The ink-stair spiraled downward for hours.
Each step groaned like turning pages. The air thickened, pressing on their lungs as though the library itself resented their descent. Lanterns of pale script floated in the void, casting sickly light across the faces of the hunters.
Lyra gripped her staff tighter. Caleb's quill scratched furiously against parchment, his mutters echoing in the stillness. Elias walked steady, Codex open at his side, glasses cracked but reflecting the glow with quiet resolve.
At last, the stairs ended.
They stepped into a cavern so vast it felt endless. Shelves towered higher than mountains, their spines warped, cracked, and mismatched. Some books oozed ink like blood. Others pulsed faintly, as though alive.
The Shelf of Prototypes.
A chill ran through the alliance. Even hardened hunters shifted uneasily.
Caleb whispered, almost reverent, "These aren't finished drafts… they're abandoned. The things the Authors didn't want read."
---
The silence broke.
One shelf split with a sickening crack. From its bindings, a monster tumbled forward.
At first it resembled a wolf — then its body lurched, sprouting a second head of a lizard, a third of a boar. Its limbs bent wrong, covered in jagged runes. Its chest cavity glowed with unfinished script, sparking violently.
A Patchwork Beast.
It roared with three voices, lunging into the hunters.
The Crimson Fangs met it head-on, axes flashing. One hunter cleaved into its side — only for the wound to close instantly, the boar-head gnashing down on his arm. He screamed as the lizard-head spat corrosive ink, dissolving armor.
"Fall back!" Hale bellowed, swinging his own axe into the beast's flank. It staggered but didn't fall.
Spirewatch scribes unleashed spells, only for the runes on the beast's hide to eat the magic, consuming it like fire devours paper.
Panic rippled.
---
Elias Moves
The Codex flared, pages spiraling around Elias.
> [New Page Recorded: Patchwork Beast.]
[Annotation: Triple Roar + Chain Lightning → Shatter Howl.]
Elias raised a page. A crackling roar burst forth, not from his mouth but from the Codex itself. The sound shattered crystal shelves, stunning the beast.
Hunters gasped as Elias stepped forward, calm in the chaos.
"Strike now."
The Crimson Fangs surged, axes cleaving deeper this time. The beast writhed, its regeneration slowed.
Lyra's violet magic flared, her bolts piercing the gaps in its armor. For a moment, the hunters rallied.
---
Stakes Made Real
Then the beast convulsed. Its chest split, a malformed arm bursting free, seizing a Spirewatch mage mid-incantation. The hunter's scream cut short as the arm crushed him like paper.
Another hunter was caught in the lizard-head's bite, dragged thrashing into the shelves before being swallowed whole.
The alliance faltered. Even the guild masters looked pale.
"This thing… it wasn't meant to live," Seraphine whispered. "And yet it does."
Elias's voice was steady. "That's what makes it dangerous."
---
Elias's Counter
The Codex flared brighter.
> [Manifestation: Guardian Summon – Leonis.]
The knight of script roared into being, shield slamming against the Patchwork Beast. Sparks flew as blade met malformed flesh.
Elias's calm voice cut through the chaos: "Lyra. Now."
She hesitated — her mana reserves were low, her body trembling. But Elias's eyes found hers, sharp and unshaken.
"You can do more," he said simply. "Read deeper."
Her chest tightened. No command. No plea. Just certainty.
Lyra raised her staff, violet light flaring brighter than ever before. Her spell surged, splitting into dozens of bolts that rained down like a storm, piercing the beast's joints, forcing it back into the Guardian's waiting strike.
The Patchwork Beast shrieked, its body tearing apart in a storm of ink and script before collapsing into ash.
The hunters staggered, panting, eyes wide.
Lyra fell to one knee, drained, but Elias's faint nod steadied her.
"Well read," he said.
Heat rose to her cheeks, though her lips curled into the faintest smile. His certainty had pushed her further than she'd believed she could go.
---
The Whisper of Arclight
Silence returned. Hunters gathered themselves, mourning the dead, binding wounds.
But from deeper in the Shelf, a new voice echoed. Low, bitter, sharp.
"So. The Authors sent readers to their trash pile."
A figure emerged from the mist between shelves. Tall, broad, regal in bearing but broken in presence. His eyes glowed with flickering golden script, his blade constantly shifting shape as if unsure what it wanted to be.
Caleb's breath caught. "No… not a beast. A man."
Lyra's grip tightened on her staff. "What is he?"
The man smiled bitterly, spreading his arms. "I am what was abandoned. The one they cut from the manuscript. The discarded hero."
His eyes locked onto Elias, burning with resentment.
"You… are my replacement."