Ares stood in the ruined chamber, the faint hum of Aetheric energy pulsing in the air. The patterns on the walls, the shattered remains of ancient devices—it all pointed to one thing. This place had been a research facility, a center for Aetheric study and experimentation. But more than that, it had been a summoning site.

  The system’s fragmented analysis, still glitching from its incomplete functions, had pieced together enough to make a grim conclusion. The Aetheric organ—the source of all this energy—was still active because it wasn’t simply a remnant. It had been extracted from a living being.

  Ares exhaled sharply, his mind racing. “So they… took someone’s organ and hooked it up to a machine?” He didn’t need an answer. The pulsating energy, still weakly flickering after who knows how many years, was all the confirmation he needed.

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  Summoning wasn’t just about energy. It required an anchor—something to stabilize the summoned entity, a conduit for the raw power to take form. And in this case, the anchor had been living beings.

  The people who built this ruin had experimented on others, extracting their organs to fuel their work. And when the ruin was abandoned, whatever they had summoned had either vanished… or been left behind.

  A deep chill settled in his bones.

  The system’s text glitched again.

  [Incomplete Data… Processing…]

  […Aetheric Organ: Function… Conversion…]

  […Experiment Log—Error—]

  [Unstable Aetheric Flow Detected.]

  Ares swallowed hard. The knowledge he had gained here was invaluable, but it had come at a cost. The flickering energy, the dying remnants of a person long forgotten, were proof of a tragedy lost to time.

  He took a deep breath, pushing down the unease. There was nothing he could do to change the past, but he could learn from it.

  “…I should get moving.”

  The ruin had served its purpose. Now, it was time to leave.