The staircase descended much longer than Nathan had calculated.

Fifty steps. Seventy. One hundred. The carved stone beneath his boots was cold even through the soles, and the walls of the descent were covered in a grayish moss that emitted a faint, greenish luminescence—barely enough to see the next steps without the lamp.

Nathan kept it lit anyway.

Liaraen descended half a step behind, her short dagger in her right hand and her left brushing the wall for orientation. Nathan could hear her breathing slowly. Not agitated. Focused.

The staircase ended in a chamber.

Nathan stopped on the last step. Raised the lamp. The light reached the walls.

And for a full second, neither spoke.

The chamber was enormous. Circular. About thirty meters in diameter. The ceiling disappeared into darkness at a height the lamp couldn’t reach.

The walls were covered in engravings that started at floor level and rose as far as the eye could see: figures, symbols, sequences—all carved with a precision that only made sense if the stone had been cut before being raised, when it was still soft, or when the world allowed things it no longer allowed.

In the center of the chamber stood a low pillar. Square. Covered in centuries of dust.

And at four equidistant points around the perimeter, four dark corridors led off in different directions.

"Nathan."

"Yes."

"This is bigger inside than the entrance suggested."

"It is."

"And older."

"That too."

Liaraen advanced two steps into the chamber. Nathan didn’t stop her. Soul Sense in active state confirmed there was nothing in the immediate chamber. The corridors did have presences. Weak. Minor. But nothing that had reacted to the lamp yet.

Liaraen approached the nearest wall. Raised her hand. She didn’t touch it—stopped a centimeter from the stone, her palm hovering over one of the engravings.

"This figure," she said without turning, "is a hunter."

"How do you know?"

"The arm posture. The back’s arc. It’s the position taught in my house’s ceremonial frescoes to represent hunters of the first cycle. Pre-Pantheon."

"How pre?"

"I don’t know. Our elven archives go back three thousand years. This engraving is older than that."

Nathan absorbed the number.

*Three thousand years. More than three thousand years.*

He approached the central pillar. Blew lightly on the dust covering its top surface. Beneath the dust was a carved stone plate with more symbols. Nathan ran his fingers over the lines. They were still sharp. As if freshly cut.

"This place shouldn’t exist in this state," Nathan said.

"No," Liaraen replied. "It shouldn’t."

Silence.

And in the silence, Nathan heard something for the first time.

Not with his ears. With Soul Sense. A very low, very distant vibration rising from some deep layer of the dungeon and reaching the chamber like the sound of breathing muffled by several floors of stone.

*Something down here is breathing.*

*Slowly. But breathing.*

"Nathan."

"Yes?"

"Let’s choose a passage."

Nathan looked at her.

"You decide," he said.

"Really?"

"It’s your adventure. I’m just the one clearing the way."

Liaraen smiled. It was a brief smile, and Nathan registered it internally without comment.

"That one," Liaraen said, pointing to the northeast corridor. "That one first."

"Why that one?"

"The moss luminescence is stronger. It suggests moisture and airflow have been consistent there longer. Places with consistent flow in pre-Pantheon dungeons, according to the few texts I’ve read on the subject, tend to be service passages, not ceremonial ones. Fewer active protections. Higher chance of finding abandoned objects."

Nathan looked at her.

"When did you read texts about pre-Pantheon dungeons?"

"When I was thirteen. I had a two-month period of obsession with comparative archaeology. My tutor allowed it because she thought it was a passing phase. It was. But I retained the information."

"Sprout."

"Yes?"

"To me, that was over a hundred and three years ago—my parents weren’t even born yet."

"And?"

"And you still remember everything."

"To you, a hundred and three years ago is ancient history. To me, it was when I was a child. It’s a difficult difference to explain."

"You’re dangerously well-educated."

"I know."

They walked toward the northeast corridor.

---

The first contact came twenty meters into the passage.

Nathan felt it with Soul Sense before his eyes registered it. Four presences. Small. Aligned against the passage’s left wall, in a side niche the lamp hadn’t yet illuminated. Presences not quite alive nor quite non-living. Corrupted.

Nathan raised his left hand toward Liaraen without turning.

Liaraen stopped.

"How many?" she asked quietly.

"Four. There." Nathan gestured with his chin toward the still-dark side niche. "I’m going to try something."

"What?"

"Quiet."

Nathan extended his right arm.

*Soul Pulse.*

The dark wave shot from his palm. Crossed the passage in a straight line. Struck the side niche.

Four sharp screeches shattered the silence.

Four creatures fell to the stone floor with the sound of small bodies collapsing without resistance. Nathan advanced two steps and raised the lamp over the niche.

They were something between rodent and reptile. The size of a small dog. Gray skin mottled with black. Four short legs ending in fine claws. Eyes that in life had probably been red, now dull.

Dead.

```

NOTIFICATION

Eliminated: Corrupted Stone Listeners x4

Level: 6

Total EXP: +240

Status: Automatic Soul Fragment absorption.

Mana recovered: +200

```

Nathan dismissed the notification mentally.

Liaraen approached the niche. She crouched beside the largest creature. She studied it with attention—seeing for the first time something she’d read described in books but never in person.

"Stone Listeners," Liaraen said. "They’re the first category of corrupted fauna documented in minor cartography. They’re called that because their perception is fundamentally auditory. They don’t see well, but they hear over enormous distances. They were waiting for the sound of our footsteps."

"Good."

"Can I take one?"

"For what?"

"The claws are sold in Northern Kingdom herbology shops. They’re a basic component of a protective tincture against hypersensitive ears. Four claws are roughly half a silver coin. Four creatures, sixteen claws. Eight silver coins."

Nathan looked at her.

"You know how much dead Stone Listener claws are worth, with specific economic detail?"

"Yes."

"Why?"

"Because I read House Sael’thoryn’s commercial catalog during the archaeology obsession period. And because once I asked our accountant how much specific things were worth out of curiosity, and the accountant took me seriously."

"Acceptable."

Liaraen took a small empty bag from her personal pouch. With her short dagger, she began separating the claws from the first creature’s paws with the mechanical efficiency of someone who’d done botanical dissections and was applying the same principle. Nathan watched her for several seconds.

"Do you need help?"

"I can do it."

"I don’t doubt you can. I’m asking if you need help."

Liaraen looked up.

"I need another bag. This one won’t be enough."

Nathan took a spare bag from his jacket—one Selene had included in the provisions. He handed it over. Liaraen continued working.

When she finished with the four creatures, she had all sixteen claws separated into the two bags. She wiped her hands on a cloth she’d also taken from her personal bag. Stowed everything.

She stood up.

"Nathan."

"Yes?"

"That skill you used."

"Soul Pulse."

"You used it without turning toward them."

"Soul Sense confirmed their positions."

"Without seeing them."

"Without seeing them."

"Four creatures at once, without missing any."

"Yes."

Liaraen looked at him for a full moment.

"You’re more useful than your F-Rank suggests."

"Apparently."

"Not apparently. Objectively."

"Acceptable."

They continued down the passage.

---

The passage ended after eighty meters in another chamber.

This one was smaller than the first. Rectangular. With two exits: one ahead, one to the right. And on the floor, distributed with the specific irregularity of objects that had been in the same place for centuries, there were things.

Fragments of rusted armor. A helmet split in two. What had once been a sword, now reduced to a blade fragment embedded in the stone. Remains of fabric that was no longer fabric but dust compacted into the vague shape of a cloak. And near the back wall, a small mound of bones that moisture hadn’t entirely destroyed.

Liaraen stopped at the chamber entrance.

"Adventurers," she said quietly.

"Yes."

"Previous ones."

"Yes."

"How many do you think?"

Nathan raised the lamp. Counted the scattered pieces.

"At least five. Probably six. A small group."

"And what killed them?"

"I don’t know. But whatever it was, it killed them all at once. The remains are concentrated. Not scattered. They fell in the same chamber, not in different passages."

"Ambush."

"Ambush."

Nathan advanced slowly. Soul Sense was active but reported nothing in the immediate chamber. He approached the remains. Crouched beside the split helmet. Lifted it carefully. The inside still had remnants of a painted emblem that time had almost completely erased. But the general shape was recognizable: a circle with a diagonal line crossing it.

Nathan went very still for a second.

*That’s the Table’s symbol.*

*This helmet belonged to a Table adventurer.*

*Table adventurers died here, long enough ago for moisture to erase the paint and oxidize the metal completely.*

*The Table has been operating much longer than official information suggests.*

He set the helmet back where it was.

"What did you find?" Liaraen asked.

"Nothing relevant for today."

"Nathan."

"I’ll tell you later."

"Acceptable."

He approached the sword fragment embedded in the stone. The blade was broken ten centimeters from the ground, but the material had a sheen different from the rusted rest. Nathan ran his fingers over the visible surface. Cold to the touch. With a slight vibration.

He looked at Liaraen.

She’d approached the bone mound and crouched beside it. Not touching. Observing.

"Nathan."

"Yes?"

"This passage leads north."

"I know."

"The air comes from the south. From the right exit."

Nathan raised the lamp. The flame flickered slightly in that specific direction. Liaraen was right.

"The south is deeper," Nathan said.

"Yes."

"Which means this group of adventurers came from the south."

"Or they were heading south and something ambushed them from the north."

Nathan processed that for a moment.

"Let’s take the south one."

"Are you sure?"

"That’s where no one came back from. That’s probably where the things Tomen didn’t want to specifically tell me about are. If we’re going to be here, I’d rather know what’s there than guess."

"Acceptable."

Nathan stood up. He mentally filed the information about the Table helmet. Checked Soul Sense once more. No immediate presences. The distant presences he’d registered from outside were still deep below, not moving toward them.

Yet.

They walked toward the south exit.