The air was still. Oppressively still.
Kael stood with Selene beside him, the two clad in reinforced cloaks of dark leather and metal lining. Before them loomed a towering archway of jagged obsidian stone, carved with symbols that shimmered faintly, pulsing with a dull violet hue. The Rift Gate. A scar on the world.
"This gate's been open for a while now," Rook said, his voice a cold whisper against the silence. He stood in front of them, unmasked but grim, his blade strapped across his back. "It's a Level Zero. Normally we'd ignore it - too weak to matter. But we got reports of some fresh adventurers from the nearby territories going in… and none of them came back."
"What's inside?" Selene asked, her arms crossed, fingers twitching toward her hilt.
"Nothing that should be deadly.". But whatever's inside doesn't belong to this side of the portal," Rook replied. "You're not here to wipe everything out. You're here to locate the disturbance's core and shut it down before it escalates."
Kael's eyes lingered on the gate. Its surface rippled like water, dark with faint purple whorls swirling inward. The color marked it: unstable, but not yet violent. The weakest class of rift.
Yet...,
Rook gave a nod. "Get moving."
Without another word, Kael and Selene stepped through.
The moment Kael crossed the portal's threshold, reality twisted. Cold pierced his skin. A thunderous silence engulfed his ears. Then - solid ground.
He staggered slightly as he reoriented himself. They now stood in a vast underground cavern, lit by bioluminescent moss crawling up columns of jagged stone. Faint echoes pulsed in the distance, like the heartbeat of the earth.
The architecture was wrong - angular, almost alien, covered in runes that flickered intermittently. Cracked pillars jutted from the floor at odd angles. Broken equipment, old bedrolls, and long-extinguished torches scattered the area.
"Looks like someone tried to camp here," Kael muttered.
"And didn't get far," Selene said, toeing a rusted helm. She glanced down at a dark smear along the wall. "Explorers. Fools, more likely. None returned. I guess they never will..."
Kael crouched near a collapsed cot, brushing dust from the remains of a pack. Rusted tools, shattered glass vials, and a half-rotten bedroll spilled out - but something else caught his eye. A small, leather-bound journal, half-torn and mottled with dried blood. He hesitated, then slipped it into his pack without a word.
A skittering sound echoed through the stone chamber. Kael turned, blade drawn.
From the shadows emerged three pale, dog-sized creatures - skin stretched thin over skeletal limbs, chitinous plating grown along their backs like armor. Their eyes glowed a sickly amber.
Kael stepped forward to intercept one. The beast shrieked and leapt. He swung his sword, grazing its side. It twisted mid-air and slammed into him, claws raking across his cloak. He grunted, rolling, and stabbed upward into its gut.
Selene moved like lightning. She ducked beneath a second beast's lunge, her twin daggers slashing in fluid arcs. Black ichor sprayed as she carved it open, spinning behind the third before it even registered her presence. It collapsed with a wet gurgle.
Kael struggled with his attacker. The creature clawed at his arm before Selene dashed in, severing its neck with surgical precision.
"You're welcome," she said dryly.
Kael coughed. "I had it."
"Sure you did."
They pressed deeper. The tunnels grew tighter, the ruins more warped. Strange moss glowed dim blue along the walls, casting dancing shadows.
A sudden snap above.
Kael looked up - too late. Tentacle-like vines dropped from the ceiling, each lined with needle-like teeth.
He twisted as one struck, barely avoiding it. Selene cried out - one had wrapped around her ankle, pulling her upward. She twisted mid-air, slicing through it, dropping to the ground as more descended.
Kael swung his blade in wide arcs, severing the flailing limbs. Acid hissed on stone where the blood landed. The central mass dropped from above - a throbbing mass of flesh hanging in the air.
Selene didn't wait. She sprinted up a fallen pillar, leapt, and jammed both daggers into its side. A shriek tore through the cavern as her blades carved through the air, leaving faint ripples in their wake like the dungeon itself flinched at her intent.
The bulb exploded. Gore splattered the floor.
Kael caught her as she landed.
"I had it," she said again.
He smirked. "Sure you did."
They ventured deeper. The faint pulsing they'd heard earlier grew louder, like a drumbeat in Kael's chest.
A large circular chamber opened before them. It was different - wrong. The stone warped as if melted and reshaped. Sigils pulsed erratically on the floor.
Then the air twisted.
A creature formed - not walked in, but simply appeared. Flesh stretched into impossible geometry. Limbs split and regrew. Eyes blinked open and shut along its sides. It shimmered like an unfinished thought, barely tethered to reality.
Kael hesitated. So did Selene.
Then it attacked.
Faster than sound. Kael barely blocked a strike and a warped limb lashed out, nearly cleaving his shoulder. Selene struck from behind, but her blades passed through like smoke.
It turned on her. She ducked, rolled, but a tendril smashed into her side, sending her flying.
Kael screamed and charged. His blade hit something solid. The thing shrieked and reformed mid-motion, wrapping around him like a serpent. He fought for breath, vision darkening.
And then,
The creature stilled. Split. A clean line from skull to gut.
It collapsed.
Rook stood where it had been, blade red, eyes cold.
"I won't do that again," he said. "Don't make me."
He turned and vanished back into the shadows.
Kael gasped, trying to regain his footing. Selene sat slumped against a wall, wiping blood from her lip.
"Well," she said, breathless. "That was fun."
Kael chuckled weakly.
They made a temporary camp in a small alcove nearby. Selene bandaged her side. Kael sat in silence, staring at the floor.
"That thing didn't fight like a beast," he murmured. "It moved too smart for a beast"
Selene nodded. "Whatever's beyond that pulse… it's not going to wait for us to be ready."
Kael looked toward the deeper tunnel, the thrum growing louder.
"We go deeper tomorrow," he said.
"No," Selene corrected him.
She stood, blades sheathed.
"We go now."