A low rumble echoed from below, faint but unmistakable. The sound of something shifting, something alive.

Ashwing tensed. "Please tell me that's just the wind."

"It isn't."

The dragon groaned. "I hate when you say that."

Lindarion stood still for a long moment, eyes fixed on the chasm. His golden irises reflected the light from below, two thin shards of dawn in a world gone dim. "We'll camp here tonight," he said finally. "Tomorrow, we descend."

Ashwing's eyes went wide. "Descend?! Into that?"

"Yes."

"Why?"

"Because whatever sleeps down there isn't just feeding on mana, it's directing it. And if we leave it alone, it may wake the rest."

The dragon groaned louder. "You really don't like easy plans, do you?"

Lindarion smirked faintly. "If I liked them, I wouldn't still be alive."

He began setting up camp a few paces from the edge, his movements precise and efficient. The air was strangely quiet, no insects, no birds, no wind. Only the slow pulse of the ley line below, like a heartbeat echoing from the earth's core.

As night fell, faint lights appeared across the expanse, wisps of energy drifting like fireflies. They weren't alive, not truly. They were echoes, remnants of the demi-humans' collective consciousness burned into the air itself. Each spark carried a fragment of memory, a sliver of thought.

Ashwing watched them, his eyes wide with fascination. "Do you think they can see us?"

"Perhaps," Lindarion said softly. "Or perhaps they see only what they were. But the world remembers everything that bleeds into it. Every war. Every birth. Every death."

Ashwing looked up at him. "Do you think it remembers you?"

Lindarion's gaze lingered on the drifting lights. "It remembers what we choose to leave behind."

The dragon fell silent. For a long time, they listened to the soft hum of the ley lines, the whisper of forgotten voices carried on the mana wind.

Then the earth trembled.

A ripple passed through the ground, throwing dust into the air. One of the glowing wisps shattered into sparks and vanished. From the ravine came a low groan, deeper this time, and Lindarion felt the vibration through his boots.

He stood instantly, eyes narrowing. "Something's stirring."

Ashwing's wings flared. "How big?"

Lindarion drew his blade. "Big enough."

A fissure split the far side of the ravine, and molten light erupted upward, gold and green mixed with streaks of black. The air screamed as raw mana tore through the surface.

From the chasm rose a shape of shadow and scale, a twisted remnant of a demi-dragon, half skeleton, half crystal. Its wings were gone, its chest hollow, but its eyes burned with green fire.

Ashwing whispered, "That's… one of mine."

"No," Lindarion said. "That's what's left of one."

The creature let out a sound between a roar and a scream. The blast of heat that followed seared the ground, igniting the dying grass in a ring of emerald flame.

Lindarion stepped forward, his cloak whipping in the sudden wind. His aura flared faintly, white at first, then streaked with gold and violet. "Stay back, Ashwing."

The dragon hovered a few meters above, voice trembling. "Don't kill it too fast."

Lindarion's smile was cold. "I won't."

The creature lunged. Its movements were heavy but fast, like a landslide. Lindarion's sword met its claw mid-strike, and the impact sent a shockwave through the air, bending the nearby trees.

His boots dug into the earth as he redirected the force sideways, spinning and slashing across its forelimb.

Crystalline scales shattered under the blow, scattering light like glass. The creature roared again, green flames spilling from its chest cavity.

Lindarion vanished from sight.

For a heartbeat, only wind and fire filled the clearing. Then he reappeared above the monster's head, descending in a blur of golden light. His blade struck true, cleaving through the mana core embedded in its skull.

The roar cut off. The creature froze, then dissolved into fragments of light that scattered into the sky.

Ashwing landed beside him, eyes wide. "You did kill it fast."

Lindarion exhaled, lowering his sword. "It was already dead. I only freed what was left."

They stood there a moment longer, watching the last motes of light drift upward into the clouds. Then Lindarion sheathed his blade and looked south again.

"Tomorrow," he said quietly, "we keep moving."

Ashwing sighed. "You never say 'rest longer,' do you?"

"No."

The dragon grumbled but climbed back onto his shoulder, curling his tail around Lindarion's neck. The prince turned his eyes toward the horizon, where the faint shimmer of mana marked the next step in their journey.

The Verdant Expanse fell silent again, save for the whisper of the ley line far below, alive, watching, waiting.

The dawn came gray and muted, veiled by a sky thick with dust. The sun barely managed to pierce through, and when it did, the light fell across the ravine like a blade drawn across skin, cutting, cold, and colorless.

Lindarion stood at the edge, cloak whispering in the wind. The previous night's battle had left no corpse, no trace of blood or broken bone, only a few shimmering motes of dissipated mana lingering like ghosts in the air.

Yet the wound in the earth still pulsed. The ley line's energy had not calmed. It throbbed now with erratic rhythm, as though whatever he had slain had only been a surface echo of something deeper.

Ashwing fluttered to his shoulder, yawning despite the tension in the air. "So. We're actually going down there."

"Yes." Lindarion adjusted his gauntlets, gaze still locked on the chasm. "If corruption spreads through the veins of this continent, I need to see its heart."

The dragon snorted. "You always want to see hearts. You ever try just, I don't know, sealing something and leaving?"

"That's not how balance works."

Ashwing sighed, small smoke rings curling from his nostrils. "Fine. But if something huge eats us, I'm haunting you forever."

"Duly noted."

He stepped forward, and the world shifted. Shadows bent slightly around him as he drew mana into his limbs, white and gold light curling like threads along his armor seams. The air thickened, humming faintly with restrained power.

Then he jumped.

For a heartbeat, there was only wind, and then silence.

The descent stretched on. The walls of the ravine glowed with faint veins of crystal, each pulsating in rhythm with the ley line's heartbeats. Fractures branched outward like lightning, leaking slow streams of luminous green mist.

He passed through layers of ancient stone, and beneath those, through the remains of carved structures: spiraled columns, half-melted runes, shattered murals depicting beings with wings of bone and light.

Ashwing clung tighter to his shoulder. "I don't like this place."