The Hall of Sacrifice

The next day arrived, cloaked in silence.

No footsteps echoed down the corridor. No guards peered through the slit in the door. Nothing but the occasional flicker of the torchlight on the walls reminded them that time was even passing.

Ethan had made progress. A lot of it.

The section of the wall he had been working on now looked even, smooth—almost as if it had never been tampered with. He had scraped it clean in thin, careful layers, making sure the damage blended in with the age of the stone.

To the untrained eye, it was untouched.

Inside, though, his inventory had grown. Not just with fragments, but with enough of the Drakiel Stone to fill a small toolbox. Each shard, each sliver, was a possibility waiting to be tested.

He was proud of the work. So were the others, though none of them said it aloud. But their silence had changed. It wasn't heavy with hopelessness anymore. It was watchful. Curious.