The descent picked up again, steeper this time. The tunnel curled downward like a rusted screw grinding into the world's meat. Air turned sluggish and thick with brine and old rot, the kind that clings inside the chest like mold spun from shadow. Verek was the first to speak, his voice quiet, pulled thin.
"We're beneath sea level."
Ezreal gave a curt nod, his jaw clenched tight. His eyes flicked over the sweating stone. "And still… no water."
The walls didn't answer with sound. They changed. Stone faded into something else—calcified flesh, or what might've been. Ridges lined it, shaped like the inside of a leviathan's ribcage. The surface shimmered faintly, shell-white streaked with dark ichor that throbbed like it was hooked to some buried, ancient heart. The glow came from strange growths: warped stalks, sickly vines, moss that pulsed in bruised jewel tones—deep green, old blue, blood red. The light didn't show anything. It swallowed it.
Silence bloomed. Not the hush of a tomb, not even that kind. This felt like sound itself had been erased. Their boots made no echo. Not even the scrape of breath.
And then the faces started.
They crawled from the walls. Shallow at first, half-seen, but too damn detailed to be carved. Moisture slicked their edges. There were dozens. Some could've passed as human if you didn't look long. Others… twisted, bent up by dreams that shouldn't have been dreamed. Too many mouths. Mouths where eyes should be. Grins stretched too wide to belong to anything that ever laughed. One face had pulled so far open, its jaw had cracked a long seam down the stone.
Caylen paused in front of one, fingers hovering just shy of it. "They're real," he whispered, like the words themselves were fragile.
"They're stone," Dax said flatly, though his eyes never stopped moving.
"They're… echoes." Caylen didn't even look at him. He spoke like someone half-asleep, or praying. "Souls, maybe. Or trapped thoughts."
Verek stepped in close, laid a hand on the cold cheek of one of the warped faces. There was a flicker of something behind his eyes—sorrow, maybe. "Impressions," he murmured. "Someone remembered them too hard, and now they're stuck."
From the eye of a stretched face, a tear broke loose. Thick. Red. Not water.
Then the walls exhaled.
It came in a pulse. Gentle, huge. Like a whole beast breathed around them. The corridor heaved, slow and sick. The air turned foul—salt, blood, rot, and the reek of crushed flowers left to die in the dark.
Caylen's voice came soft and tight. "We're walking into its throat."
Dax's hand found his sword hilt. "I vote we walk the other way."
"You won't," Ezreal said. He didn't look back. Just kept walking. No challenge in his tone. Just the grim certainty of someone who knew how things end.
The tunnel opened.
A round chamber lay ahead, sloped inward like a bowl. The ceiling stretched up and up until it didn't exist anymore, just fell into a black that no light could bite. In the center of the floor waited a pool. Perfectly still. Perfectly black. It didn't reflect. Didn't ripple. Around it, fungal stalks ringed the edge like a broken crown, thin and colorless. Their glow was the color of forgotten things.
Caylen knelt by the water, peering down. "It's not water."
Ezreal narrowed his eyes. "It's not… anything. I can see the stone beneath, but I don't think it's there."
Verek stepped up beside them, staring into that still void. "It's absence. Just... not a thing. Not magic. Not matter. Not anything."
The stalks leaned inward.
Something rose.
Not movement. Not exactly. More like the world peeled. Like something had been waiting right there the whole time, just behind the idea of space. She emerged. Tall. Too tall. Built like a person, but the shape was all wrong. Limbs long, smooth, too graceful. Skin pale and see-through, like a jellyfish left to drift between stars. She had no mouth, but she hummed—and the sound hit sideways. Like it came from inside your skull.
It twisted thought. Shook loose the anchors. For a breath, Verek forgot why he was here at all.
Caylen stumbled forward, eyes wide, face soft with wonder. Like a boy chasing a bedtime story.
Ezreal moved fast. He slammed Caylen down with a snarl. "Don't look."
Dax's arm snapped forward. A dagger flew. It passed through her, no resistance. Verek's hands surged with fire, words ancient and sharp spilling out. The flame struck nothing.
Another shape revealed itself. Then another. Then none. Then too many. They didn't move—they just became. Like bad dreams shaking free of the skin.
Reality sagged. Blurred. Like a pane of wet glass dragged by invisible fingers.
Mirrors. Not reflections. Possibilities.
"They're not supposed to exist," Verek said, voice raw, filled with awe that didn't want to be awe.
"They think they're helping," Caylen whispered, eyes wide. "Freeing us. From thought. From meat."
Thimblewick was clinging to Verek's coat now, trembling like a leaf in a furnace. Then the scream came—high and wrong, like glass screaming across metal. The air cracked beneath it.
Ezreal carved a sigil in the air, a ward flaring blue. It shattered the moment it lit. Blood slipped from his nose. He didn't even flinch. Didn't notice.
Dax let out a roar and charged, whipping a rusted chain he'd scavenged from the chapel upstairs. It swung clean through one of the forms.
They shrieked—but not with rage.
They mourned.
And then the light died.
Not dimmed. Died. Not darkness like night. Darkness like unmaking. Like the idea of light had been yanked from existence. No eyes. No body. Not even heartbeat.
Then Verek's voice cracked through.
It shook. It fought. But it rose.
One word. A word made of light.
It exploded through the chamber like a sunrise dropped into a battlefield. Brightness tore through. The creatures didn't scream like they were burning. They howled like they were being erased. Shapes unraveled, mist on a gale.
Gone.
Scattered.
The pool remained. Still. Waiting.
No one spoke. What could be said? Each of them had seen something different in the dark.
They kept walking.
The tunnel thinned. The stone changed again. No markings. No runes. No signs it had been carved by anything with hands. It was just… there. Smooth and broken in places, with veins of mineral bleeding light from above.
The air dragged with memory. Not theirs.
The growths were wrong again. Bulbous sacs pulsed, but not in time. Roots crawled even though no wind touched them. Every step felt like it shouldn't have happened.
Ezreal slowed. His voice was a wire pulled too tight. "Movement. All around. Not just ahead."
The spiral ended. The way straightened into a long hallway, floor flat and worn. Everything turned to gray. Sound vanished.
And then came a smell.
Woodsmoke. Parchment. Lilac. Fresh bread like the kind you dream of from childhood kitchens.
A doorway waited.
Bone curled into an arch above it. Polished clean, too perfect. Symbols danced along its curve, shifting. Not one script—but each of them read it anyway.
Ezreal blinked hard. "It says… 'Rest now.'"
"No," Dax snapped. "It said 'Remember.'"
Verek stepped forward slowly, eyes narrowed. "'Return,'" he murmured. Then he walked through.
The room on the other side stole the air from their lungs.
A dome stretched overhead, painted in unmoving stars. Moss blanketed the stone floor like it had been laid there with care. Tapestries swayed, though no wind moved. Crystals rose from the floor, clear as ice, carved with faces—some peaceful, others caught in screams.
And in the center: a feast.
Steam curled from bowls. Bread shone golden and perfect. Fruit gleamed like it had never known rot. Wine glittered, a galaxy in a glass.
No one stood waiting. But they'd been invited.
Ezreal's voice came low, uncertain. "It's not real. But it's not like any illusion I've felt before."
He didn't say the rest.
Because this wasn't made for the body. It reached for the soul. For the softest, most broken pieces.
Dax moved closer. His fingers reached toward the bread like they belonged there. "Smells like my mother's house. When I was small. Before it all burned."
Caylen's eyes glassed over. "I see our house. Before the plague hit. My sister's laugh. My parents in the garden…"
Verek's hands shook. He whispered, "This isn't memory. It's a wish someone made too hard."
Ezreal nodded, rigid. "It's a trap. A kind one. That makes it worse."
Behind them, the door vanished.
And from across the table, a voice whispered.
"Stay."