Xaden moved quietly through the undercity cave.
Except it wasn't a cave. As he soon realized, it was more of an underground drainage system.
The injury at his side still hurt badly, but at least the pain had now settled into a more acceptable form of agony.
After some minutes of aimlessly wandering, he finally decided to take a pause.
"What am I even doing anymore?" He rested his back against the wall and slowly lowered himself so he sat down on the dusty, uncomfortable ground.
He had limited time to find the key to heaven and reach heaven's door to move on to the next crucible. A simple enough task, aside from the fact that Xaden had entirely no clue where to find either one of those.
Xaden willed the tablet to appear once again in his mind. Strangely, he just knew how to make the screen materialize.
He reread the entire message. One thing in particular caught his attention.
Ascend or remain.
Forever.
'The key to heaven... Heaven's door.'
He had an idea.
He willed the tab away and got back on his feet, fighting a spell of dizziness.
Xaden's mind lingered back towards the hollow, what he had dimmed to call the entities that had chased him down here.
He had heard that the crucibles were designed so that the candidate would never encounter a beast that the candidate did not have at least the slightest chance to defeat or at least avoid.
Although he hadn't seen the hollows in action, he wasn't exactly planning to hang himself out to them to see just what exactly they could do.
Beasts had ranks of their own, from regular animals to savage beasts, followed by feral beasts, transcendant, legendary, emperor, demonic, calamitous titans, and finally the highest rank of beasts humanity has encountered, the ones who people only talked about under hushed tones.
Then there were the Others, the shadow-like creatures that had managed to wipe out nearly all of mankind. Not much was disclosed to the public about them, except that they were large, malevolent, and terrifying.
Then there was the uncanny resemblance between the others and the hollow...
'Maybe I'm just thinking too deeply into this.' Xaden waved aside the conspiracy. Whoever the bastard's father was, they were still after his ass.
He had to get moving.
The darkness got thicker the deeper he went. Heavy as though it were the thing holding the structures above. The space was also getting narrower. Xaden now kept one hand against the wall as he moved. The surface was cold and damp, uneven beneath his fingertips. Every few steps, something loose shifted under his boot, as though the earth itself was begging to give way.
'That can't be good.'
Then he saw it. A small light somewhere amidst the darkness. Not bright enough to mean freedom, but still, something.
He didn't run towards it immediately. The hollows had already done plenty to make sure he kept his wits about. Instead, he moved towards it slowly.
His boots stepped on something hollow.
He held his breath.
Another step.
The same hollow sound was heard. Faint but undeniable.
'Please...'
He took another careful step back.
The floor gave way.
'Shit, not again!'
Xaden fell into darkness.
For a split second, he marveled at how there was no noise this time, no host, only the sudden, terrifying feeling of there being nothing underneath him except the unknown.
He hit something hard on the way down, his shoulder slamming against an edge. Pain exploded in that area before he could even respond. His body slid over broken concrete and twisted metal, the rough surfaces tearing at his few clothes and skin.
He finally landed. Extremely hard.
The breath knocked out of him as his broken body finally settled on damp earth. His back had hit the ground first, and for that moment, the world contorted into several different levels of pure agony. His breathing, hoarse as the air from his chest had been stolen from him.
"...hah-" He breathed out a laugh. The sound barely came out.
He stared up at the ceiling, the small light he had perhaps imagined was gone. Only shadows and darkness. Or perhaps that was his vision.
Xaden tried to push himself up, but his arms trembled violently. His side burned where the wound had reopened, warm blood spreading slowly beneath his hand. His head throbbed, the world tilting slightly every time he tried to focus.
The darkness he felt now seemed different, colder. The pain in his shoulder pulsed again, sharper this time. His breathing grew slower, heavier, his body suddenly feeling far too tired for the situation he was in.
'Don't pass out, asshole.' He chided himself. 'You will die down here.'
But the darkness had other plans.
Xaden tried to fight it, to keep moving, even as his body went numb.
Even as he tried to get away from the pair of red eyes that had locked onto his broken figure.