Lucien reacted without hesitation.
The moment the miasma brushed the edges of his perception, calculation replaced surprise.
He turned and moved. His figure blurred as he dashed through the deeper parts of the Obsidian Tower.
He was not the only one who felt it.
The ancient beings did.
The howling that had once filled the chamber was gone.
The beings inside the cages had gone eerily still. Their gazes were no longer wild with rage or humiliation. They were fixed outward, toward the unseen void beyond the tower's walls.
Miasma. Black Mass Monsters.
Their mortal enemies.
Lucien arrived before them in a breath.
For the first time, none of them shouted at him.
They looked at him with expressions layered and complex. Hatred remained, but it had been overlaid by something heavier. A shared understanding of danger.
This was not a petty conflict.
This was unprecedented.
Lucien did not speak.
He acted.
