SCRAPE. CRACK.
The sound of the Stalker's claw against the ancient stone was the death knell of their sanctuary. The massive chunks it tore away from the pillar were a terrifying testament to its strength. The cavern was a delicate ecosystem, a balance between the weight of the mountain above and the supporting pillars below. The blessed water might repel the creatures of the Verse, but it could not hold up a collapsing ceiling.
Anya stared at the creature, her face a mask of grim determination. Her crossbow was useless, her pragmatism a hollow shell against the sheer, inevitable force of nature. She had seen the Verse claim countless lives, but never with such cold, calculated malice. This wasn't a hunt for survival; it was a siege of attrition, a slow, agonizing execution.
"It's going to bring the whole thing down on us," she stated, her voice a low growl, the words hanging heavy in the tense silence.
Elara, her face pale, nodded grimly. "We have to stop it. But how?"
Elias, still weak but his mind clear, pushed himself to his feet. He looked at the Stalker, at the monstrous claw methodically tearing apart the pillar, and a strange, cold calm settled over him. He was a healer, a mender, a force of wholeness in a world of decay. But he was also a man who had stared into the abyss and refused to blink.
"Its power is its strength," he said, his voice quiet but carrying a new, resolute authority. "Its size, its claws… that's what makes it a threat. We have to take that power away."
Anya stared at him, her brow furrowed. "How? I can't exactly tie its legs together."
"We use the cavern against it," Elias said, his gaze sweeping the vast space. "This place is a tomb, a prison. But it's also a weapon."
He pointed to the pool. "The water repels it. It's a barrier it cannot cross. But it's also more than that. It's a force. We saw what it did to the crawler meat. It doesn't just repel Verse-flesh; it unmakes it."
Anya's eyes widened, a spark of understanding igniting in their depths. "You're not thinking…"
"It's the only chance we have," Elias affirmed. "We have to lure it into the water. We have to make it touch the pool."
The plan was insane. It required them to get close to the most dangerous creature in the Gloomwood, to provoke it, to risk everything on the hope that the blessed water would be as destructive as it was defensive. It was a gamble that made Anya's use of the Stalker musk seem tame by comparison.
"It won't be easy," Elias continued, his mind racing. "It's intelligent. It won't just walk into the water for no reason. We need a distraction, a lure. Something that will draw its attention away from the pillar."
He looked at Anya, his gaze steady. "Something that it wants more than it wants to destroy this cavern."
Anya's face hardened. She knew what he was asking. The Stalker wanted the Stalker musk. It wanted what had been stolen from it. And they were still drenched in its scent.
"No," she said, her voice a low growl. "Absolutely not. I am not going to be bait."
"It's the only way, Anya," Elias pleaded, his voice soft but insistent. "You're the only one who can do it. You're the fastest, the most agile. You're the only one who can draw its attention and keep it long enough for me to act."
She stared at him, her mind warring with itself. Her survival instinct screamed at her to refuse. To stay behind the bell tower, to let the cavern fall, to let them all die. But she looked at the faces of the survivors, at the fear in their eyes, and she remembered the feel of the venom burning in her veins, the desperate gamble she had taken to save him.
She looked at Elias, at his unwavering resolve, and felt a strange, grudging respect. He was asking her to risk her life, not for a principle, but for a strategy. For a chance.
"Fine," she said, the word costing her. "But you are going to owe me more than just your life this time, Healer."
The plan was set. It was a desperate gamble, a dance with death in the shadow of a falling sky. Anya would become the lure, drawing the Stalker's attention while Elias prepared his desperate, impossible weapon. The fate of the Sunken Chapel, and everyone within it, hung in the balance.