Kael took a deep breath, trying to compose himself. The world still spun slightly around him, as if reality were wavering after the magical effort he had just performed. His hands trembled, not from fear, but from the residual tension left by the confrontation with the spirit of connection. He leaned on his knee, panting, and stood up with a muffled groan.

The spiritual amphora pulsed softly in his left hand, emitting a spectral glow. An unpleasant heat, like steam rising from a corrupted furnace, emanated from it—a constant reminder of what was inside. Still, Kael did not let go. He held it as if it were a sacred artifact.

"We still have work to do," he muttered, adjusting his tattered coat over his shoulders and wiping away some of the dried blood trickling from his eyebrow.

Klee rushed over to him, relieved to see him standing. "Are you okay? Because... it looks like your soul almost left your body. Twice."

"Yeah, barely," he replied, smiling wearily. "But now we have something that can contain the curse. Or at least prevent it from spreading further."

Klee stared at the amphora suspiciously. "What if it breaks?"

"Then we're screwed."

She swallowed hard.

Kael turned his gaze back to the village. The fog was slowly receding—still present, but losing density, as if it had been deprived of its vital center. The dead who had been stirring now seemed motionless, like puppets with their strings cut.

But something still bothered him.

"The silence is wrong," he said, frowning.

"Wrong how?" Klee asked, still twirling a magic bomb between her fingers.

"It's not natural. It's not... the end. It's a pause."

He turned and began walking down the street toward the heart of the village. His gait was determined, though heavy. Each step made the ground creak, as if the entire village were holding its breath.

Klee followed, almost stepping on his heels. "Wait, are you saying there's more?"

"Yes," Kael said firmly. "The connection has been sealed, but not destroyed. I feel the fragments... like shards vibrating in the air. This isn't over."

With each step he took, Kael used his spiritual perception to probe the energies of the place. With the amphora in his hands, the still-active seals reacted, vibrating subtly in his bones. It was as if he was becoming part of the web he had once intended to destroy.

Umbra spoke, her voice like a deep tide in his mind:

"You have become a knot. The walking prison. The fragments now follow you, Kael."

"Great," he muttered. "That'll be really handy when I want to sleep."

"I doubt you'll be sleeping anytime soon," Ahri replied, her voice echoing softly. "I sense an emanation to the south. It's not as intense as the spirit of connection, but it's... ancient. Persistent. Like a forgotten root."

Kael stopped at the intersection of two alleys, his eyes fixed on the old blacksmith's shop—now in ruins. Part of the roof had collapsed, and an extinguished forge still smoldered, though the place was clearly deserted.

"There," he murmured.

Klee narrowed her eyes. "In the smithy? Why always dark places, full of sharp things and the stench of charcoal?"

"Because evil likes to hide where it was forged."

They entered cautiously. The heat there was strange—suffocating, even without a fire. Kael looked around until his eyes fixed on something buried under fallen stones. A blacksmith's hammer, with ancient runic symbols engraved on its head. As he approached, he felt his spine freeze.

It was one of the anchors. A powerful one.

"This wasn't just a curse thrown at random," said Kael, feeling the echo of the energy trapped in that object. "It was planned. Forged. Each anchor was handpicked. Symbols of faith, of work, of collective memory. All to corrupt the soul of the village."

Klee knelt down next to the hammer. "Now what? Do we destroy them?"

"No. Not yet. We need to gather them all first. Then, a ritual of joining and containment. If we try to break one now, the seal on the amphora may be compromised."

Klee grimaced. "Have you always been so... rule-bound?"

"Only when the alternative is to die and drag the world down with me."

He wrapped the hammer in a containment rune and stored it in a velvet bag reinforced with enchantments. As he did so, the temperature in the room dropped abruptly. A sign that the spirit present there had retreated—or been pulled by the amphora.

They left the smithy carefully. The village seemed even quieter now. And in the distance, in the dark evening sky, swirling clouds formed a reddish-purple veil — as if the spiritual world were slowly tearing itself apart.

Kael looked at it and clenched his fist.

"Raven, wherever you are... you knew all this, didn't you?" he muttered. "This mission was never just a simple test."

Klee heard him, but said nothing. She just approached him and walked beside him.

The fog was forming again—slowly, subtly—as if waiting for more.

They crossed a narrow street lined with skeletal houses, shattered windows, and doors torn from their hinges. The fog, though thin, still crept along the ground, as if searching for the next body to consume. The sky above had taken on an opaque purple hue, bathed in distorted reflections from the sealed anchors.

The sound of their footsteps echoed hollowly on the stones. No birds, no crickets. Only the muffled rhythm of their breathing and the crackling of arcane energy that still vibrated in the air around Kael.

"How many anchors are left?" Klee asked, fiddling with the bracelet that powered her bombs. "I'm losing count."

Kael examined a rune that glowed faintly in the palm of his hand, aligned with the presence of the sealed anchors. "If Umbra's count is right... three more. Maybe four, if the curse has spread beyond the perimeter."

Klee snorted. "Sure. It's never just three."

That's when she stopped abruptly.

"Kael... wait."

The tone of her voice changed—low, dry, uneasy.

Kael turned, alert. "What?"

Klee pointed to a ruined house ahead, its roof collapsed and walls covered in moss. There was something on the doorstep, something moving slowly. A figure, indistinct at first glance, as if it were part of the fog condensing there.

"There's something there..."

Time froze for a fraction of a second.

Kael saw the movement—too fast to be human, too heavy to be spectral.

"Klee!" he shouted, lunging forward.

In a single motion, he pushed Klee aside and placed himself between her and the figure.

RAAAHHH!

The impact was brutal. Claws tore through the air and then flesh, striking Kael in the back with enough force to knock him to his knees. He screamed through clenched teeth, trying not to collapse.

The claws had penetrated the plates of his leather and chain mail armor, cutting through his back in three deep gashes, from shoulder to waist.

Klee rolled on the ground, landing on his elbows. "Kael?!"

He fell forward with one knee on the ground, blood running down the side of his body, and yet he conjured a barrier of fire in a desperate snap, blocking the second attack.

From the mist emerged the creature.

It was grotesque—quadrupedal, but with asymmetrical, muscular limbs, all wrapped in misshapen skin, red and raw like exposed flesh. Its eyes were multiple and arranged irregularly across its skull, as if they had been glued there by a sick mind. Its claws—black, long, and curved—were drenched in blood. Its nostrils flared like those of a hungry animal.

"Living curse..." Kael murmured with difficulty, swallowing the metallic taste of his own blood.

Umbra whispered immediately.

"This is not a spirit. It is a physical form... corrupted. A body used as a receptacle for loose fragments. A monster made of flesh and curse."

Klee stood up quickly, her eyes wide. "You're hurt...! Damn, that went deep, Kael—"

"Don't stop. Don't think about that now," he said, his voice tense. "Are you going to cover me or are you going to let this thing tear me in half?"

Klee bit her lip and turned the cylinder on her bracelet, preparing two small firebombs.

The creature roared, and the eyes on its skin glowed with supernatural hatred.

It lunged again.

Kael snapped his fingers and raised a wall of curving flames between himself and the creature. The beast crashed into the fire, roaring as its raw flesh began to bubble. But it didn't stop. It was beyond pain. It plowed through the flames, burning, melting, just to reach its target.

"Heavens... it's coming hard!" Klee shouted.

"Now!" Kael growled.

Klee threw the first bomb straight at the creature's paws. The impact exploded a wave of compressed air and heat, sending magical shrapnel into the exposed flesh. The beast stumbled—only for a second, but it was enough.

Kael spun to the side, even as pain screamed through his muscles. His hands quickly traced glyphs in the air, summoning a spear of condensed fire. With a guttural cry, he hurled it with force directly into the creature's flank.

The spear pierced the beast, exploding into flames inside it.

It screamed—a grotesque sound, somewhere between a roar and a sob—and staggered backward, flames spreading across its body. Still, it did not fall.

"She won't stop," Klee gasped.

Kael staggered but remained standing. "Her soul is no longer here. Just flesh driven by hatred." He ran his hand over the wound on his back, feeling the warm blood. "We'll have to incinerate everything."

Klee picked up one last bomb, a larger one with silver runes.

"Can you do it?" she asked.

Kael stared at her, his eyes burning with restrained fire. "You ask that now?"

She smiled nervously. "I wanted to give you a chance to show off, you know?"

"Okay, then."

Kael raised both hands, channeling what little mana still swirled within her body. Umbra and Ahri merged into her aura, amplifying the power of the final spell.

"Let's purify."

Klee threw the bomb into the air—it hovered for a moment, activating the runes.

Kael struck it with a burst of condensed flames.

The resulting explosion was brutal. A whirlwind of golden fire enveloped the creature completely, engulfing flesh, bone, curse, and everything else. The beast let out one last sound, muffled by the flames that purged it until nothing remained but misshapen ashes.

Silence returned.

Kael fell to his knees, panting. Klee ran to him and held him by the shoulders, preventing him from falling.

"You're bleeding a lot, Kael!"

"I noticed," he replied, with a crooked, pale smile.