darkness—a soft, ethereal glow outlining her form.
Yvaine lowered her hood, revealing a pale face almost luminous beneath the moonlight. Her eyes held a strange depth, ancient and sorrowful.
"I wasn't always just a Mage-Scribe's ward," she said, her voice calm but haunted. "I was once a vessel—carrying a shard of a god, imprisoned long ago beneath the Veiled Archive."
Her hand rested lightly on Gold's shoulder. "When I touched the orb, I saw my past — visions of betrayal, sacrifice, and exile. A god's fragment, chained by memory and blood."
Gold's breath hitched. "You know what's locked beneath the Academy?"
Yvaine nodded slowly. "If you open that chamber, you risk unleashing something that could consume us all. But if you don't, the power inside you will consume you instead."
Irethiel stepped closer, urgency sharp in her voice. "This isn't just about power or knowledge. It's about survival. We must decide — together — before the gods awaken, or before the Shadows find us."
Gold's gaze dropped to the key, the cold stone a weight heavier than any pact he'd ever made.
The night held its breath.
"Then," he said slowly, voice steady, "let's find out what waits in the shadows."