Chapter 18: Boots

The silence pressed close, broken only by the scuff of worn boots against ancient stone and the low, strained breaths of weary survivors. Lucian's steps faltered for just a moment. A scent drifted through the corridor. A mix of ash, iron, and dust and the memory came, unbidden. Not in images, but in sensation. Heat. Screams muffled by distance. The wet, rattling breath of something massive dying slowly. A flash. A gasp. Then darkness. He touched the edge of the cloth wrapped tight around his eyes.

The blindfold was more than fabric. It was a reminder of the story of how he lost his sight. A story he had never shared with anyone till this day. One that he might perhaps take to his grave or take to the top, depending on what fate had in store for him.

Rough against his fingers, slightly stiff from dried sweat and dust, it smelled faintly of old cedarwood and something cleaner beneath, a soap long used up. A gift. A grave marker. A second skin. He adjusted it carefully, as though someone might notice if it slipped even a little.

Behind him, Kaela's voice murmured something to Tavian, too low for Lucian to catch. But he heard the weariness in her tone, the tight edge of fatigue covered in forced confidence.

Tavian responded with a muttered quip, his usual grin dulled by exhaustion. Even he couldn't joke his way out of the tremble beneath his voice. Lucian's hand drifted down to the hilt of his dagger. Not for comfort, just habit now. The heat of the blade grounded him. Real. Present.

They walked in a staggered line, torches flickering low. The light didn't help much anymore. Mist clung to them like a second cloak, thicker than it had been before. Every surface looked slick and colorless, as if drained by time and fear.

The air was heavy with the residue of their last fight, the scent of burned flesh, decayed blood, and something else. Something wrong. Their clothes clung to them, damp with sweat and cold.

Lucian's coat was torn at one side, the seams stretched where something had grabbed him earlier. Kaela's armor was scorched along the shoulder, blackened and cracked. Tavian's once-bright scarf hung in tatters, barely clinging to his neck. Joran's left vambrace was missing entirely. Garrick's gear whined with each step, the runes embedded in his chestplate flickering like a failing heart. No one spoke of the ones they'd lost again, though it still weighed heavily on their minds.

Lucian tilted his head slightly, feeling the faintest change in the stone underfoot. It sloped downward. Not much. Just enough. "We're going deeper again," he murmured. Kaela heard him. "The mountain has no end." "No mercy either," Tavian added, voice light but brittle.

The tunnel stretched on as the group moved in silence. The long corridor had no sound save their footsteps and the distant drip of moisture onto stone. Even the chains had gone quiet, as if watching. The chamber they found was half-collapsed, but defensible. Jagged stalactites hung like fangs from the ceiling, and the air was cool with an undercurrent of rot. But no red mist. No centipedes. No whispers. For now.

Footsteps echoed in unnatural ways, bending back around them like whispers from something that didn't want to be forgotten.

The chains, once a constant companion in the silence, had quieted again. But they'd return. They always did.

Lucian touched his blindfold again. His fingers lingered longer this time. He remembered nothing clearly. But some part of him remembered enough. The flash of light. The screams. The blood on his hands. His own, and others'. He hadn't been born blind. And he didn't plan on staying that way.

"Hey," Kaela's voice cut through the fog. "You still with us?"

Lucian nodded slowly. "Yeah." She didn't press. Just walked a little closer. He took a long breath through his nose, steadying himself. One step. Then another. No turning back now.

...

The path ahead narrowed again, forcing the group into a single file. The walls pulsed faintly, veins of mineral essence glowing behind the stone like buried stars. Lucian ran his fingers over the damp surface. It felt alive. Not in the way a beast breathed, but like the mountain itself was remembering something ancient and choosing not to share it.

Kaela walked just ahead of him, her voice soft. "You ever wonder what's beyond all this?"

Lucian tilted his head. "Beyond the mountain?"

"Beyond the world you know."

He was silent for a moment. Then, "Every day."

Tavian's boots scraped lightly behind them. "You ever hear the legends, Lucian? The ones about the Floating Realms?"

Lucian frowned. "Floating realms?"

"Massive cities drifting above the clouds," Kaela said, half-smiling. "Some say they're built on sky-iron and kept aloft by ancient engines. Others say they hover because the earth below refused to hold them anymore."

Tavian grinned. "One story says there's a realm where time runs backward. Another tells of a beast the size of a continent that sleeps beneath a salt ocean, and people live on its back without knowing."

Lucian's expression didn't change, but something sparked behind his blindfold. "And people believe this?"

Kaela's voice lowered. "People believe what they survive. And the world is bigger than what fits between one war and the next."

Lucian considered that as they moved deeper.

Tavian continued, "There are forests where the trees whisper names you've never spoken aloud. Valleys where every stone is etched with a different memory. And have you heard of the Maw?"

Lucian shook his head.

"A chasm so wide, people say it's the wound left behind when the gods abandoned the world. You throw something in, it never hits the bottom. But sometimes… it throws something back."

Kaela snorted softly. "Now you're just scaring the blind kid."

Lucian smiled faintly. "I don't scare easy."

"Good," Tavian said. "Because there's tech out there even scarier than the myths."

Kaela nodded. "Relic-tier technology. Pre-Collapse. Stuff older than the empires. Weapons that fold space. Implants that let you rewrite your memory. There's a story about a man who turned his heartbeat into a forge and built cities from rhythm alone."

Lucian felt something tighten in his chest. Not fear. Longing. "Have you seen any of these things?"

Kaela glanced back. "No. But we've seen hints. Artifacts etched in languages we can't decode. Machines that still hum even though no one's touched them for centuries. Some think they were built by the first cultivators. Or something even older."

Tavian leaned closer. "There's more out there than anyone's telling us. Even this place, these tunnels. This mountain, it's a leftover from something much bigger."

Lucian trailed a hand along the wall again, feeling the pulse of ancient power just beneath the surface.

He didn't speak, but his thoughts buzzed.

The world is bigger. Stranger.

And I want to see all of it.

The path eventually widened again, sloping downward until the tight tunnel spat them into a yawning stone corridor. The air grew cooler, less oppressive and more stale. Here, the scent of old dust reigned. No rot. No blood. Just age. Forgotten age.

Lucian kept one hand on the wall, but the surface had changed. Less jagged. Smoother. Etched with old wear from traffic, boots, wheels, something heavier. People had passed through here once. Long ago.

The others were quieter now, no longer filling the silence with talk of cultivation. Kaela's voice came after a long pause.

"Most people never make it this deep."

Lucian tilted his head. "Why?"

"Because the mountain doesn't want to be known," she said flatly. "Not because it's alive but because it's cursed."

Tavian grunted. "Cursed or not, this place feels like it belongs to someone. Or something."

Lucian didn't respond. He was listening again. Not for sound, but the way space shifted ahead. The echoes no longer bounced like in a tunnel. The pressure in the air changed.

They were approaching something larger.

The corridor led them forward until they reached a wide archway flanked by two crumbling pillars. Beyond it, the tunnel opened into a vast hollow chamber—the skyline.

The air here was still and dry, layered with fine powder. Pale dust clung to the walls, to the black-veined floor. Everything was lit only by the flicker of their torches and the faint glow of mineral veins in the walls.

The space ahead was vast and vaulted like a cathedral, the ceiling lost in shadow. Wide archways, like carved stone roads, diverged from the central platform, each veering into its own tunnel system, veiled in mist and shadow.

Lucian stepped lightly onto the raised stone dais at the heart of the chamber. Around it, carved into the stone floor, were dozens of radial paths, archways branching off like the spokes of an ancient wheel. Some were narrow, others wide enough to fit a transport vehicle. All of them vanished into black.

Tavian let out a low whistle. "Well, this isn't ominous at all."

Kaela knelt again, brushing a hand through the fine dust. "No prints. Not recent ones."

Joran stood at the edge of one of the archways. His face unreadable. "We'll have to pick one."

Garrick growled. "Pick? We're just guessing?"

"There's no map," Kaela said. "Just directions and chance."

Lucian's blindfold fluttered slightly as he turned his head, sensing. Not with sight, but his instincts. Ones that had been honed over the years. Someone else was here.

"Quiet..." He said.

The silence deepened again as he paid closer attention.

He didn't have to wait long though.

A faint sound echoed in from one of the side arteries. Not wind. Not chains.

Boots.

A second set.

Then voices. Low. Cautious. Too far to hear clearly, but closing.

Lucian slowly straightened.

"We're not alone," he murmured.

Joran drew his weapon in silence.

Kaela rose to her feet, scanning the darkness beyond the nearest archway.

From the far passage, shadows bloomed, and out of the gloom stepped another group. Figures armed, armored, and just as stunned to see them as they were to be seen.