The tunnel pulsed like it was breathing.
Slow. Subtle. Wrong.
Each step Elian took was swallowed in that rhythm — not of wind or machinery, but of something deeper. Something alive. The walls were smooth, stone fused with faint organic texture, and thin veins pulsed with dull crimson under the surface. Not bright. Not hot. Just present, like blood moving through ancient arteries.
He kept silent.
Here, even breathing felt like a risk.
Shardthread's glow had dimmed to a soft pulse, barely lighting more than a few feet ahead. It was like the weapon itself was holding its breath.
[Environmental Shift: Defiant Path]
[Influence: Psychological fortitude will be tested. Behavioral imprinting in progress.]
Elian read the message, lips tightening.
"Always watching," he muttered.
The system didn't respond — but something else did.
A low thrum in the air. A pressure behind his eyes. Not pain. Just… attention.
The tunnel sloped gently downward before widening into a vast chamber carved like a spiral pit. Each ring of the spiral dropped deeper, forming a staircase of stone ridges circling toward a central basin.
At the very bottom stood a pedestal.
And atop it — a mirror.
But it didn't reflect light.
It absorbed it.
And in its dark surface, there was no image. Only words:
You are not the first.
Elian descended, careful with every step. The spiral was lined with shadows — but they weren't just shadows.
Figures.
Etched directly into the stone. Silhouettes, thin and jagged.
They moved as he moved.
He turned his head. So did they.
Lifted his blade. So did they.
Every gesture. Every breath. Mirrored, delayed by only a second.
He stopped halfway down, staring at one.
It raised its hand — a mimic of his own — and then slashed its throat.
No blood.
Just silence.
The shadow reabsorbed into the wall.
Elian pressed on.
[Thread Signature: Unstable.]
[Profile: Anomaly with deviation potential.]
[Alignment Path: Defiance – Confirmed.]
"Good," he whispered. "Let them try to cage me. I'll snap every lock."
At the bottom of the spiral, the mirror pulsed once — like a heartbeat.
He approached.
Its surface shimmered, black and glossy, but offered no reflection.
Instead, a second line of text appeared beneath the first:
The others obeyed. You hesitate.
Elian reached out.
Before he could touch it—
A sound behind him.
Footsteps.
Wet.
Measured.
Too close.
He spun.
Nothing.
The spiral behind him was empty.
But his shadow — cast from the glow of Shardthread — no longer moved with him.
It stood upright.
Facing him.
And smiled.