Darian took a step back, moving away from the canyon's edge. The heat rising from the crack dried his throat, and the roars that made the stone vibrate froze his blood.
"We need information before doing something crazy," said Aria, lowering her bow. "To the town. Now."
They walked the short distance separating them from Amber Refuge. The settlement was built right at the cliff's edge, with limestone walls of a natural amber color, a yellowish-brown tone that blended with the earth. When they crossed the gates, they found absolute chaos. People ran desperately, barricading their wooden and stone houses.
In front of the main palisade, a broad-shouldered dwarf was organizing some militiamen. Darian approached respectfully, lowering his head slightly.
"Excuse the interruption," the young man said. "We come from Arkania. The blacksmith Thorgar asked us for Resonant Core Crystals from the bottom of this canyon. Could you tell us what those beasts fighting are?"
The dwarf looked at him, evaluating his gear, and let out a tense snort.
"The crystals are at the bottom, stranger, but going down now is suicide. The one that flies is Vaelor, the guardian of this area. But the rock one... that's the anomaly. Stone beasts here measure five meters at most; that monstrosity measures over twelve. They've been fighting for three days without rest, going in and out of the crack, destroying the Emerald Forest in their wake. That dark energy from the bottom mutated the rock one and made it savage. Vaelor is trying to kill it before it climbs up and massacres us."
Darian looked at his companions. If Vaelor lost, the town would disappear. It wasn't just about the crystals; it was about the people, about the guardian exhausting itself alone. Darian sought the gazes of Varkas and Aria. There was no need for words. In that silence, there was a complicit look, an absolute understanding that their fates were tied to this mission.
"We can do it," Varkas murmured with a fanged smile.
"We can do it," Aria agreed, drawing her bowstring taut.
Darian tightened his grip on his sword's hilt.
"We're going down," he decided. "Vaelor is not going to die alone."
"You have to wait until dawn," the dwarf warned. "If you go down now, the tremors will turn you to pulp."
The night was torture. The ground shook and the abyss spat bursts of magma and wind. At dawn, silence fell over Telesto. They took the elevator platform and began the descent. The light disappeared, replaced by a red mist and the metallic blue glow of the black crystal veins in the walls.
The platform hit the bottom. There was Vaelor, prostrate and bleeding. Before him, the twelve-meter aberration rose. Upon seeing the humans, the monster opened its jaws and spat an immense ball of boiling magma.
"Fire!" Darian shouted.
Aria activated her Air Wall, raising a gale that deflected the heat. Behind her, Varkas used his Deep Anchor and raised an Earth Wall. The magma ball impacted with overwhelming force, destroying the defense and sending Varkas flying through the air. The giant rolled across the ground, spitting blood with burns on his arms.
Aria used Flash Step and leaped toward the crystal walls, firing her Piercing Rain. The arrows embedded themselves in the cracks of the monster's armor, bursting the flesh from within. The beast, blind with pain, tried to devour Varkas. The giant activated his Seismic Gauntlets and drove an uppercut into the jaw, but the force of the impact dislocated his shoulder, making him fall.
The beast launched a ground-level tail sweep toward Darian.
Flow Perception.
Time stopped. Darian slid underneath, drew his sword, and cut the tendon of the rear leg. As speed returned, the monster fell to its side, but reacted by detonating the scales on its back. A massive shower of sharp rock shrapnel burst outward.
Varkas took two fragments in the abdomen and collapsed. Aria, in the air, saw her Vacuum Sphere shattered by a rock that sank into her calf, making her crash to the ground with a cry. Darian was struck in the left ribs; the crack of bone was sharp. He fell on his back, coughing blood.
They were massacred. The dragon prepared one final magma attack. It was going to finish them.
"You remind me of someone, boy..." Vaelor's ancestral voice resonated only in Darian's mind. "I knew I could trust you. I'm going to open you an opening. Use it."
Vaelor exhaled one last hyper-concentrated ray of wind that blasted open the rock dragon's chest armor, leaving its black heart exposed. Then, the guardian died.
Darian got to his feet, trembling. He invoked Flow Perception and fused wind and fire. He compressed the air around the flames with overwhelming pressure, until the blade of his sword became a sphere of blue-white plasma, blinding and unstable.
He leaped. He dodged the fangs and drove his sword directly into the exposed heart.
Detonate.
The internal detonation was apocalyptic. A shockwave of heat and absolute thermal pressure burst the colossus from within. The recoil was savage: Darian felt his right forearm fracture and his skin burn as he was blasted through the air.
Silence returned. Darian crawled across the obsidian floor, clutching his broken arm. Looking at his hand, he saw his sword hadn't survived: the blade was incinerated, turned into a handful of gray dust that the canyon wind carried away in an instant.
Aria and Varkas lay wounded, but alive. Vaelor's body dissolved into silver light, leaving behind a warm, sky-blue egg.
But from the black blood pool of the monster, the anomaly emerged. A heavy grimoire, bound in black leather with an eclipse and broken chains. It emitted a dark violet light that altered gravity, making the air heavy and crushing around it.
Darian, leaning against a rock, looked at the violet book pulsing in the darkness. They had survived, but the weight emanating from those pages reminded him that this was only the beginning of something far darker.