The air itself seemed to shiver as Nerin stepped into the heart of the city's cursed cathedral—a cathedral not of faith, but of fractured memories and whispered sins. The walls weren't just crumbling stone; they were digesting light, swallowing every glimmer until darkness reigned absolute.
Here, the Hollow Mark pulsed violently on his palm, a black sun split in two, flickering with a cold, blue flame that licked his skin like frostbite. The bone knife in his grip throbbed in sync, a tether between his fractured soul and the unholy trial awaiting him.
A voice, layered like shards of broken glass, echoed through the vast emptiness.
"Welcome, Hollowed. The Trial of Echoes begins."
From the shadows emerged reflections—twisted, warped replicas of Nerin himself, each bearing a fragment of his stolen memories, distorted by the city's hunger.
They moved like phantoms, their mouths silent but their eyes screaming torment.
Nerin's heart hammered a brutal rhythm as he faced them, every step a war between self and shadow.
The first echo lunged—fingers sharp as broken bones, clawing at the fragile barrier between past and present.
Pain flared—memories shredded like tattered pages, revealing horrors long buried. Faces of those he'd lost flickered and dissolved, screams etched into the marrow of his bones.
But with each strike, Nerin's adaptive instinct surged—his senses sharpened, his movements fluid, a dance of survival choreographed by the Hollow Mark's cruel design.
The echoes multiplied, a chorus of agony and deceit. Their voices, once silent, now roared in his mind, whispering lies that threatened to drown his resolve.
"You are nothing but shadow. You belong to the city."
His breath ragged, Nerin gritted his teeth, voice cutting through the chaos.
"I am the blade in the darkness. I will carve my own fate."
Steel met phantom flesh, bone knife slicing through illusions. Each echo shattered released a bitter memory, a shard of pain—and with it, a fragment of power.
The cathedral groaned as if in pain, the walls bleeding shadowy ichor. The trial demanded sacrifice, but Nerin's hollowed soul burned brighter with each conquest.
As the last echo dissolved into silence, the voice returned—softer now, yet laced with menace.
"You have survived the Trial of Echoes, but the city remembers. And it always comes for its debts."
Nerin's chest heaved, the Mark's cold fire simmering with new hunger.
Outside, the blood-red moss pulsed in the gathering dusk, the Hollowed City watching, waiting.
The trial was far from over.
The city's pulse quickened beneath Nerin's feet, a sick heartbeat of rot and ruin that echoed through the hollowed streets like a promise — or a curse. The Trial of Echoes had broken something loose inside him, a shard of shadow sharper than any blade. Yet, the hunger within the Mark was a living thing, insatiable and cruel.
Nerin staggered through the blood-drenched alleyways, the red moss crawling up his legs like veins of poison. Every breath was thick with the acrid sting of ash and decay, the air heavy as if the city itself was breathing—waiting for his next step to falter.
Then, the whispers began.
Not the soft curses of the shadows, but something older. Darker.
"They come for you," a voice rasped inside his skull — neither friend nor foe, but a warning carved from nightmare.
Suddenly, the ground beneath him split with a scream of stone, and from the depths surged figures — Hollowed, but not like him. These were debtors of the city, twisted husks bound by chains forged from their broken oaths and stolen memories.
Their eyes were pits of endless hunger, mouths dripping with shadows that tasted like betrayal.
"You owe," they hissed in unison, claws reaching like death's cold fingers.
Nerin's body reacted before his mind. The bone knife, now a shard of primal instinct, sang through the air, carving arcs of desperate defiance. Each strike was a promise — that he would not be swallowed without a fight.
But the debt was not just blood. It was memory, pain, sacrifice. For every Hollowed he felled, a piece of himself bled into the cursed soil.
His mark flared violently, the cold blue fire turning into a raging storm beneath his skin.
Pain exploded in his chest as visions flooded — faces twisted in agony, voices begging for release, screams that cracked the very air.
The debt was a chain, wrapped tight around his soul.
Nerin gritted his teeth, voice ragged yet resolute.
"If I must pay, then so be it. But I will burn this city to ash before I kneel."
With a roar that shattered the silence, he plunged deeper into the labyrinthine ruins, every step a defiance against the curse, every breath a vow to reclaim what the city had stolen.
Above, the twin moons bled shadows into the dusk, watching the Hollowed war against his fate — a war that was far from over.
The dusk bled deeper, suffocating the Hollowed City in a shroud of bruised purple and sickly crimson. Nerin's footsteps echoed hollow against the cracked stones, each one a fracture in his own unraveling resolve. The bone knife dangled from his fingers, a whisper of cold steel against his scarred palm where the Mark burned like a wound refusing to heal.
He found himself before an ancient monolith, half-buried in the blood-red moss that pulsed like a heartbeat of decay. Its surface was etched with symbols that clawed at the edges of his memory—forgotten runes of power and pain, woven with curses older than time itself.
The city's breath grew heavy, pressing against his chest like an iron vice. The sky above churned with the twin moons—the cracked one bleeding shadows that dripped like poison into the earth.
A voice, older than the stones, whispered through the bone-thin silence.
"The Hollow Mark was born of betrayal—of souls sacrificed to bind the city's curse. It is a lock, a key, and a chain. Those marked carry the weight of forgotten sins, tethered to a fate they cannot escape."
Nerin traced the carved symbols with trembling fingers. The Mark pulsed in answer, flickering with a cold blue fire that felt both like a prison and a promise.
Memories stirred—fragmented echoes of a time when the city was alive, vibrant, and whole. Then came the fracture—a cataclysm of blood and shadow. The original Hollowed, those who had dared to resist, were branded and bound, their souls fractured and scattered into the city's very bones.
"You are the legacy of that betrayal," the voice rasped, "a fragment of the forgotten. To survive is to become the echo of those who came before."
Nerin's breath hitched, the weight of centuries pressing down on his spine. The Mark flared fiercely, searing through flesh and spirit alike.
He clenched his fist, bone knife whispering a promise of cold retribution.
"If I am a shard of the forgotten, then I will carve my own path. Not as a prisoner of this curse, but as its breaker."
The city around him seemed to pulse with anticipation, shadows writhing like living tendrils eager to feast on his defiance.
The trial was no longer just about survival—it was about reclaiming a stolen legacy, or losing himself to the endless hunger of the Hollowed City.
The monolith cracked, a fissure spreading like a wound across its surface.
And from the darkness beyond, a new voice called—sharp, hungry, and undeniably alive.
"Welcome back, Hollowed. Your reckoning begins now."