Their journey brought them to a place forgotten by time—a sunken ruin, half-buried beneath tangled roots and the silent stillness of a drowned forest. The structure had once been proud, its pillars carved with sacred glyphs, but now it slumbered beneath dark, frigid water. Moss coated the walls, and ghostlight shimmered beneath the surface.
Elira's stone fragment had guided them here. Its pull had grown stronger with every step, leading them to the remnants of an archive said to hold echoes of the temple's oldest truths.
Caelen stepped into the flooded hall, water rising past his knees. The cold stabbed through him, but it wasn't what made him stagger. The curse howled. Drowned souls stirred beneath the surface—their pain sharp and silent, voices choked by water, memories crushed beneath stone and time.
"Elira," he called, his voice barely holding. "They're here. All of them."
She moved beside him, torch in hand, her face pale with awe and unease. "We're close. The fragment... it's humming."
Deeper in the ruin, they reached a vaulted chamber where the water was stillest. At its center rose a pedestal—worn, but untouched by time. Upon it rested a crystal, faintly glowing, its pulse slow and steady like a heartbeat.
Elira reached out. Her fingers brushed the crystal.
And the world shattered into vision.
Flashes surged through their minds: the forging of the heart—a pure source of light and emotion, born from the world's hope. The curse, once a gift, twisted into suffering by fear. And then… a presence. A figure wrapped in silence and shadow. Eyes like void. A hunger that felt nothing.
The End That Feels Nothing.
Caelen gasped, staggering back. Elira's hand trembled as she steadied herself against the pedestal.
"He's coming for the heart again," she whispered, her voice trembling. "To finish what he started."
Caelen's scar burned beneath his tunic, each pulse synced with the crystal's fading glow.
"Then we stop him," he said, voice low, steady. "Whatever it takes."
The visions faded. The chamber fell silent once more. But the silence no longer felt empty—it was charged with knowledge, heavy with purpose.
They emerged from the ruin just before nightfall, the chill clinging to them, the crystal's memory weighing heavily in their minds.
The temple loomed closer now, its presence like a breath held across the land.
But so did the enemy.
And Caelen's curse, burning brighter than ever, had become a beacon in the dark.