The air changed as they climbed. It grew warmer thicker laced with the faint scent of oil, iron, and old incense. Elias felt it immediately, the way his bones vibrated differently now, less wild, more focused.“We’re close,” he said quietly.Seren glanced up the narrow stairwell. “Close to what?”“The palace,” Caedia answered. “Its understructure. The marrow beneath its stone.”Seren swallowed. “That’s… unsettling.”Elias almost smiled. “It should be.” The stairwell opened into a long, horizontal passage reinforced with carved stone instead of bone.Old Bonekeeper sigils had been scraped away and replaced with noble crests Vintrel lions, council seals, Alchemist glyphs burned deep into the walls.Seren frowned. “They erased everything.”“Yes,” Caedia said softly. “And still feared what lay beneath.”Elias’s fingers brushed the stone.The bone-song whispered. Above… blood… chains… He stiffened. Seren noticed instantly. “Elias?” “She’s above us,” he said. “Lyra.”Caedia turned sharply.

The palace undercorridor smelled of iron, wet stone, and fear. Elias slowed only when Caedia raised a clenched fist. “Stop,” she whispered.Seren froze beside him instantly. “What is it now?”Caedia tilted her head, listening not with ears, but with marrow. Her blind eyes clouded darker than usual. “They know,” she said quietly.Elias felt it too a wrongness in the air, like a note played off-key. His bones thrummed uneasily. “The Alchemists?” he asked.“No,” Caedia replied. “Worse.”Seren swallowed. “Please don’t say worse.”Caedia’s jaw tightened. “The palace guard has been reinforced. Bone-dampened armor. Resonance anchors in the walls.”Elias cursed under his breath. “They turned the palace into a cage.”“They turned it into a trap,” Caedia corrected. From ahead came voices many of them sharp, disciplined. Seren whispered, “That’s… a lot of people.”Elias adjusted his grip on the bone dagger. “We don’t fight head-on.”Caedia nodded. “Good. Because if you do, the Echo will answer a

The palace undercorridor shook as something detonated far above them. Stone dust rained from the ceiling. Seren flinched. “That wasn’t us.”Elias stopped mid-step, bones humming violently beneath his skin. “No,” he said quietly. “That was a signal.”Caedia tilted her head, blind eyes glowing faintly. “They’ve begun the ritual.”Seren’s breath hitched. “Already?”“Yes,” Caedia replied grimly. “They know you’re close.”Elias clenched his fists. The Echo surged, sharp and furious, vibrating through his ribs like a living thing demanding action.“How much time?” he asked.Caedia hesitated. “Minutes,” she said. “Not hours.”Seren grabbed Elias’s sleeve. “Then we move now.”They broke into a run. The undercorridors twisted upward, narrowing into steep bone-lined passages reinforced with alchemical steel. Sigils burned into the walls containment runes, anti-resonance wards.Seren grimaced. “I hate these symbols.”“They’re meant to weaken Elias,” Caedia said. “And attract him.”Elias scoffed,

The city loomed above them like a wounded giant. From the ridge overlooking the capital’s underlevels, Elias could see the damage clearly now collapsed spires, cracked walls veined with glowing corruption, smoke rising in thin, constant columns.The once-proud bone-buttresses that supported the upper districts were fractured, some stitched together with crude Alchemist reinforcements that pulsed an unhealthy blue.Seren swallowed hard. “It’s worse than the rumors.” Caedia stood beside her, head tilted, listening to vibrations no one else could hear. “The city is screaming.”Elias didn’t answer immediately. His bones were already singing in response low, furious, restrained only by discipline earned through pain, loss, and relentless training.“They’re bleeding it dry,” he said finally. “Harvesting marrow straight from the foundations.”Seren looked at him sharply. “They’re using the city itself?”“Yes,” Elias replied. “That’s how they’re powering the ritual lattice.”Sylare hugged her

The underground river thundered beside them, black water smashing against bone-carved banks as Elias led the group forward. The tunnel ceiling dipped low, forcing them to crouch, the air thick with rot and old magic.Seren broke the silence first. “We’re not supposed to be this close already.”Caedia’s staff scraped the stone as she walked. “We’re not supposed to be alive, either.”Sylare hugged herself, voice barely audible over the water. “They’ll feel him soon.”Elias didn’t slow. “Let them.”Seren shot him a look. “That confidence scares me.”“It should,” Caedia said calmly. “Because it is no longer confidence. It is certainty.”Elias exhaled through his nose. “I’m not walking away this time.”Seren grabbed his arm and forced him to stop. “Elias look at me.”He did. Her eyes were wet. Angry. Afraid. “You’re not just a weapon. You’re not just the Echo. You’re still you.” He swallowed. “I know.”“Then promise me something.”“What?”“That when this is over… you’re still here.” Elias