The sky had darkened, taking on the same bruised red as the horizon before dawn.
Pillars and monoliths rose along the road, each spire glowing in sequence from amber, to gold, and finally to vermilion.
The dark-gray metal felt familiar.
Foreboding.
Oppressive.
Something was wrong.
The structure had absorbed his stockpile of power and copied every piece of data he possessed. It now wore the shape of his armor, powered by his own energy.
He decided to test the theory.
Tensing his muscles, he raised one arm. Cyan energy gathered within his palm, its color gradually shifting toward amber.
The spires responded.
A force suddenly pressed against the soles of his feet.
His eyes flared vermilion.
Then he was yanked forward.
Dragged against his will toward the center of the region.
At the heart of the ruins stood a massive construct resembling a mechanical coliseum. Sweat gathered along his brow as the structure continued guiding his body toward its entrance.
The doors opened.
He entered.
The chamber beyond felt regal and solemn.
Dim light spilled from hexagonal panels embedded within the vaulted ceiling. A raised ledge loomed ahead, partially concealed by shadow.
He wrested control of his body back and looked around.
This was the first chamber.
The first break in the structure.
Shadows pooled within its corners, unmoving and impossibly deep.
At the center of the room, standing upon a podium, was a statue shrouded in an ornate cloak.
Surrounding it, massive murals had been carved into the walls.
A trilogy of stories.
Each panel seemed to move not physically, but like a memory replaying itself across stone.
The first depicted a creator watching over his work.
Then his own creations turned against him.
The creator was shattered by the very beings he had brought into existence. His creation rose in corruption and destroyed everything he had built.
Yet two of his progeny remained loyal.
One fallen god was eventually replaced by the Tribunals.
The second mural depicted a man who had lost everything to gods who had rebelled against their maker.
He suffered.
Then he stole the power necessary to trespass into their realm.
He returned after razing the world, slaughtering three of the twelve Heralds:
Power.
Perception.
Evolution.
In the end, however, he was ambushed.
Weapons had been forged specifically to stop him—the Soulborne.
Two entities, male and female, had been created to combat the super-adaptable being known as the Axate.
That being was Akumo.
And Akumo was eventually split into twelve beasts.
The cost was the souls of the Soulborne themselves.
The third mural unsettled him the most.
It depicted a horned entity spawned from Akumo during its final moments, gathering power.
Beside it stood a gestation pod.
Within the pod, a child appeared to be growing.
But the rest of the mural was blank.
Nothing.
No conclusion.
No explanation.
That alone was strange.
What happened next was stranger.
The image began to glitch.
The statue of the priest vanished from his sight.
For an instant, there was nothing.
Then,
Pain.
It struck like a hammer.
Mind-numbing.
Soul-searing.
The sensation scorched through him as sparks danced across the stone and air.
A hundred meters away, the priest stood motionless.
Its robes billowed in a wind that was not natural.
Its eyes flashed purple.
Then crimson.
Then a void-black corruption.
One exposed palm was ornate and streaked with blood.
Within that hand writhed an artificial vertebra.
Its metallic spokes twisted and moved with a life of their own.
The priest released a single, slow breath.
The object reacted.
And Arc felt the implant's influence begin to peel away.
Suppressed memories slammed into him.
Torture.
Endless small cruelties.
Emotions he had buried for years came roaring back to the surface.
The practiced apathy fractured.
He panicked.
For the first time, he understood with cold clarity that he might actually die here.
Everything he had been,
Everything he believed himself to be,
was a lie.
His body reacted on instinct.
Wounds snapped closed as a thin cyan aura leaked from beneath his skin.
He charged.
Silver armor spread across his hand as he hurled himself forward at top speed, his voice reduced to a raw cry of strain.
The priest began to speak.
Ancient words filled the chamber.
Each line struck him somewhere beyond the reach of ordinary language.
Then the priest's declaration rolled through the chamber, slow and terrible.
"Noirwraith, reaper of identities and power. Your time has come. Judgment for your perversion of the laws of our reality and for their exploitation. You are an anomaly to be extinguished. You stand accused for your crimes.
Just as Lord Jura was eradicated, so shall you be made to perish. Just as Akumo, usurper of the Axate, faced loss, so shall you lose. Just as those you killed despaired, you will taste despair.
Fall!"
The word crashed through him like a physical force.
The chamber seemed to lean as gravity itself rearranged.
The bones within his body sang beneath the pressure of the command.
He hit the ground hard.
The world tilted.
And everything went into motion.