The ley-born giant pivoted, runes strobing in jagged rhythm. Each pulse made the snow jump from the ground like dust shaken by thunder.

  Eis didn’t move alone this time.

  “Ronan, draw it off the crack!”

  “On it!”

  Ronan dashed forward, shield raised, blade sweeping upward in a clean arc that carved a blazing scar across the construct’s arm. Fragments of glowing blue mana scattered like sparks.

  Kael planted his feet several paces back, bow already drawn. The string hummed through the cold air.

  “Give me a clean line!”

  Before Eis could respond, Lira stepped forward, staff blazing with pale light.

  “Blessing of clarity!”

  The mage’s spell rippled outward — a shimmering pulse sharpening vision, steadying breath, aligning instinct.

  Kael released.

  The arrow whistled through the pass and struck the cracked rune cluster in the sentinel’s torso. It burst in a flare of azure fire, staggering the creature.

  The Archmage guide flinched behind them, gripping his trembling compass.

  “I—I’ll support where I can!” he shouted, raising a hand to cast a shaky ward over the two nearest coachmen.

  The sentinel roared — a grating, metallic sound — and slammed both fists into the ground.

  Shockwaves tore through the pass. Ice erupted.

  “Incoming!” Lira cried, slamming her staff into the ground.

  A dome of warm gold snapped up, catching a wave of force that would have crushed two retreating caravaners.

  The Archmage guide gasped, then flung a rune-stabilizing ward at the stone ridge, preventing a collapse of falling rock.

  “I—I’ve reinforced the left flank!” he stuttered.

  Eis snapped a barrier spellcard.

  A translucent silver shield blossomed to her right, deflecting debris that would have struck Kael.

  Kael shot her a grateful look.

  “Perfect timing!”

  “Focus,” Ronan barked, though his tone held approval.

  He slid beneath the sentinel’s next swing, blades flashing. He slashed the joint at its knee — the rune-lines there crackled and dimmed.

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  The giant staggered.

  “Now!” Eis shouted.

  Kael fired again — this time a rune-tipped arrow.

  It buried itself in the weakened knee joint and detonated, splitting the ley conduit.

  Lira lifted both hands, chanting sharply. A wash of warm magic burst outward, healing Ronan’s scorched arm from the blow he’d taken.

  “You’re fine, keep going!” she yelled.

  “Didn’t plan to stop,” Ronan replied through gritted teeth.

  The Archmage guide added another pulse of stabilizing magic, reinforcing the ice beneath Ronan to keep his footing steady.

  Eis closed in.

  She felt the ley current twisting underfoot — the sentinel’s tether unraveling but still anchored by one pulsing rune cluster deep in its chest.

  The heart.

  She drew a new spellcard — mana break — a disruption sigil engineered to drag unstable mana to the surface.

  She snapped it.

  A column of force slammed downward around the sentinel.

  The ley lines under its body tore upward in bright strands, whipping like raw lightning.

  “Kael!”

  “Already on it!”

  His arrow flew — a perfect line toward the exposed heart-rune.

  It struck.

  A sharp crack.

  A flare of blinding blue.

  The sentinel froze.

  Its runes flickered…

  once, twice…

  then burst outward in a cascade of pale mana as the construct collapsed into glittering shards of stone and frost.

  Silence fell — broken only by the settling crackle of ice and the team’s ragged breaths.

  Lira lowered her staff, panting.

  “Everyone alive?”

  “Barely,” Kael muttered, checking his bowstring. “That thing hit like a fortress.”

  “I prefer forts that don’t move,” the Archmage guide added shakily, leaning on his staff. He released a stabilizing ward, letting the ground settle again. “Ley sentinels are not supposed to wake without direct command…”

  Ronan wiped his blade clean, gaze shifting to the glowing fissure.

  “Ley sentinel, like you said. If one survived down here, more might be guarding the path.”

  Eis stepped closer to the remnants.

  The air hummed faintly — not hostile this time, but measured, observant.

  “ Vauren must have activated it,” she said quietly. “It was protecting the road. ”

  Kael took a deep breath.

  “I hope that was the only one then.”

  Eis looked north — where the ley road pulsed faintly under the snow, glowing like a heartbeat.

  “Hopefully.”

  The Archmage guide exhaled shakily, clutching his compass.

  “I—I can resume leading. The ley current is stabilizing again.”

  Ronan nodded. “Move out.”

  The caravan regrouped, shaken but intact.

  The mountain shadows stretched long across the pass, and the ley veins beneath their feet glowed brighter now — as if the land itself acknowledged their passage.

  Beyond the next ridge lay the Frostline Shrine.

  The last safe waypoint before the Sun Vault.