SSS Talent: From Trash to Tyrant-Chapter 396: The Fall of the Thal’zar [X]

The stairs ended beneath their feet.

The space that opened below was vast and wrong in its scale. Tunnels stretched out in every direction, dozens bleeding into hundreds, hundreds dissolving into thousands. Some were wide enough for entire formations to march through. Others narrowed into jagged throats that vanished into darkness after only a few meters. Stone walls bore scars of old excavation and newer violence, claw marks and fractured supports hinting at movement far deeper than sight could reach. 𝘧𝑟𝑒𝑒𝘸𝘦𝘣𝑛𝑜𝘷𝑒𝓁.𝘤𝘰𝓂

It was not a place meant to be understood at a glance.

It was a maze.

Valttair took a single step forward and stopped. The structure did not invite haste. Each corridor felt capable of swallowing an entire unit without leaving a trace behind. The kind of place where a wrong choice could not be undone.

The air felt different.

He turned his head slightly toward Elenara.

"Do you have any information on these tunnels?" he asked, voice calm but direct. "We can’t afford to linger here."

Every second spent choosing blindly was another second handed to Kaedor and Icarus.

Elenara studied the tunnels without moving closer, her attention flowing across the branching paths as if the stone itself were speaking to her. After a moment, she raised one hand.

At her signal, an elf stepped forward from the rear ranks.

He was unremarkable at first glance. His build was lean rather than imposing. Platinum-blond hair fell loose around his shoulders, close enough in tone to Valttair’s to invite comparison. Only when he turned did the detail that mattered become clear—one ear was damaged, shortened by an old wound that had healed long ago. The mark of survival.

Elenara’s voice carried quiet confidence. "We don’t have maps," she said. "But we have something better. Someone who can take us straight to Kaedor."

Valttair’s gaze settled on the elf, not unkind but exacting. He measured posture, breathing, the stillness that came from familiarity with danger rather than fear of it. What mattered was not how the elf looked, but what he was.

"An Explorer," Valttair said, recognizing the class without being told.

The elf inclined his head once.

Valttair considered the tunnels again. Their depth. Their scale. The way they promised delay and misdirection.

"These paths are vast," he said at last. "And we don’t have time to wander. Are his abilities truly enough to guide an army through this?"

Elenara did not hesitate.

"They are," she replied. "He doesn’t search blindly. He tracks essence. Strong traces. Deep ones. If Kaedor is anywhere below us, this will lead there."

Elenara kept her eyes on the tunnels as she spoke.

"His capabilities are extraordinary," she said. "If we follow his lead, we’ll reach Kaedor quickly."

She did not frame it as a gamble.

Then she added the condition that mattered.

"But he has to be protected. If he dies, we’re lost."

Valttair did not answer right away. The alternative was obvious to both of them.

"We could force our way through," Elenara continued, her tone tightening. "But I’m not a barbarian. I won’t bring the tunnels down just to move faster. Too many of my people would die."

Valttair weighed her words. Unlike her, he would not have hesitated to carve a path if that were the only option. Power was not the issue.

Authority was shared.

After a brief silence, he accepted what had already been decided.

"Then we follow your plan," he said. "It’s the logical path."

The matter was settled.

The explorer moved forward and took his place at the center of the formation.

He did not rush. He closed his eyes for a brief moment and activated his skill, letting his awareness sink into the stone beneath their feet. The tunnels answered in fragments. Old paths. Broken ones. Traces left by thousands who had passed and died below.

Then one presence stood apart.

The explorer adjusted his direction without a word, turning toward a single tunnel that felt heavier than the rest, as if the stone itself resisted being near whatever lay ahead. His skill was not searching anymore. It was following.

Essence.

Deep. Twisted. Wrong.

Valttair did not need to be told what it meant. Elenara felt it as well, the same pull they had sensed from afar now given shape and direction. A void creature did not move unnoticed, and if its presence was this clear, then Kaedor and Icarus would not be far from it.

Especially Icarus.

An experiment like that would never be left unattended.

The formation shifted smoothly. Shields closed ranks. Summons moved into position. Thousands followed as one as the army entered the chosen tunnel, stone swallowing light behind them.

The path was set.

They had barely advanced a few meters when it happened.

From a side passage, a lycan burst into view and hurled an explosive in a low arc meant to detonate in the heart of the formation. The device spun once through the air, already humming with unstable force.

It never reached its mark.

Thaleon’s summon moved on instinct. The stone-bound beast surged forward and threw its mass over the explosive, pinning it beneath layers of rock and condensed mana. The detonation followed a heartbeat later, contained and crushed inward. The shock rolled through the tunnel as a dull pressure rather than a blast, dust shaking loose from the ceiling but leaving the formation intact.

Before the echoes could fade, Lysandra was already in motion.

She crossed the distance in a blink, blade flashing once in a clean arc. The lycan’s head separated from its body and struck the stone floor before the rest could react. The corpse collapsed where it stood, blood spreading thinly across the tunnel’s edge.

Shields tightened. Spacing corrected. The line flowed forward as if the interruption had never happened.

The explorer did not look back. His focus remained fixed ahead, essence pulling him deeper into the maze.

The message was clear.

The tunnels were defended.

This was not a lone act of desperation, but a warning shot. And the alliance did exactly what the enemy feared most.

They kept moving.