The silence that followed Arien and Nyra as they crossed the labyrinth's threshold was as dense as an unspoken promise. The last glance exchanged between them, still beneath the greenish veil of the entrance, carried more than courage—it held an acceptance of the inevitable. When darkness closed in around them, it was as if the labyrinth itself, now awakened, waited to weigh the value of every choice.
Their breathing seemed to merge with the heavy air, and each step sounded like a pact sealed with the ancient ground. The echoes of Nyra's words—"If you have doubts, this is the time. What lies beyond does not forgive hesitation."—still vibrated inside Arien, but there was no room left for uncertainty. Only the hard and painful certainty of one who accepts crossing a threshold that never closes behind them.
The corridor soon narrowed, becoming tight and irregular, as if the path itself were testing the resolve to go on. The light from the crystal embedded in Arien's blade flickered with every step, hesitant, reflecting the weight of what they had both left behind. In the walls, deep cracks oozed a dark, almost living slime that seemed to observe the invaders' courage with invisible eyes.
Somewhere ahead, a deep sound echoed, like an ancient breath coming from the depths of the labyrinth. The atmosphere seemed to squeeze the chest, mixing the heat of the stone with the invisible presence of something that had yet to reveal itself, but already made its vigilance felt. Nyra, beside Arien, moved with the attentiveness of someone who knows every noise now has meaning—every shadow could be a memory, or a trap.
Everything around them carried the sense that, after crossing that passage, nothing would ever again be just a memory. The labyrinth was watching. The pact made at the entrance—to not retreat from the truth, even if it destroyed them—was beginning to demand its price. It was not just a test; it was the prelude to sacrifice.
And as they moved forward, Arien felt that the air carried something different, a living expectation. It wasn't just fear—it was the premonition that, finally, the Static Flame would reveal itself not only as a mystery but as an uncomfortable truth waiting to be unearthed.
Arien: — "What do you know about the Static Flame?"
Nyra didn't answer immediately. She ran her fingers over a wall covered in faded carvings and murmured something in an ancient language, as if asking permission to remember.
Nyra: — "My people call it the Silent Spark. They say it was born on the day a god tried to love a mortal and, failing, burned his own hope. But the flame born from this act didn't consume flesh or wood... it consumed memories. Desires. Promises."
Arien: — "Like a fire that burns from the inside."
Nyra: — "Yes. And sometimes, you don't even need to see it to feel it. It leaves people empty. It erases their purposes."
Arien (his voice hesitant, almost a whisper): — "So... was that what happened in Mahran? There wasn't real fire, just that emptiness... Was it the Static Flame that destroyed my village?"
Nyra stopped, staring at him with the intensity of someone who has seen the same end elsewhere.
— "Yes, Arien. In Mahran, the Static Flame was used as an arcane weapon. Not to burn walls or bodies, but to erase what cannot be rebuilt: soul, memories, stories. When this flame is invoked with intent, it consumes bonds, names, existence itself. On the outside, everything seems only ash and silence. But inside, it's as if the village never existed. What remained in Mahran was not destruction—it was forced forgetting, crafted by someone who knew how to wound not just the flesh, but what gives life its meaning."
Nyra lowered her voice, her expression hard, almost a lament:
— "When a village is touched by this kind of magic, no one can even weep for the dead. Because what remains is only emptiness, and the cruel doubt—if there was ever anything there to remember."
For a few moments, silence closed in between them—but it was no longer an empty silence. It was the echo of what had been erased, the heavy presence of all the pains that didn't even have time to become longing. Arien walked beside Nyra, feeling the strangeness of that weight: it was not common sadness, it was the absence of any trace of mourning. It was like walking in a grave where even the names of the dead had already been forgotten by the world.
The corridor, attentive to the mute sorrow of the travelers, seemed to open ahead like a wound that never healed. Arien's steps echoed in a restrained rhythm, as if afraid to awaken sleeping memories in the stones. The air carried that scent of antiquity and broken promise, so dense it was hard to breathe deeply.
As they approached the heart of the labyrinth, the temperature seemed to plummet—not from cold, but from the invisible weight of what had been torn from that place by ancestral forces. It was as if the entire journey to that point was preparing Arien for what could not be understood with words: the meaning of what was lost.
At last, they reached an octagonal chamber. In the center, a broken statue held a bowl in which small black flames burned. It was like seeing shadows in combustion. No heat. No real light. Only the suffocating presence of something that burned without sense.
Arien approached slowly. The crystal in his weapon glowed brightly, then went completely dark. The black flame seemed to "notice" him.
Nyra: — "Careful. It reacts to the truth you carry. And to what you hide from yourself."
Arien: — "Then it will want much from me."
He reached out, hesitating for a second, and touched the edge of the bowl.
As soon as his fingers touched the cold edge of the bowl, Arien felt a wave of chills run through his entire body. The surface of the stone seemed to vibrate under his skin, as if it absorbed his essence. For an instant, he lost awareness of his own body—he no longer felt the weight of the blade in his hand, nor the ground beneath his feet; it was as if he had been swallowed into a space suspended between time and memory. Around him, everything became darkness split by fragments of ancient light, like silver lightning illuminating forgotten scenes.
The images came as a silent avalanche: he saw Mahran not only in ruins but alive, throbbing, in its last moments. The sound of his sister's bell rang out, clear and sharp, a warning and a farewell mingled in a single note before the explosion without fire. Every sensation was real—the smell of dust, the heat of fear, the unbridgeable distance between him and those he loved. A hooded figure appeared in the distance, cloaked in shadows, eyes hidden, but with the posture of one who observes and controls everything.
And then, everything condensed into a single symbol: a spiral mark engraved on the ground, glowing like an ember under the ashes. Arien felt he was not just a spectator—he was part of that living memory, carrying the weight of all lost oaths and secrets. Time seemed to fold, and for a moment, he felt that everything there—the past, the present, the void—was sustained by the same silent flame, waiting to be understood.
Arien: — "They weren't demons... not only. Someone was guiding it."
Nyra: — "The Static Flame never moves alone. There is always a hand. An intention. An emptiness being fed."
He staggered back, breathing heavily. The flame in the bowl grew calm again, as if it had fed on his torment.
Nyra: — "It shows. But never explains. It's up to you to put the pieces together."
Arien: — "It's not fair..."
Nyra: — "Nothing here is. Not life. Not what comes after."
There was compassion in her voice, but also distance. As if she had already gone through that and decided not to lose herself again.
They left the room in silence, each wrapped in thoughts that burned more than any physical flame. The next corridor seemed to absorb the remaining light, plunging them into a reddish glow that pulsed from the stones themselves. The air grew denser, as if breathing required effort, and every step sounded muffled, echoing against walls that seemed to slowly close in around them.
As they went on, Arien felt the temperature rise—not a welcoming heat, but a suffocating, almost oppressive sensation that pressed on the bones and stirred up memories he tried to forget. The space grew tighter, the walls pulsing in crimson tones, as if the labyrinth now fed on the travelers' vulnerability. It was impossible to ignore how personal that corridor was: there was no protection there from what they carried inside.
In that uneasy silence, Nyra—perhaps to ward off the growing darkness—began to tell an ancient tale from Nostraïl. She spoke of a forgotten hero, someone who, driven by the desire to heal others' sadness, dared to bring the Static Flame to the world, believing it could warm empty hearts. But hope turned to mistake—and all he accomplished was to spread absence wherever he went.
The legend, murmured in the twilight, seemed to entwine with their path. Nyra concluded with a bitter look: that hero lost more than his identity—he lost even the right to be remembered. Not physically, but because people stopped recognizing him; even the mirrors refused to reflect his image. The fire that does not burn, after all, does not warm, does not protect: it only erases what exists, and leaves behind silence and emptiness.
Arien: — "Is that a curse or a warning?"
Nyra: — "Both. The fire that does not burn also does not protect. It only consumes."
As they walked, the crystal in Arien's blade shone again—this time, trembling but steady, as if sensing the closeness of something not just memory, but living, threatening matter. The heat of the corridor blended with the crystal's pulse, and Arien was certain that ahead awaited a presence that could no longer be avoided, something all too real to hide behind memories.
Gradually, the walls began to recede, and the floor trembled beneath their feet. Stone doors opened, as if the labyrinth itself were recognizing—or testing—the travelers who dared cross its deepest secrets. The silence broke with the harsh sound of moving rocks, leaving the air filled with an almost sacred expectation.
They crossed that threshold knowing that nothing ahead would be simple—and that the Static Flame would not let them pass without demanding a price. In the look exchanged between Arien and Nyra was the silent understanding of those who know that some scars never disappear, they just move somewhere else.
And there, under the weight of choices and scars, both felt that the true ordeal was only beginning. For what awaited them in the shadows of the next hall—as Arien would soon discover—was not just a creature forged from pain, but the very reflection of all they had tried to forget