The echoes of that voice still lingered, but now it was drowned beneath the deafening roar of the guards. They came in a swarm—faces twisted, mouths stretched wide in screams, eyes glazed over like shattered glass.

  Jake gritted his teeth. “Cole—”

  “I know!” Cole shouted, already moving. His heart raced, not with fear, but something worse—the uncertainty of whether he would make it out alive.

  The three sprinted, heading straight for the exit of Fort Blackridge. But even that was blocked—guards waiting like vultures, eyes hollow, weapons raised.

  Desperation fueled Cole’s next move. He yanked the compass from his pocket, fumbling with it as they ducked behind a wall, leading to the inner courtyard. His fingers trembled, rage simmering beneath the surface. “Hello?!” No response. “Hello?!” he barked again, voice rising with panic. “Pick up the fu—”

  A burst of static crackled through the device.

  “What is it?” The voice was cold, calm—too calm.

  Relief hit Cole like a punch to the chest. He’d never been happier to hear that voice.

  “Fort Blackridge. It’s a trap. Their base isn’t here—we need backup.”

  A pause. Then, confusion. “You didn’t expect that?”

  Cole almost laughed—almost. The absurdity of it tangled with his rising fury. “What?” he snapped. Before he could say more, a guard lunged over the barricade. Jake reacted fast, slamming the blunt end of his rifle-spear into the guard’s skull, sending him sprawling.

  “What the fuck do you mean, ‘you didn’t expect that’?” Cole hissed into the compass, his anger boiling over now.

  Another pause. Then the leader’s voice returned, quieter this time, something strange threading through it. “Nevermind...”

  The words hit Cole like ice water. ‘What the hell was that supposed to mean?’

  But there was no time to dwell.

  “I’m coming,” the voice finally said, clipped and distant. “Survive until then.”

  The line went dead, leaving only static—and the sound of the enemy closing in.

  “We need to keep moving,” Bea said, her voice low but sharp, cutting through the distant echoes of screams. Fear flickered in her eyes, barely restrained beneath the hard edge of her composure. As someone born with the transference pathway, she was the most vulnerable here—her abilities to utilise memories were useless against the dead.

  With swift, practiced motions, she unwrapped the chains coiled around her silver arm guards. The faint metallic clink echoed ominously in the cold air.

  “There’s an underground section beneath the storage room,” she continued, spinning the chains like a skipping rope, the whip-whip rhythm steadying her breaths as she bounced lightly on her feet, warming up. Her fear was buried beneath sheer determination. “If we make it there, it’ll buy us time to figure out our next move.”

  Cole nodded, glancing at Jake, who gripped his rifle-spear tightly, knuckles white. No words needed. They moved.

  They sprinted through the cracked stone archway, leaving the inner courtyard behind as the swarm of guards poured in like a black tide, their guttural cries rising in a deafening chorus. The fortress walls seemed to close in, shadows twisting under the flickering torches that lined the narrow hallways.

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  “Left!” Bea shouted, leading the way.

  They turned sharply, boots pounding against the uneven ground. The passage twisted, forcing them into tight corners and low arches. The air grew heavier, thick with the scent of rust, sweat, and something else—decay.

  A group of guards rounded a corner ahead, their faces twisted in unnatural rage. Jake didn’t hesitate. He pushed forward, ramming the blunt end of his spear into the first guard’s chest with bone-crunching force, sending the man sprawling backward. Bea’s chains snapped out like striking vipers, wrapping around another’s neck. She yanked hard, pulling him off balance before slamming him into the wall with a sickening crack.

  Cole’s heart raced—not with as much fear as before, but with a cold, burning focus. He darted past them, his movements sharp and efficient, slashing with his weapon when needed, always pushing forward.

  They burst through another doorway, entering a crumbling hall filled with broken crates and shattered glass. Shafts of pale light leaked through cracks in the stone ceiling above, casting jagged patterns on the floor.

  “We’re close!” Bea gasped, pointing toward an iron door at the far end.

  But the guards weren’t done. More poured in from side passages, claws scraping against stone, eyes wild.

  “Keep moving!” Jake shouted, his voice raw with urgency.

  He covered their retreat, swinging his spear with brutal efficiency, each strike buying them precious seconds. Bea’s chains danced around her like silver serpents, wrapping, pulling, snapping.

  They reached the door, and Cole slammed his shoulder into it. It groaned under the impact, rusted hinges protesting. He hit it again—this time, it burst open, revealing the dark outside world once again, masked in a pale moonlight, the storage room just beyond.

  Once entering, the familiar, metallic scent of dried blood hit them immediately. Jake’s eyes darted to the dark stain on the floor—the same one he’d touched earlier, it was most likely Bea’s doing at an attempt of survival.

  Bea didn’t hesitate. She kicked aside a broken crate, revealing a metal hatch partially coated in layers of rust.

  “Get it open!” she snapped.

  Cole grabbed the rusted handle, muscles straining as he yanked. The hatch resisted, but he pulled with everything he had until it finally gave way with a screech of tearing metal. A narrow staircase spiraled down into darkness.

  Jake slid in first, weapon ready. Bea followed, her chains wrapped tightly around her arms.

  Cole hesitated for a heartbeat, glancing back. The guards were almost on him. Their twisted faces filled the doorway, hands reaching out like claws.

  He slammed the hatch shut just as the first guard lunged.

  Darkness swallowed them whole, the sounds of the nightmare above muffled but not gone.

  They descended the narrow staircase, Bea leading the way. The dim light from above faded with each step, swallowed by the oppressive darkness below. None of them spoke at first, their ragged breaths and the echo of footsteps against the cold stone walls were the only sounds. It was as if the weight of their narrow escape needed space to settle in their minds.

  Eventually, Bea broke the silence. “This is where I’ve been since the trial began.” Her voice was low, almost blending with the echoes. “Do you have any idea what the condition to complete the trial is?”

  “I wish we did,” Jake muttered, the edge of exhaustion in his voice.

  Cole’s eyes stayed fixed ahead, the dim outlines of the underground chamber coming into view. “Besides that… what was that back there? The guards, the way they moved. That had to be a Bloodcraft user’s ability, right?”

  Silence followed, heavier than before. The question lingered between them, unspoken fears threading through the gaps.

  A person’s essence, strength, and fate were woven into the fabric of their blood. Bloodcraft reshaped the user, strengthening or altering them based on the lineage they were born into.

  Lineage determined their power. The stronger the bloodline, the greater the potential. Bloodcraft users could awaken ancestral traits, inherit latent abilities, even rewrite their own existence through refinement of their blood.

  Cole’s voice cut through the stillness. “Do you guys know of any lineage that can control the dead?”

  Bea didn’t answer right away. She glanced over her shoulder, her expression shadowed with unease.

  “You said we’re in the Convergence War, right?” she finally replied. “That ability… it might not even exist anymore.”

  The thought settled over them like a suffocating weight. If that was true, they were facing something ancient, something lost to time—an ability with no records, no weaknesses they could prepare for.

  Dread crept in, silent and unrelenting. They were fighting a Bloodcraft user shrouded in mystery, armed with powers they didn’t understand. And down here, beneath the fortress, there was nowhere left to run.