Chapter 19: The Third Path

The silence between us wasn't merely the absence of sound—it was a pressure, a tension humming beneath the surface of the room like a coiled beast waiting for release. Elairen and I stood before the door, its surface unnervingly smooth, almost featureless, like it had never been meant to open in the first place. I pressed my hand to it, half expecting resistance, half expecting it to vanish under my touch—but it did neither. I pushed harder. Nothing. I tried pulling, then striking the sides with my palm, but the door refused to acknowledge my presence.

Elairen, quiet as a knife in the dark, simply watched me. Her eyes flickered with a barely perceptible curiosity, not at the door, but at me—like she was studying how I handled futility. For a moment, I almost smiled.

Then, the walls responded.

Crimson letters bled into the pristine white around us, forming with no sound, no heat, no magic I recognized. The script seemed to bruise itself into reality, as if the stone itself had been wounded.

"Six entered. Three shall leave."

A chill ran down my spine, not from the message itself, but from what followed next.

"Two are not enough."

I turned toward Elairen. She was already staring back, unreadable, as if she had expected this all along. Our eyes met, and in the space between us, understanding passed silently—this wasn't over. Not yet.

"…Can't we proceed just the two of us?" I asked aloud, my voice quieter than I intended. I didn't expect an answer, not truly.

But the walls had more to say.

The text pulsed once—then morphed.

Its shape twisted grotesquely into something obscene—a wide, jagged smile carved from light and shadow. And then:

"The path opens... for now."

We both inhaled at the same time. Not in relief. In dread.

Still, we stepped forward.

The doorway shimmered, not with magic but with an absence of meaning—as if it wasn't a door at all, but a suggestion of one. On the other side was… something. Not quite a chamber, not quite a tunnel. A vast, amorphous space extended before us—pristine white stone giving way to irregular terrain, a cavern embedded inside an artificial shell.

And then… the sound.

A giggle. Then another. Then the unmistakable, high-pitched cackle of something ancient and vile.

Goblin.

Then another.

Goblin.

Dozens more.

They came not in a charge, but in a tide—crawling out of dark cracks in the stone, some upright, some hunched, all of them grinning with malformed mouths and yellowing teeth. Ten. Twenty. Fifty. Then more.

They didn't stop coming.

I didn't count them. I didn't need to.

I turned my head slowly to Elairen, and though her body was motionless, her eyes had narrowed slightly—her posture shifting just enough to betray preparation. She wasn't afraid. That intrigued me more than the horde itself.

Without a word, I pulled the secondary blade from my belt and tossed it to her. She caught it in the air, fluid and sharp, like the weapon belonged to her all along. Her calm was surgical.

She intrigued me. These creatures, these twisted echoes of savagery, stirred something familiar in me—nostalgia, even. But Elairen… she seemed untouched by it, as if even memories could not stain her steel.

The goblins began to laugh. High-pitched, mocking. As if they saw a child, a soft target, an easy kill.

Let them.

I drew in a breath. A deep, centered, intentional breath.

Not for air.

For life.

The essence I had stolen—no, harvested—from the bodies before, coiled inside me like fire behind my ribs. And now, I summoned it, condensed it, directed it. I wasn't manipulating mana. I wasn't casting spells. This was biological warfare—internal alchemy fueled by the life force of the dead.

Every muscle fiber in my body surged with artificial adrenaline, a rush of power not granted by deities or rituals, but by sheer necromantic control. I forced that energy into my limbs, reinforced my bones, tightened my tendons like piano wire.

This body was young. Sixteen, maybe. But I had worn forms that cracked mountains. I had torn archmages to pieces with less than this.

Let them come.

The first goblin leapt. Sloppy. Predictable. Its dagger aimed for my ribs.

I didn't dodge. I angled. Let its own weight betray it. My elbow slammed into its jaw, followed by a downward palm strike—a real-world martial maneuver—tetsui-uchi, the hammer fist.

Its skull crumpled. It dropped without a sound.

Another charged. This one smarter, flanking wide.

Mae-geri. Front kick to the knee.

Pop.

It screamed.

I didn't let it finish. A straight punch—seiken-tsuki—to the throat silenced it forever.

One by one, I moved between them like a wraith, striking fast, calculating arcs of momentum and recoil. Their claws shredded air where I had been seconds ago. My fists, my feet, my body—weapons refined through centuries of combat, now driven by the raw engine of stolen vitality.

Every kill fed me.

And I fed greedily.

My bones hardened—literally. The life energy calcified the structure of my skeleton. The dermis beneath my skin thickened, changing density, atoms restructured to mimic materials harder than steel.

When I struck a goblin's skull with the edge of my hand, it shattered like dry bark.

And still I laughed.

Not out of joy.

But release.

This… this was freedom.

I caught glimpses of Elairen between strikes—her movements were swift, deliberate, every slash a kill. She wasn't improvising. She was executing a pattern. Twin kills, always two at once. Her blade was an extension of her mind. Her silence, her posture—it wasn't restraint.

It was discipline.

She knew I was watching. And still, she didn't waver.

Eventually, the tide began to thin. The goblins slowed. Bodies littered the chamber in heaps, blood soaking into the white stone. I exhaled.

And whispered to myself:

"…As the last of House Mariell… I dedicate these deaths to our name."

My voice was low, almost reverent.

Then I turned—and saw her.

Elairen, crouched beside one of the corpses, had her hand deep in its chest cavity. With a sickening crunch, she extracted something small, faintly glowing.

A crystal.

I stared, momentarily unsure if I was hallucinating.

She noticed.

"You're wondering why I'm taking them," she said, her voice calm, as if we were sipping wine in a quiet study. "We'll reach an open space eventually. These are worth coin. And more. You can absorb them. They strengthen you—think of them like… stat boosts in a game."

Game?

Stat boosts?

Was I in a world where gamified progression systems were real?

My fingers twitched. I reached into a goblin's chest with zero delicacy, tore through its sternum, and pulled free one of the crystals.

It pulsed in my hand. Not with mana. Not with qi. Not divine or demonic.

Something… else.

I narrowed my eyes.

Had I landed in one of those realms? One of the fractured systems built around levels, stats, experience points?

Before I could say anything, three doors appeared at the far end of the chamber. Simultaneously. Silently.

From each, several figures stepped through. Nine total.

They stared at us—blood-slick, crystal-stuffed, calmly conversing amidst corpses.

We stared back.

They clutched weapons—knives, poles, makeshift swords.

They were ready for war.

Pity they didn't realize it had already begun.