Nia received her answer soon enough. The wagon she sat on reached the summit a little later, but then she could finally see what lay before them. It stole her breath, and a chill spread through her. Dizziness threatened to overwhelm her, and she had to suppress a scream.

  The hill on which they all stood in a line continued a few hundred more steps, sloping downward… and then ended in a sheer cliff. Beyond it stretched a rocky plain that appeared to be perfectly smooth. It was a completely level surface without a single flaw. Even the cliff had a straight edge, and soon Nia realized it was an enormous circular crater, as if a giant cylinder had been pressed into the landscape.

  What happened here?

  Kelwin asked Lera the same question.

  "How should I know?" she snapped back, still staring intently ahead.

  "I do not think this is natural. How could it be? Someone or something must have made it. But what? The entire landscape is altered. Not even a High Exorcist could create something of this scale... I think? No one. It is impossible, and yet here we are…" she muttered, mostly to herself.

  "Exorcist Lera, could it have been the… the Nightmare we felt back when we were traveling to Exorcist Immesh?" Kelwin asked cautiously.

  He spoke slowly, as if half expecting Lera’s whip to strike him without warning.

  "Impossible. I do not believe Exorcist Immesh could have dealt with this. Destruction on this scale, imagine how much Lucidity must have emanated from a single being to do this… Fuck!" she cursed.

  "Over there. There is something over there, Exorcist," stuttered a Hunter beside Nia, pointing his lance into the distance.

  The man was rigth: Barely visible, a jagged structure rose on the horizon. There were not enough details to make out more, but the warmth inside Nia came partly from that place.

  The false Locu… Why…?

  "I think that is it," said a Huntress who shielded her eyes from the sun to see better. "The seed."

  "Possibly. But whatever it is, we need to go there!" Lera said.

  She did not move at first, but soon trotted slowly toward the edge before them. When she was almost there, she gripped her whip tight and dismounted.

  Then, she approached the cliff cautiously and finally knelt before it.

  Nia could see her fingers brushing along the rim as she scanned the edge with feverish eyes.

  Not long after, the Exorcist rose abruptly, turned around, and stomped back toward them.

  "It goes down at least a hundred steps, then comes the flat surface you can already see from here. The seed appears to be inside that structure over there. So we have indeed to enter that area," she said to the group.

  "Are you sure? Should we not turn back and report this? If we are wiped out, no one will know what happened…" Kelwin suggested cautiously.

  Lera shot him a murderous look.

  "We are so close. I have no use for your cowardice now. Exorcist Immesh must have seen this too. I do not know why he told us nothing, but we are certainly not the only ones who know about this… place," she said.

  Then she placed her hand on the ground and closed her eyes.

  At first Nia noticed no change in their surroundings and looked around in confusion. Only an icy wind swept over them from the vast plain, stealing the warmth the sun had given her.

  All that remained was the heat inside her that revealed the presence of the false Locu. And a hunger to reach him... and to reach the seed. To find out...

  “Nia… come… to me… join me… I want to see you… suffer…”

  Nia flinched. It was just like last time.

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  Just like when she had been forced to cower beneath the Holy Shield near the ruins, which now felt like an eternity ago.

  When Uda had sat beside her to comfort her…

  …and Locu’s voice had slipped into her mind and tempted her with hideous promises of pain and judgement.

  When she had joined Uda to go back under the pretense of saving others still trapped outside the barrier...

  A hissing and gurgling sound tore her from her thoughts. The stones before Lera began to steam, slowly at first, then glowing red, and soon they flowed thickly toward the cliff’s edge.

  The heat was unbearable, even from a distance.

  It smelled strangely sterile, and Nia began to sweat.

  At the same time, the light of the chain stabbed even more sharply into her mind as Lera's Lucidity pulsed.

  Still hissing and gurgling, the once solid rocky ground melted into thick lava and spilled over the cliff.

  Kelwin had stepped back and turned away, his face flushed, his breathing loud enough that Nia could hear it.

  Lera looked as she always did, though her eyes were closed in concentration and she murmured something under her breath.

  The molten rock soon hardened again and cooled.

  The heat faded, and the air grew somewhat fresher, though still dry.

  All that remained of Lera’s Lucidity was a long, ramp-like formation of stone leading down to the plain, shallow enough for them to descend with the wagons and animals.

  Soon, Lera mounted her horse again, though it was visibly difficult for her.

  "Shall we take a break? We have not rested, and you pushed yourself very hard, Exorcist Lera." Kelwin emphasized his words as if he cared for her well-being, yet his colorless face betrayed his growing fear.

  "No. We are too close. I will meditate on the way. Forward, march," she barked, struggling to hide her trembling and strained breathing.

  Reluctantly, they began moving again.

  The descent along Lera’s ramp was long, but she had chosen a slope that would not cause them to slip, and soon they stood on the smooth surface.

  Nia peeked cautiously over the wagon’s edge and studied the ground.

  As she had seen from above, everything was like polished glass.

  Nia could now make out some depressions where, like air bubbles, chambers beneath the earth had been exposed.

  Apart from that, the expanse was mirror-smooth.

  "I think you could have saved yourself the trouble, Exorcist," a Huntress remarked, unsure if she should speak up, pointing to something far to their right.

  There was a ramp there as well, but it had been carved into the wall, as if someone had shaped it directly, previously hidden but now visible, mocking them.

  "Immesh and his people!" Lera cursed, ignored the woman, and urged her horse forward without a word.

  It was strange, after all the bumping and shaking, to travel across such perfectly even ground.

  To Nia’s displeasure, it made her horrid thoughts sharper than she liked and once more pushed memories of the waking Locu into her mind.

  The cold wind still whistled around them, and she wrapped her arms around her knees to keep warm. Her dress offered almost no protection; it was too thin, and the revealing cut exposed more skin than she had ever wanted.

  "But is it not how it must be…? They see you as a worthless object, less than these horses they ride… That is how it should be… They carried did my job while I slowly returned… Filthy zealots... "

  The false voice swept through her thoughts, and Nia felt as if every last bit of grounding left in her was slowly breaking away. Breathing became harder and harder, and she gulped down air in frantic bursts.

  Slowly, she grew dizzy.

  Damn it, damn it… Breathe in, breathe out. Calm, calm…, she ordered herself, but it did little good.

  The bright stones burned against her neck, the weight of guilt pressed heavier on her conscience, something unfathomable pulled at her, alien and relentless, and in the distance the strange structure rose ever more clearly into view.

  Focus on that rock formation, look at its shape. Think of nothing else. When you reach it, it will be over. He will take you, and everything will be finished. You will be alone with him and all your pain. And it will feel good. So good… Finally held accountable… And you might see the seed... You need to know...

  With all her strength, Nia pulled herself together. She looked past Lera, who had settled onto one of the other wagons ahead and seemed to have forgotten everything around her, her eyes closed.

  Soon Nia could make out details in the rocks, stone-like growths rising high into the sky. They looked like the needle-tipped, razor-sharp teeth of some enormous animal or Nightmare growing out of the earth, waiting to snap shut and devour them.

  Their travel continued, and the distance to the structure was greater than she had first assumed. They made good progress, unhindered by Nightmares or terrain. Even so, it was already afternoon by the time they were close enough to see more.

  It began with small, pointed stones appearing on the smooth surface around them. Nia saw that all of them had sharp edges and surfaces so polished she could see the reflections of the burning Sun in them. As they drew nearer to the center of the structure, the knife-like stones grew taller, twisting further into the sky, soon surrounding the unit in a forest of long, narrow blades that seemed to slice even through the clouds.

  "Come closer… you are almost with me… you will receive your punishment… suffering beyond your mind’s limits… and I know you will love it… because it is just…"

  The false Locu’s voice dripped with contempt inside Nia’s mind. She began to long for the encounter more and more, almost as she had when she first sensed him in the ruins after her companions had woken. Deep benath lay the only comfort she could find, the abyss she remmebered so soothingly, the promise of all the suffering being gone soon.

  The wagon came to a stop with a groan as the draft horse could no longer pass between the blade-like stones without getting stuck. Their march halted abruptly, until Lera’s voice drifted back to Nia from somewhere ahead beneath the glittering surfaces.

  "Dismount. We are almost there. Move," she ordered.