Chapter 7: “The Vault Beckons”

Darkness.

Real, oppressive, thinking darkness.

The adventurers' torches barely held back the suffocating black that pressed in around them. Magic light flickered. Heat drained from the air.

"This doesn't feel like any dungeon floor we've been on," Mira whispered, her voice a brittle thread. "It's like… the shadows are watching us."

They are.

High above them, completely out of sight, Leo flowed along the ceiling like a serpentine shadow. His form had fully adopted his Phantom Wraith evolution—sleeker, more fluid, able to phase in and out of solid objects at will.

He watched.

He studied.

And he waited.

[Dungeon Level: 7 – The Forgotten Vaults][Status: Inverted][Environmental Threat: Unstable Reality][Forbidden Entity: Dormant]

The adventurers stepped into a wide circular chamber. Symbols in a forgotten language pulsed along the stone floor. A central obelisk stood cracked and humming, covered in divine-looking glyphs long since corroded.

"This wasn't made by the same people who built the dungeon," Zek muttered, checking his daggers. "This feels… old. Too old."

"There's no record of this vault in the guild archives," Aurelia confirmed. "Which means the seal was meant to be permanent."

"Then we shouldn't be here," Ryn growled. His wolf paced beside him, ears flat. "This place is wrong."

"The relic," Mira said, pointing to the obelisk. "That's what's throwing divine energy like crazy. We take it, we leave. Simple."

Leo watched with a faint smirk.

Simple. Sure.

Above them, the walls whispered. Not in words. In intent.

Something below had begun to stir.

The stone trembled with breath. The glyphs shivered like dying nerves.

Leo felt it too. A presence far older than even Elara.

Ancient divinity, twisted and broken by time.

Entity 017, the system had called it.

He could feel it pressing against the floor beneath the obelisk. A seal, but thin. Fractured.

Like ice about to break.

He hovered closer, feeling the divine pressure pulse in waves.

And there—within it—a flicker of something… familiar.

Leo froze.

A scent. A thread. A memory.

Lysia.

It was her soulprint. Warped. Stretched. But definitely hers.

She was here. She's part of this now.

"Mira, hurry," Aurelia said. "Whatever this thing is, it's not fully dormant. I can feel it twitching."

The mage began casting a siphon spell.

"Five more seconds—"

Too late.

The obelisk screamed.

A psychic pulse tore through the room—blades of memory, agony, and ancient will.

The humans screamed. Blood dripped from ears. The wolf collapsed, whining.

Leo winced—not from pain, but recognition.

That voice… It's Lysia. What did they do to her?

The obelisk cracked in half.

And a hand emerged from the floor.

Not a human one.

Not even a monster's.

It was bone-white. Twisted. Clawed. Glowing veins of silver ran up the arm like wires.

And its fingers were chained.

[Entity 017 – The Bound Hunger has Awakened][Divine Signature: Hybrid – Core Contaminated by Chimera (Lysia)][Threat Level: ???]

The adventurers backed away.

"Weapons up! We retreat!" Aurelia shouted. "Zek, cover Mira!"

"I told you we shouldn't have come here!" Ryn roared, holding his bleeding head.

Leo didn't move.

Didn't help.

Just watched.

Until the ground beneath them exploded.

A figure half-formed from black light and radiant bone burst upward, screaming in three different voices—one of which was Lysia's.

It attacked without form—whips of bone, bursts of holy flame, lashes of corrupted mana. The adventurers fought back, but the room distorted. Space bent. Gravity twisted.

Leo felt the threads unravel.

This place will collapse.

And in that chaos, something within him whispered.

"Save her."

He didn't know if it was Elara's voice. Or a memory. Or… maybe his own.

But something real called him.

He moved.

One shadow tendril speared through the beast's neck—diverting its next blast of mana.

Leo dove downward, through the noise, and reached into the creature's chest.

There.

Buried beneath the corruption, a divine core. Hers.

He grasped it.

[Divine Fragment Detected: Radiant Chimera – Lysia][Extract? Warning: Extraction will trigger evolution path.]

Do it.

He pulled.

The creature screamed—Lysia's voice tearing through the chaos.

Light exploded.

The Vault collapsed.

🔹 System Alert

[You have absorbed 1 Divine Fragment – Radiant Chimera][Hidden Evolution Path Unlocked: Abysswalker Lv. 0][New Ability Gained: Fragment Echo – Replay Memory of Consumed Divinity]

When Leo opened his eyes, he floated amidst the ruins.

The adventurers were gone.

Dead? Fled? It didn't matter.

The chamber was collapsing. Cracks of white light spread like veins through the ground.

And inside him… Lysia's scream still echoed.

He clutched his chest, feeling the echo resonate.

She's not gone. Not completely.

And then Elara's voice returned. Gentle. Broken.

"You found her."

Leo didn't answer.

He just floated in silence, surrounded by dust and fractured divinity.

And whispered—

"Who did this to her?"