The dank, humid darkness of the fungal‑matted cavern receded behind them, replaced by a markedly different air. Raine Morningstar's consciousness struggled to the surface as if emerging from a deep sea; each breath was heavy with the weight of survival. He could feel that terrible chill and burning agony within his body had largely abated—though his limbs remained weak and his spirit felt hollowed out, that specter of death that had dogged his bloodline had at least receded for the moment.
He forced himself upright, blinking against the dim cavern light until his vision cleared. Karrion Ironforge's weathered, anxious face hovered over him; the dwarf's rough fingers gingerly probed Raine's forehead before a relieved sigh escaped him. "You're awake? How do you feel? By my ancestors, you almost went off to join them in eternal ale!"
"I'm… still alive." Raine's voice rasped like sandpaper. He wiggled a finger and felt again the long‑lost sense of control, however feeble. "Thanks to…" He trailed off, glancing toward the cavern's far corner.
There, Thalia Night'song lay curled as though part of the shadow itself. Though seemingly asleep, the ghostly pallor of her translucent skin, the tight furrow of her brow, and the aura of life flickering low around her spoke of another deathly edge. Raine recalled the strange glowing warmth that had coursed into him before his black veins receded—and he pressed himself to rise.
Karrion followed his gaze, voice low and guarded. "She saved you—used some ancient rite, cost her dearly." The dwarf hesitated, uncertainty furrowing his brow. "You owe her your life. But… she's not well."
Raine fell silent, torn between gratitude and growing unease. Who was Thalia truly? What power had she wielded? That pure celestial energy, akin to his own starlight blood yet older and tinged with sorrow, left him unsettled.
"Don't dwell on it yet," Karrion grunted, patting Raine's shoulder. "Once you're stronger, I've got new news."
The dwarf then recounted his discovery: the star‑born emblem hidden under moss, the secret corridor it revealed—a possible ancient route to Fallenstar. His excitement warred with caution. "That emblem's definitely star‑born! This passage… may be one of the ancient ways to the Fallen Star City itself! Who knows what awaits deeper down, but it's better than rotting here."
Hope flared once more in Raine's chest. Despite his weakened state, and the unknown beyond that hidden fissure, "Fallenstar" remained his guiding obsession. He stared at the yawning crevice in the rock, as if he could already smell the dust of forgotten ages.
"When do we leave?" he asked, voice faint but resolute.
"When you can walk straight," Karrion interjected, "and she…"—he gestured to Thalia—"…needs time to recover. We'll tackle that old path at full strength."
Over the next few days, the trio rested in the makeshift refuge. Raine's body recovered astonishingly fast—somehow nourished by the golden blood's lingering spark—while Thalia remained fragile, coughing and pale whenever she tried even simple shadow‑stepping. Karrion's suspicion deepened, but he kept it to himself, discreetly offering Thalia extra rations. Raine, torn between gratitude and unease, didn't know how to broach the subject.
When Raine could stand unaided and Thalia could clutch her cloak for support, they decided to venture down the ancient path.
Karrion reopened the hidden stone doorway with practiced hands. A stale, musty draft greeted them—ancient air unmarred by the Blightwood's stench.
"Watch your step," he warned, lantern aglow. "These stairs have seen centuries; one wrong move and—"
The stone steps descended steeply, barely wide enough for a single file. Walls were coated in dust and cobwebs; here and there, faint wall‑paintings and rune fragments peeked through eons of grime. The air—dry and scratchy—felt frozen in time.
Yet this stillness did not guarantee safety. Raine sensed a peculiar, muted energy lingering in the air—not star‑magic, nor the Blight's vile taint, but an echo of something vast and primeval, now almost extant, like the last breath of a fallen deity. Even here, corrosion's ink colored the edge of that ancient gleam, revealing that even these buried halls were not wholly spared the Blight's reach.
Thalia, in the center, walked with cautious elegance. She scanned the dimness under her hood, body taut as she resisted unseen pressures.
"This place… is very old," she whispered, voice quavering. "The magic is pure, yet there's… a taint beneath it."
"How bad could it be?" Karrion scoffed, tapping loose stone with his axe. "Better than those creepers outside, at least. No black‑bleeding trees in here."
They pressed onward until the passage opened into a wider cavern, once reshaped by mortal hands but now half‑collapsed. A narrow causeway of fallen rubble led on under craggy stalactites.
Ahead, the corridor pinched into a throat‑like ravine between sheer walls. These walls glittered with clusters of icy‑blue crystals—faint celestial residue, as though old starlight wept from the stone. The air here was so stagnant it might have been cement.
Most striking at the narrows stood a colossal figure, blocking their path entirely—an impossible guardian.
It resembled a towering humanoid clad in primeval armor of unknown alloy, its surface etched with elegant but nearly obliterated runes. In its gauntleted grip rested a massive, rusted battle‑axe, its edge faintly cold. Yet half the armor was overgrown with that same ghostly blue crystal, while the other half writhed with living black corruption—slick tendrils of Blight weaving through its plates, exuding putrescence.
The guardian's helmet visor was a shadow‑blacked slit; now, it was utterly still, as if dormant for untold ages. Its presence alone pressed upon the three like a living weight—divine awe and corrupted horror rolled into one, a relic of duty twisted by madness.
Karrion was the first to break the silence. "By the beard of my forefathers… what in the Nine Hells is this? A star‑born golem? A cursed sentinel?"
Raine's heart thundered. His own tenuous star‑blood thrummed at a pitch of recognition and dread. This sentinel… it bore the same heritage as him. It felt kinship and horror in the same instant.
At that moment, as if stirred by Raine's bloodline resonance, the ancient guardian motioned ever so slightly…
A grinding, weighty scrape—like mountains shifting—rung through the chamber as centuries of dust cascaded from the giant's surface. Two lights kindled within the slit of its helm.
One was a pure, cold-blue glimmer, like a frost-star's radiance—imbued with authority and order.
The other was a murky, abyssal red flare, brimming with madness and the lust for destruction.
Those two utterly opposed lights intertwined and clashed within that narrow visor slit, then fixed upon the three of them—most insistently on Raine.
"Intruders… Blood of the Stars… why… rouse… the slumbering…"
A colossal, warped thought—its voice an amalgam of countless echoes—bore down upon their minds. It carried the cadence of ancient speech laced with the rasp and frenzy of corruption, splitting their heads with pain.
The Guardian had awakened.
It was not wholly consumed by shadow‑blight—its blue light proved a remnant of ancient stellar will, bound to obey an age‑old command. Yet the crimson taint revealed how deeply corruption had warped its core, turning its sacred duty into indiscriminate obstruction.
Slowly, it raised its massive battle‑axe. Along the blade, star‑light and blight‑energy wove together into a visible, ever‑rippling aura.
"The Forbidden Ground… must not… be crossed… begone… or… be obliterated…"
Ancient duty and blighted malice coalesced into an icy ultimatum. There would be no parley.
The trial—indeed, the battle—began.
The Guardian made no immediate charge. It lifted its unarmed left gauntlet and slammed it upon the floor!
CRASH!
The tunnel trembled violently. Blue crystals studding the walls flared with searing brilliance even as black blight‑matter along the floor writhed with malignant energy.
"Watch out!" Karrion roared, flinging Raine and Thalia back, his rune‑shield springing to life.
In the next instant, a storm of pure-star beams—ice‑cold and regimented—and vicious dark arrows forged of corruption, rained down from every direction.
These were not mere physical blows but assaults on the very essence of life. The stellar beams sought to freeze and bind, while the shadow bolts yearned to consume and twist the mind. Two antithetical forces, twisted together by this ancient guardian, formed an attack nearly impossible to withstand.
Karrion's shield flickered with runic light, absorbing the brunt—but even it was flecked with frost and blight. The dwarf grunted, muscles trembling under the onslaught.
"It's—resistant to both energies!" Thalia observed, weaving a thin shadow‑veil around them in desperation, though it scarcely slowed the barrage. Pale and weakened, she dared not unleash her full power for fear of enraging the Guardian's corrupted core.
Raine ground his teeth, fighting dizziness. He tried to summon what little star‑light remained within him to resonate with the Guardian's pure energy, to disrupt its balance—only to have his feeble power shattered by the colossal aura, igniting another wave of backlash that left him gasping.
"No… too strong… too chaotic!" he panted.
The Guardian's initial blast did not satiate it. Each ponderous step it took shook the earth. It hoisted its axe high—blue‑black energies coalescing into a deadly vortex at the blade's edge.
"It's preparing its ultimate strike! Spread out!" Karrion bellowed, bracing his shield.
Facing such titanic might, the three were in grave peril. Raine's star‑light was too faint to be effective; Thalia was too drained to weave potent magic; and Karrion, though unyielding, could barely withstand the punishing energy assaults.
The axe descended with the roar of an avalanche—aimed straight at Karrion's shield!
Raine's eyes snapped open, dread clawing his mind. He knew this blow could shatter the dwarf's defense and leave him grievously wounded.
"Karrion!"
In that split‑second, Raine's mind raced. He noted how the Guardian's dual energies—starlight and corruption—strained against each other, causing a momentary rigidity in its limbs. When it channeled both in unison, a flicker of instability shone at the joints of its armor.
"Karrion! Hold it off three more breaths! Thalia! Strike the crystal cluster behind its left knee!" Raine roared, his voice strained with urgency. "I'll—get closer!"
Get near this behemoth's axe? It was madness!
Yet in Raine's eyes burned a desperate resolve, and the others, seeing his fierce determination, had no time to question—they had to trust him.
"All right, you mad dwarf!" Karrion thundered, slamming his shield into the Guardian's shin to hamper its movement.
Thalia's lips turned bloodless as she drew upon her last reserves, unleashing a shadow‑whip that streaked toward the corruption‑encrusted joint behind the Guardian's left knee.
At Raine's signal, he hurled his star‑stone—now faintly aglow—at the visor slit, aiming to strike the pure blue spark within.
In that moment, the Guardian seized—its helm's blue light flickered fiercely, warring with the crimson tide—and its axe crashed into the ground instead of its intended target, carving a deep chasm and sending shards flying.
Karrion was flung back but alive; the axe's swing had found only earth.
Raine's star‑stone connected, and Thalia's shadow‑whip bound the knee joint. The Guardian bellowed in shocked rage, stumbling as its corrupted limb seized.
Opportunity seized, they would press their assault on this ancient sentinel, the clash of order and decay fulfilling fate's grim design.