The scar had stopped pulsing.

  Kael wished that meant something good.

  It didn’t.

  It meant the ground was waiting.

  Nyros sat at the very edge of the black line, tail wrapped around his paws, staring at the soil as if daring it to misbehave. Eira paced tight circles behind them. Nima paced wider circles, mostly because he believed distance improved survival.

  Rhoen had gone to gather a proper Guild team.

  Which left Kael… babysitting a hole in reality.

  Again.

  Nyros flicked an ear. The fox felt it before Kael did: a tiny, faint tremor beneath the grass. Not a pulse this time.

  A breath.

  Kael tried very hard not to sigh. “Why do things keep breathing near me?”

  Eira stopped pacing. “Are you sure it wasn’t your imagination?”

  “Unfortunately,” Nima said, “he never imagines the safe things.”

  Nyros let out a low chuff that meant listen.

  Kael crouched, placing a flat palm on the ground.

  No hum.

  No threadbeat.

  Just a soft, subtle vibration—like someone dragging a fingertip across the underside of the world.

  The Mist inside him tightened.

  Eira crouched beside him. “What is it?”

  “I don’t know,” Kael said. “But it’s not Hollow.”

  Nima raised a hand. “I would like to politely suggest that ‘not Hollow’ does not automatically equal ‘friendly.’ That’s a dangerous assumption. It’s like saying a bear isn’t a wolf so we should shake hands with it.”

  Kael smiled faintly. “If a bear shakes your hand, that’s impressive.”

  “Only once,” Nima muttered.

  Eira squinted at the scar. “Does it still feel like your father?”

  Kael’s chest tightened. He didn’t like the question, mostly because he didn’t have an answer that made sense even in his own head.

  “I don’t know,” he said quietly. “But it feels… familiar.”

  Eira’s expression softened. “You okay?”

  “I’m fine.”

  Nima pointed. “He’s lying. His lying voice is obvious.”

  “That’s my normal voice,” Kael said.

  “Exactly.”

  Nyros nudged Kael’s ankle, then the fox sat back and faced the scar again, fur raised slightly.

  This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.

  Something else had changed.

  The air.

  The wind.

  The hum beneath the leaves.

  Kael stood slowly.

  Eira reached for her ribbon.

  Nima gripped his spear with both hands, mostly for emotional support.

  “Okay,” Nima whispered. “Is anyone else hearing—?”

  A sound rose from the scar.

  But not a hum, not a pulse, not resonance.

  A click.

  Then another.

  A slow, irregular clicking… like nails tapping wood… or something testing the angles of a cage.

  Eira’s voice dropped to a whisper. “Kael…”

  He didn’t move.

  The scar bulged—just barely—as if soil was lifting from below.

  A crackle of silver mist escaped the seam.

  Nyros scrambled backward, tail twice its size.

  Nima screamed a little. “Nope. No. Absolutely not. This is how horrors start.”

  The clicking stopped.

  Kael stepped closer.

  “Kael!” Eira grabbed his sleeve.

  “It’s not attacking,” he said. “It’s… calling.”

  Eira stared. “You don’t answer things that call from underground! That is a rule in every book ever written.”

  “Not in Eldoria,” Kael said.

  “Because Eldoria doesn’t write books,” Nima snapped.

  Another click.

  This one sharper.

  More deliberate.

  A line of soil just beside the scar split open—not erupting, not tearing.

  Unzipping.

  Kael tightened his grip on his sword-hilt.

  Mist coiled around his wrist in a faint glow.

  Eira tensed. “Kael—”

  A small shape rose from the opening.

  Kael stepped back.

  Then blinked.

  “…Is that… a box?”

  A little rectangular object—about the size of a thick book—pushed itself through the soil, covered in dust and faint threads of silver-white.

  Nima peered over Kael’s shoulder. “…Is this the part where the ancient artifact curses us? Should I be worried? Should I leave?”

  The box shook slightly and flopped onto the grass, the way a fish might flop out of water if a fish had corners.

  Nyros padded forward, sniffed it, and chirped in confusion.

  Kael crouched.

  Eira grabbed his shoulder. “Don’t touch—”

  The box opened.

  On its own.

  A soft hiss of mist escaped like old breath finally exhaling.

  Inside was—

  Kael’s pulse stopped for a second.

  A thread spool.

  Silver.

  Old.

  Delicate.

  And glowing faintly like a heartbeat.

  Not resonance.

  Not magic.

  Mist.

  Pure Eldoria Mist.

  Eira gasped. “Is that—?”

  Kael nodded slowly. “It’s Eldorian thread.”

  Nima tilted his head. “We make thread now?”

  “This kind of thread,” Kael said softly, “is woven by Eldoria’s windbell keepers. It’s used to bind memories. Stories. Songs.”

  Nima blinked. “We make magical yarn?”

  “Very powerful magical yarn,” Eira said.

  Kael reached toward it—

  —and the thread glowed brighter.

  A hum traveled up his arm, echoing through his ribs.

  Something whispered inside the spool.

  Not a voice.

  A memory.

  A memory that didn’t belong to him.

  Kael jerked his hand back.

  Nyros yelped.

  Eira moved in front of Kael instantly. “What did it do?!”

  “I…” Kael swallowed. “…I heard a voice.”

  Nima raised a hand. “If the box called his name, I’m leaving.”

  “It wasn’t saying my name,” Kael said. “It was… singing.”

  Eira stared. “Singing what?”

  Kael hesitated.

  Because the words weren’t words.

  They were threads.

  Interwoven rhythm.

  Something his bones recognized.

  “…A lullaby,” he whispered.

  Eira’s frown deepened. “Kael… who sings it?”

  Kael didn’t answer.

  Couldn’t answer.

  But the Mist inside him pulsed with a quiet certainty he didn’t like:

  Someone beneath this hill knows that song.

  Nima poked the air nervously. “Okay. To summarize:

  We found a magic box.

  It crawled out of the ground.

  It gave Kael a cursed spool of emotional yarn.

  The ground is humming lullabies.

  This is terrible.”

  Kael stood, slowly, holding in a shiver.

  “It’s not Choir,” he said. “It’s… older.”

  Nyros growled low.

  The sky dimmed slightly, a passing cloud moving over the sun.

  Eira stepped closer to him. “Kael. Tell me the truth. Does any of this feel like your father?”

  Kael looked at the spool.

  At the scar.

  At the quiet stretch of land breathing beneath them.

  “I don’t know,” he whispered. “But whatever it is… it knows me.”

  The wind shifted.

  The scar pulsed once.

  Just once.

  A deep, resonant beat that vibrated through the hill.

  Nima screamed again. “NO. No pulsing! We talked about this!”

  Kael tightened his fists.

  Eira read his expression and cursed under her breath. “Kael, don’t even think about—”

  “We have to go down there,” he said quietly.

  Nima dropped his spear. “NO WE DO NOT.”

  Eira took a slow breath. “We’re not going underground alone.”

  “Then we get Rhoen,” Kael said. “And a team.”

  Nyros barked twice in firm agreement.

  The scar throbbed again.

  The ground clicked once more.

  The spool sang its soft, terrible lullaby.

  Kael swallowed hard.

  “…And we go before whatever is down there decides we’re late.”

  mini-boss enters the stage:

  The Mourning Warden.