"If we do not find a way to light this tomb within the next five minutes, we are all going to turn into living statues."Marcus dropped his heavy pack onto the slick, frozen stone of the cavern floor, his teeth clicking together with a loud, rhythmic violence as he rubbed his blue-tinged hands frantically."Stop complaining and help clear the entrance so the frost beasts can get back out," Evelyn snapped back, though her own shoulders were hunched tight against the piercing chill that radiated from the ice walls."They are not trying to get out, Evelyn, they are standing guard," Ethan said, his voice low and raspy as he watched the massive alpha frost-beast settle itself across the narrow mouth of the cave, blocking out the howling fury of the blizzard outside."Guard or warden, it does not matter if we freeze to death in the dark," Thorne muttered, dropping to his knees and striking a heavy iron flint against a dry scrap of cloth. The s

"If you slip on this ice and fall today, Ethan, I am not jumping down after you to explain your corpse to Evelyn," Garrick whispered, his boots sliding half an inch on the treacherous blue slope as he clutched the hilt of his iron dagger with white-knuckled intensity."You would miss me too much, Garrick, and besides, I have no intention of dying on a frozen rock today," Ethan replied, his breath pluming out in a thick white cloud as he pressed his back against the jagged stone wall of the cliff."You always have a smart word ready for every single suicide mission, do you not?" Garrick muttered, shaking his head with a tense, breathless laugh that quickly faded as he looked down at the three imperial scouts patrolling the narrow path fifty feet below them. "I have to admit something, Ethan. Back at the shrine, when you took that soul-chain extraction, I thought you were just another reckless kid with a death wish. But watching you lead us through this fro

"Ethan, grab my hand, do not let go!" Evelyn screamed, her voice cracking with raw terror as the snowy cliff beneath their boots completely dissolved into a roaring avalanche of shattered stone and blinding white smoke.The ground simply vanished beneath his heels, leaving nothing behind except for empty air and the howling fury of the storm. The world tilted violently on its axis, spinning in a dizzying blur of gray rock, white snow, and the dark, churning expanse of the northern sea far below. Every instinct in his body screamed in protest, muscles tightening into knots as the cold mountain wind whipped past his ears with the deafening roar of a freight train."I think my luck has finally run out, Evelyn!" Ethan shouted back, his body spinning wildly through the freezing air as gravity dragged him downward with terrifying, merciless speed toward the churning black teeth of the ocean waves."You do not get to give up after everything we survived, Eth

"If you try to suck in air once we cross this threshold, Ethan, your lungs will implode under the weight of the sea before you even finish gasping," Kaelen warned, his bioluminescent skin flashing a sharp, warning crimson in the pitch-black water."You always know how to make a man feel completely welcome, Kaelen," Ethan choked out, his fingers shivering against the cold metal of his gear as the terrifying drop of the abyssal trench loomed directly beneath them."This is not a social visit, human, this is a suicide drop, and if your magic fails for even a second down there, the pressure will turn you into paste," Kaelen snapped back, his webbed hands tightening on his spear as the current pulled fiercely at his shoulders."Then let us just hope my magic likes deep water as much as I do," Ethan muttered, staring down into the impenetrable black void that stretched out below the rocky ledge."You are drowning, host, and it is entirely path

"If you are planning to suffocate in the dark, could you at least do it quietly so I do not have to listen to your lungs rattling like broken glass?" Umbra's voice snapped inside Ethan's skull, sharp and dripping with dark irritation."I am trying not to die, Umbra, which takes a surprising amount of concentration," Ethan wheezed, his hands pressing blindly against the cold, jagged stone wall as the crushing weight of the collapsed vault closed in around him."Well, your concentration is failing, because the water pressure is already leaking past my adaptation magic," the entity retorted, a cold shiver of panic racing down Ethan's spine as a freezing trickle of seawater soaked through his collar.Ethan squeezed his eyes shut, his chest heaving as he clutched the satchel of azure soul-cores tightly against his ribs. The air in his cramped pocket was running out fast, turning thick and hot with every desperate breath he forced into his burning lung