The wind screamed across the chasm, a howling dirge that clawed at Reven's coat as he stood at the edge, looking into the churning void below. The broken sky pulsed with dull light, casting shadows across the jagged cliffs. Behind him, Kaela tightened the straps of her cloak, her eyes scanning the cracked stone path that wound into the black.
"This is the only way forward," she said. "According to the glyphs Voska translated, the Vault lies beneath the Severance."
Reven gave a short nod, jaw clenched. "And once we enter, there's no coming back the same."
Kaela's hand brushed his arm. "None of us are the same, Reven. Not since Emberfall. Not since you pulled me from the ruins."
He looked at her, softer now, but still burning with purpose. "Let's hope we're enough."
Together, they stepped onto the bridge, a relic of a time when the world was still whole. The path had long since broken in places, forcing them to jump, climb, and scramble across unstable spans. Every step reverberated like a heartbeat in Reven's skull, memories of fire and ruin pressing at the edge of his thoughts.
Behind them, Lirien floated down from a ledge, her wings folded like a cloak of glass. "Storms are converging. The sky's shifting."
Kaela raised her eyes. "That's not weather. That's influence."
They all knew what she meant. Whatever was buried in the Vault wasn't sleeping. It was stirring.
The descent into the Severance was worse than Reven expected. The stone bled heat. The walls whispered. Their shadows twisted when they weren't looking. By the time they reached the base of the ravine, sweat clung to their backs and silence had swallowed their courage.
Sera-9's voice crackled through the receiver at Reven's side. "Radiation spike. Something's alive down there. Or worse, something wants to be."
"Status on the structure?" Reven whispered, drawing his blade.
"Reading traces of old-world alloy. Definitely human architecture… with augmentations. Possibly Bone Witch interference."
Kaela drew her twin blades. "So we're walking into a trap built by ghosts and monsters."
"Sounds familiar," Reven muttered.
The Vault door rose out of the stone like a maw, twenty feet tall, ribbed with rusted metal and bone lattice. Carvings lined its surface: spirals, runes, and the unmistakable claw-mark of the Scorchborn. Lirien reached out and traced a groove.
"This wasn't just sealed," she whispered. "It was locked away for a reason."
Reven stepped forward, the crystal shard from Emberfall clenched in his hand. It pulsed, matching the rhythm of his heart. As he pressed it into the key socket, the Vault groaned and opened.
Inside was blackness and something breathing.
The chamber beyond was massive, vaulted and organic, shaped like the inside of a beast's ribcage. Machinery hung from the ceiling like dying stars. In the centre was a pedestal. On it: a sphere of glass and gold, cradled by bone.
Kaela stopped cold. "That's a Memory Core. Old Dominion make."
Sera-9's voice sharpened. "If it's intact, it might contain pre-Ruin data. Coordinates. Blueprints. Or... consciousness."
Reven approached slowly, the heat in the room rising with every step. As he neared the Core, the air shimmered, then split.
From the shadows, something stepped forward. Tall. Inhuman. Covered in plating that shimmered like black oil. Its face was a mask of metal and tusks. Reven recognized it instantly.
"Raze."
The Iron Warlord's voice was like stone breaking. "I warned you not to dig too deep, Reven. Now you've uncovered what even I feared."
Kaela stepped between them. "We're not here to start a war."
Raze didn't flinch. "You already have."
Behind him, others stepped out, - beast-kin warriors, twisted by ash and augmentation. Reven drew his sword. The Core pulsed again.
"Whatever's in there," he growled, "we're not leaving it behind."
Raze smiled. "Then bleed for it."
The chamber exploded into chaos.
Swords clashed. Lightning flared. Reven ducked under a bone-blade and drove his sword into the chest of a charging brute. Kaela danced through the fray, her fangs bared, blades flashing with silent fury. Lirien soared above, raining shards of sky-fire on the enemy below.
But the tide was turning. For every warrior they felled, two more came.
At the pedestal, the Core began to crack.
"Sera, now!" Reven shouted into the receiver.
A burst of static, then: "Engaging failsafe. You've got ten seconds before the Vault collapses."
Reven sprinted for the Core. Behind him, Kaela screamed his name. Raze lunged. The Core shattered.
And everything went white.
When Reven opened his eyes, he was lying in ash.
Kaela knelt over him, blood on her face, tears in her eyes. "You're alive. Gods, Reven, you're alive."
He coughed, sat up. The Vault was gone — only scorched earth remained. Of Raze, there was no sign. Lirien hovered nearby, singed but alive.
Reven looked down at the remains of the Core. Something glimmered in the wreckage. A shard. Not crystal but data. Information.
He picked it up.
Sera-9's voice returned, faint. "I'm reading it now. Reven… this isn't a map. It's a message. From the old world. From the first ones."
He looked to Kaela. To Lirien.
"What does it say?" Kaela asked.
Reven stared at the text unravelling on the shard's surface.
"We tried to save you. We failed. But someone else will rise."
The wind howled above them, but it no longer felt empty.