CHAPTER 351: INTO THE LABYRINTH

After taking in the Dragonyx blood Alen prepared for this, Endless and the others entered what was once whispered in myth as "The Living Labyrinth", but not even those ancient tales could have prepared the army for what they faced.

The moment the Chaos Twins — Aron and Selene — led Endless, the Dark Magi, and the horde of newly conquered orcs and goblins past the obsidian arch that marked the Labyrinth’s outer threshold, the world shifted.

Literally.

The skies above twisted like a liquid sheet of burning silver, spiraling in counter-motion to the labyrinth walls that scraped the heavens themselves. Massive stone corridors reorganized themselves with groaning thunder, slamming and folding, building new paths while crushing old ones.

The first hour was uneventful — if walking through a breathing dungeon made of bones and blackstone could be called that. But that changed swiftly.

By the second hour, screams filled the air.

The ogres had gone first. Their massive bodies were split by floating blades that materialized from thin air — spectral, silent, ruthless. One by one, they dropped to their knees, blood gushing from invisible wounds. Goblins followed, falling by the dozens as shadows burst from the walls and wrapped around their necks like nooses.

Some were dragged screaming into walls that swallowed them whole. Others simply disappeared.

And through it all — Endless walked.

Unflinching. Unshaken.

The only sounds from him were the soft clinks of his obsidian-plated boots as he advanced, the ends of his tattered cloak whispering across cracked stones soaked in blood and silence.

"Master Endless," Selene muttered, glancing back as the last of a goblin platoon was ripped to shreds by spiked tendrils that shot up from the floor. "We’re down to half already..."

"I’d say less," Aron added dryly, swatting away a disembodied claw made of translucent bone.

Still, Endless didn’t stop. His eyes — void-like and ancient — were fixated deeper into the Labyrinth.

"I don’t care."

The voice was soft, almost human in timbre — but the energy behind it made the air tremble.

"The Labyrinth hungers. Let it feed."

"But—" Selene started.

He cut her off without turning. "They are fodder. If they cannot survive this crossing, they are unworthy of my command."

The Dark Magi, silent until now, hovered behind Endless. Black smoke coiled around him like an echo of undeath. Unlike the goblins, the entities of the Labyrinth had avoided him — as if sensing something darker, something more ancient within him.

Aron hissed. "This place... it changes even me. The air here is alive."

"It’s more than alive," murmured Selene, her voice tight with awe and disgust. "It’s listening."

They passed statues of forgotten kings whose faces changed every time you blinked. The walls bled ichor. And above them, arcane glyphs flickered in long-dead tongues across inverted ceilings. It was not merely a maze — it was a crucible that filtered weakness through suffering.

One corridor opened suddenly, revealing a sprawling inner chamber of spiraling towers and bridges suspended in mid-air. Bodies of former intruders — both beast and man — littered the floating platforms. In the center of it all stood a massive, rune-etched Gate. Unlike the one they passed to enter the Labyrinth, this gate pulsed with dormant energy, sealed by celestial sigils that shimmered with restrained fury.

That was their destination.

And just beyond that Gate...

Kael Dragonyx.

The once-revered patriarch of the Dragonyx family. Now exiled. Now isolated within the heart of the Labyrinth, consumed by his own ambitions — and perhaps... something even darker.

Endless finally halted.

His eyes narrowed on the sealed Gate. His voice slithered into the air like venom:

"We’re here."

The Chaos Twins stiffened.

"So the deal begins?" Selene asked.

Endless turned his gaze slowly toward her. "No. The reckoning begins."

Behind him, the few surviving orcs and goblins stood trembling, many of them on their knees, whispering broken prayers. Their blood soaked the stones, feeding the Labyrinth even as the air grew denser, tighter.

Aron looked over the edge of the floating platform, watching more walls shift far below — one of them shaped like a serpent’s maw.

"I still don’t like this place," he muttered. "Always feels like we’re inside something that’s not dead yet."

"Of course not," Endless replied absently, already extending his hand toward the sealed Gate.

"The Labyrinth is alive. And it remembers."

As he approached, the sigils flared in response — some recoiling in resistance, others flickering like they recognized him.

Endless placed a palm against the center rune. A ripple of dark light surged through the entire structure, and with a thunderous groan, the Gate began to open.

Behind it... lay a descent into an obsidian void. A staircase of bone and light. At its end...

Was Kael Dragonyx.

Endless smiled faintly. His voice dropped into a whisper of prophecy:

"Let’s wake up the devil that shaped your world."

---

Beyond the obsidian gate, down the endless stair carved from bone and stardust, the air changed.

It was heavier. Ancient. As if time itself held its breath here.

Endless walked with regal calm, the Chaos Twins and the Dark Magi behind him. At the bottom of the descent was a chamber unlike any other in the Labyrinth. It was vast — a cathedral of silence — held together by runes older than Aetheris itself. The floor was a polished onyx mirror, reflecting the stars from a ceiling that didn’t exist. Pillars of fractured memories rose in spirals around a single, glowing dais.

And seated upon that dais was Kael Dragonyx.

He was not how many would remember him.

His once imposing presence had withered into a gaunt, weathered frame. His long silver hair fell around his shoulders in tangles, and his sharp blue eyes were now dulled by bitterness and time. But what remained unbroken was his pride — it clung to him like the final piece of armor he refused to shed.

Kael’s gaze flicked up when Endless entered.

"You came," he said hoarsely.

"You called," Endless replied simply, stepping onto the onyx dais with no hesitation.

Behind him, the Chaos Twins remained at the chamber’s threshold, silent.

The Dark Magi merely hovered, a wraith of anticipation.

Kael didn’t rise.

"I didn’t call for you, Endless," Kael rasped as he eyed the chaos twins. "I called for a way out of this cursed place and to ask if the brat has been acquired."

"Although am completely clueless of what you are talking about in the second half. But in the first half, I," Endless said, "am the only way out. That makes us aligned, doesn’t it?"

There was silence between them.

Kael’s hand moved subtly, revealing the Dragonyx Heirloom—a sleek, dark-gilded crest sealed in ancient steel and imbued with the royal bloodline’s vow. Even sealed, it radiated authority and dread. The last vestige of an empire long buried under betrayal and war.

Endless’s eyes glittered.

"There it is," he murmured, reverent and cold. "The Key to the Fatebound Star. The Will of the Ancient Flame."

Kael gritted his teeth. "You know what this heirloom is capable of. You know what would happen if you misuse it."

"Of course," Endless said smoothly. "That’s precisely why I want it and had to go through the trouble to why I want it through mind speech."

He stepped closer. "You see, the Celestials... they feared this heirloom. Not for what it is—but for what it unlocks. The birthright of the true kings of Aetheris. Power that predates even their golden dominion."

Kael narrowed his eyes.

"You would plunge the world into ruin."

"No," Endless corrected, voice smooth as silk. "I would restore it. Balance by flame. Unity by chaos. The world you once ruled is now fractured, polluted by the weak-willed and the self-righteous. You’ve seen it. Felt it."

Kael clenched his fists, veins bulging across his knuckles.

"Don’t lecture me like a god, Endless."

"I’m not a god," Endless said, now standing directly before him. "I’m your answer."

There was a long pause.

Kael stared into Endless’s eyes—and what he saw there wasn’t madness, or even ambition. It was certainty. Like he had already seen the future carved from the blood of Aetheris and had simply come to collect his tools.

Kael’s pride screamed at him. But his logic... his understanding of the world... it was broken long before this day. His family betrayed. His legacy shattered. His name—dragged through blood and ash.

He opened his palm.

The Dragonyx Heirloom floated upward, glowing faintly as ancient seals clicked and unraveled.

The chamber shuddered.

The stars above warped.

And Endless smiled darkly as he extended a hand, wrapping his fingers around the ancient relic. At the moment of contact, black lightning coiled around his arm and licked across his body. His cloak flared. His eyes burned like dying suns.

The Heirloom accepted him.

Kael, defeated, stared down at his own hands. Once, they held kingdoms. Now... they were bound by consequence.

"I will never serve you," he muttered.

"You already are," Endless replied, slipping the heirloom into a fold of his robe.

The moment he did, a pulse exploded through the Labyrinth. Somewhere in the depths, walls rearranged. Doors opened. The skies above trembled.

Endless turned.

"Come, Kael Dragonyx. You have buried yourself in sorrow long enough. It’s time to meet the boy who holds your family name."

Kael’s head rose as his eyes glttered.

"...Kaelen."

"Yes," Endless said with a smirk. "He kinds of walks in your shadow but burns with his own fire. Let’s see if that flame can withstand the storm we are about to unleash."

Kael stood up at last, the old pride still flickering behind tired eyes.

"This isn’t the end, Endless."

"No," Endless agreed. "It’s the beginning of everything."

And with that, they vanished from the dais — a dark spark and a fading echo — as the Labyrinth groaned behind them, fully awakened.