CHAPTER 93: THE MAZE (SERAPHINA’S POV)

"Where am I?"

I looked up. The whole sky was white, nothing above me but an endless, blank space stretching forever.

The ground was white.

The walls were white.

Everything was too bright, empty and silent.

I was standing in what looked like a maze... but no matter which direction I turned, it all blended into the same hollow whiteness.

Earlier, I had unleashed my flame, but it fizzled out like smoke.

Now I was panting, exhausted.

"Lucian!" I shouted again, though I’d already lost count of how many times I’d called his name.

No answer. Just that empty echo coming back to me.

"Lucian, where are you...?"

The silence stayed.

Then suddenly something moved.

A shadow? I think it was a shadow.

It slipped past the corner of my vision, fast and silent.

"Hey—wait!" I forced my tired legs to move, stumbling forward. My footsteps echoed strangely, bouncing around the walls like the place was listening.

I followed the shadow around a corner.

One after another. Every turn looked the same.

White walls. White ground. White sky.

But the shadow was the only thing here that wasn’t empty, so I kept going.

"Stop!" I called again.

This time it slowed. For just a second.

Long enough for me to catch a faint outline, a figure blurred like smoke trying to become a person.

"Who are you?" I asked, breathless.

No reply.

It turned and drifted deeper into the maze, and even though every instinct told me not to follow...

I did.

I don’t know how long I walked. Minutes? Hours?

Eventually, the shadow vanished. And I was alone again.

My legs gave out, and I sank onto the cold floor, palms pressed to the ground to steady my shaking breaths.

"What should I do...?" I whispered.

My chest tightened, the kind of pain that should’ve spilled out in tears.

But tears never came for me. They couldn’t.

So all that ache stayed trapped inside my throat, heavy and sharp.

And as the silence folded around me, pressing down like a weight... one thought hit harder than the rest. All of this... probably happened because I didn’t listen to Lucian.

The moment that realization settled in my chest, the walls around me pulsed faintly, as if the maze itself had been waiting for me to understand something.

A ripple of light shivered along the white surface, gentle but unmistakable, like the entire place exhaled in response to my admission.

I stared at the glowing walls for a long moment before my strength gave out.

My knees bent, and I sank slowly to the cold floor, lowering myself until my back met the ground. The chill seeped through my spine, but I didn’t care. I just needed a moment to stop moving, to stop thinking, to breathe.

I lay there quietly, staring up at the endless white sky above me.

Nothing shifted.

Nothing stirred.

Only the echoes of my earlier steps lingered, faint, distant, swallowed by the maze.

A few seconds slipped by, and my thoughts drifted with them, slowing down enough for another idea to form.

"Light!" I jerked upright so fast my vision swayed. "Shadow could form because of light, right?" I asked myself, as if saying it out loud might help the thought make more sense.

But as soon as the excitement rose, it faltered.

My expression dropped into a frown as I slowly turned my head, scanning the space around me with growing disappointment.

The whole place was bright.

Blindingly bright.

The white sky, the white walls, the white floor—they didn’t glow from a single direction. They shone from everywhere and nowhere at all, like the world had been washed in pure light without a source.

"How...?" I whispered, frustration curling in my chest. "How did a shadow even appear if everything here looks the same?"

I lifted my palm and cast it in front of me, testing.

No shadow.

Not even the faintest outline.

It was impossible.

Shadows needed contrast. Shadows needed darkness. Shadows needed something solid blocking something brighter but here, the shining white swallowed everything evenly. It didn’t bend around me like real light; it simply existed.

I sat there for a moment, stunned by the realization.

"So if there’s no light source..." My voice grew softer, thoughtful, almost afraid of the answer, "and there’s no darkness either..."

Then what exactly had cast that shadow earlier?

=====

Cold, real cold, settled into the air, frost creeping along the floorboards, the walls, even the edges of the furniture. The entire room felt tight, tense, as if one wrong breath might shatter it.

Lucian stood rigid near the window, arms crossed, jaw clenched so hard a faint crack formed on the glass beside him. His aura had iced over half the floor without him realizing.

Auren stood a few steps away, not kneeling, but with both hands hovering over a single silver feather, one he had plucked earlier specifically for this spell. It served as his conduit for dream-linking, glowing faintly between his palms. The light pulsed erratically, flickering like a candle fighting against a storm, reacting to the unstable barrier that had locked Seraphina’s soul away.

He exhaled, his breath shaky from trying to hold onto the fragile thread between realms.

Lucian finally broke the silence, voice low and rough, "Did you manage to send it...?"

Auren didn’t look up, "Can you be patient for once?" he muttered, face tightening in concentration. "I need to focus before—"

He stopped abruptly.

A muscle jumped in his jaw.

Lucian’s eyes snapped toward him. "What is it?"

Auren swallowed, then frowned deeper as the feather dimmed in his hands.

"It seems like she stopped following..." he said quietly.

Lucian’s stomach twisted. "Stopped?"

Auren nodded slowly, his brows drawn tight as he tried to reconnect with the fading rhythm of Seraphina’s consciousness.

"The signal was faint to begin with... whatever realm she’s trapped in isn’t stable. But..." He hesitated, glancing briefly at Lucian’s expression before he continued. "She was moving toward the guide I sent. Now she’s... still."

Lucian’s breath hitched, frost spreading violently across the windowpane behind him.

"Is she losing strength?" he asked, the question breaking out more like a threat to the world for daring to harm her.

Auren’s silence was answer enough.

Lucian closed his eyes briefly, forcing in one steady breath, then opened them again with a dangerous calm, "Find her again."

Auren let out a long exhale, closed his eyes for a heartbeat, then nodded, though a faint shiver betrayed him.

"Fine," he said, lifting the feather again, "but one condition."

Lucian arched his brow.

Auren pointed at the frosted floor, the foggy windows, and the thin layer of ice creeping toward his boots.

"No full-blast air-conditioner, please," he muttered. "I’m trying to focus, not freeze to death."