The hours crawled by in the cramped darkness. The black stone pressed in on them from every side, smooth and cold beneath their fingertips. Faint, darker grooves veined its surface, barely visible in the thin light that filtered through the cracks between the fingers.

  Every time Riven shifted, his shoulders scraped against the walls. He couldn't even straighten his legs, let alone stand. A dull, prickling numbness had settled into them, the kind that built when muscles stayed locked in one position for too long, and it only made the confinement feel worse.

  To pass the time, he dragged the tip of his sword against the stone in slow, absent strokes, the faint scraping sound was the only thing breaking the silence.

  At some point, he turned his head toward Lya.

  She's been asleep for a while now.

  Not long after they had squeezed into the narrow space, exhaustion had simply taken her. She had curled into herself, knees drawn tight against her chest, as if shielding the burns on her skin from the cold of the stone.

  But as the drops outside began to fade to nothing, Riven started to wonder if he should wake her so they could leave soon.

  I can't stand this place anymore. We're packed in here like rats in a trap.

  Suddenly, Lya jolted awake with a sharp, violent motion.

  Riven tensed, his hand instinctively moving toward his sword. For a second, he didn't understand what had startled her—there was no sound, no movement outside.

  "Hey," he said, his voice cautious. "What's wrong?"

  His question hung in the narrow space, unanswered. Lya's breathing came quick and shallow, her chest rising and falling as if she'd been running. Her eyes were fixed on the gap between the curled fingers, where the deluge had finally stopped.

  He was confused by her reaction, but with the path outside finally clear and the danger apparently gone, he had only one thought on his mind—getting out of this damn place.

  They didn't waste time. Crawling out was harder than getting in, their bodies wedged tight as they squeezed through the narrow gap. Riven had to twist his shoulders at an awkward angle just to slip through, the black stone scraping against the stone as he forced himself into the open.

  Once outside, he straightened up and pulled in a deep, lungful of fresh air, as if he'd been holding his breath for hours.

  Riven turned his gaze toward the horizon. "We should leave. Now."

  Before another burning rain falls, or something worse.

  Lya nodded, and they set off. The color had returned to her face, the exhaustion that had weighed her down earlier finally lifting.

  Even though they had both been burned, she had taken the time to heal them before they left. Riven had told her it could wait, that the burns were only surface-level and didn't need immediate attention. She had ignored him entirely, her hands already glowing green before he could finish the sentence.

  They walked without any clear destination, following the same direction they had been moving in for weeks now—though they had no real way to determine what that direction even was.

  Still, they had no intention of staying near the ruins where the creature had nearly killed them. They didn't know what lay ahead, but at least here, they knew what was behind them. And whatever that thing was, it hadn't exactly won them over.

  Riven had expected more damage from the black rain, but the landscape remained mostly unchanged, untouched. It was as if the crimson earth had simply swallowed it whole. Only faint traces of the viscous substance lingered on the bones and corrupted hands, whose fingers had already begun to unfurl in a motion so slow it was almost imperceptible.

  But there was something that had changed. Or rather, something that was only just beginning to appear.

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  Riven veered slightly off their path and approached one of them. Cracks of varying sizes had split open in the ground, jagged fissures cutting through the crimson earth like wounds. The one he stood in front of was wide enough to fit a narrow city alley.

  He started to lean forward over the edge, craning his neck to peer inside, but Lya grabbed his shoulder at the last second.

  Her brow furrowed. "You sure that's a good idea?"

  Riven simply shrugged and leaned back, though this time more carefully. His heart was beating a little faster than before.

  Inside, he couldn't see the bottom. It was obscured by a thin, blood-red mist that clung to the depths.

  He straightened up slowly, his gaze lingering on the fissure for a moment longer before he turned away.

  When they came across another crack a few hundred meters later, Riven leaned over the edge again. The same mist greeted him, thick and red, swallowing whatever lay below.

  Yet his jaw tightened as a detail on the ground caught his eye. Long claw marks gouged into the earth and scraped across the stone wall of the fissure.

  Four parallel grooves, each one wide and brutal, carved with enough force to split the compacted soil. Whatever had left these marks was powerful.

  His hand drifted instinctively toward the hilt of his sword.

  But, before he could examine them further, a sudden sound broke his focus—a sharp cry from Lya, startled rather than afraid.

  He spun around to see her brandishing her dagger, hacking awkwardly at a red plant that seemed to be coiling toward her.

  Riven moved quickly toward her. "Wait, don't damage it."

  The plant was unlike anything he'd seen before. A cluster of crimson stalks rose from the ground, each one ending in a flared, trumpet-like mouth lined with serrated edges. Inside those gaping openings, thick black liquid pooled and dripped—the same substance from the corrupted hands and the rain. But what caught his attention most were the stalks themselves. They weren't still. They swayed and twisted like living tentacles, slow and searching.

  As Riven stepped closer to examine it, one of the stalks lashed out toward him. He jerked back, barely avoiding it.

  Shit. It's attacking.

  Lya stared at him, her expression flat. "Really?"

  "I wasn't shocked because the plant was red," she added dryly.

  Annoyed, Riven raised his sword and brought it down in a wide, decisive arc, severing the thickest part of the plant at its base.

  The stalks collapsed to the ground, twitching once before going still. Lya stepped forward and kicked the remains aside with her boot.

  After they set off again, the hours crawled by slowly. It was the same routine as always—walking, pausing when Riven needed to catch his breath, then walking again. His injuries still weighed on him, forcing them to stop more often than either of them would have liked.

  The fissures became more frequent along the way. Every few hundred meters, they would pass another one, sometimes two or three clustered together. They also encountered more of the blood-red plants and gave them a wide berth.

  But as night began to fall and they searched for shelter, something caught their attention.

  It was unlike anything they had seen since being thrown into this place.

  A structure of black stone rose from the plains ahead, its color nearly identical to the corrupted hands. But this was different. This wasn't natural.

  They stepped inside cautiously, their eyes scanning the ruins. It resembled a small chapel, or what remained of one. Most of the walls had crumbled, leaving only jagged sections standing at odd angles. Broken arches jutted from the ground like ribs, and the roof was gone entirely, exposing the darkening sky above.

  Only the entrance had survived mostly intact—a massive archway flanked by a section of wall that shielded the interior from view.

  Riven looked around, satisfied. "Now this is proper shelter. For once."

  A ruined house. I'll take it. Beats sleeping under a skeleton or on hands that move.

  He began to settle in, spreading out their meager belongings. He pulled out the last two strips of dried meat and set them down between them.

  His gaze drifted to Lya, who was wandering through the structure, her eyes tracing the crumbling walls with quiet curiosity.

  "We're down to these two pieces," he said, his tone flat, clearly understanding what this entails.

  She glanced back at him, then gestured toward the wall. "Look at this."

  Riven followed her finger. Carved into the black stone were symbols—angular, deliberate, but completely unfamiliar.

  "You know what they are?" he asked.

  Lya tilted her head, studying them from different angles. "No. I've never seen anything like them. Never even heard of them."

  She gave up after a moment and sat down beside him, reaching for her share of the meat.

  They ate in silence, the ruins growing darker around them as the last light bled from the sky.

  Lya's hands found his injuries without a word, the familiar green glow filling the space between them. It had become routine now, almost expected.

  Neither of them said it aloud, but they both knew. Tomorrow, they had to hunt. And this time, there was no guarantee the creature would be injured.