CHAPTER 238: A LIGHT THAT DISTORTS

The cavern reeked of scorched chitin. A thin haze of smoke curled upward, clinging to the ceiling like the ghost of what they had just endured. Carcasses of beetles littered the ground in obscene abundance, clicking faintly as their twitching legs settled into stillness.

No one spoke.

Elisa stood in the center, her hands lowered now, but the spheres still whirled faintly, as if unwilling to obey her call for calm. The faint hum they emitted set every nerve on edge. Her eyes, wide, luminous, seemed too bright for her own face—like borrowed stars that had no place in a human gaze.

Maggie finally broke the silence. Not with words, but with a grunt—she planted the haft of her halberd against the stone, leaned on it heavily, and released a breath that sounded almost like relief. Yet she didn’t look at Elisa. Not directly. Not the way she used to.

Armin muttered something feverish, cradling his arm, his stare darting between Elisa and the piles of beetles as though unable to decide which was worse. Inès pressed herself to the wall, pale, trembling, her lips moving without sound.

And then Zirel laughed. A dry, shallow laugh that carried no humor but cut through the air like a blade.

"Well," he rasped, clutching his chest where the scar still pulled, "if anyone here doubted whether Lady Elisa deserved her place in the Fleur du Vent..." His smirk widened despite the exhaustion dragging down his face. "I think the debate is settled."

The words fell like stones. No one corrected him. No one dared. The lie had taken root, and now it was fertile soil for manipulation.

Elisa closed her fingers around her spheres, forcing them to still. They slowed reluctantly, then froze, dropping into a silent orbit close to her temples. Her hand trembled as though she were fighting an invisible tremor inside herself.

Inside, her thoughts clawed for breath. The insects had not hated them. She felt it. They had swarmed not out of malice but because something in her—the energy, the light—had called to them. Drawn them. As if she were less a woman than a beacon, an exposed flame attracting moths in the night.

And when she had unleashed the storm... a hollow opened in her chest. Not exhaustion—something deeper. A void, yawning, hungry. The sensation that each new fragment of power she touched did not just drain her but claimed her.

She could still smell the ozone on her skin. Still feel the faint crackle of electricity under her nails.

Her gaze flicked toward Maggie—and for the first time, she saw hesitation in her friend’s eyes. Not doubt in Elisa’s loyalty, no—but doubt in whether she was still entirely human.

Elisa’s throat was dry. She forced herself to speak, her voice hoarse.

"We move. Before more of them come."

No one argued. But as the group gathered itself and prepared to move on, the order of things had changed. Elisa no longer walked beside Maggie. She took her place at the rear, her own silent bulwark, feeling their gazes on her back—no longer awestruck fear, but pure distrust.

Each step widened the chasm. Each breath was a reminder of what she had done, of what she was becoming.

And in the silence that followed, as they plunged back into the darkness, a thought, cold and clear, sprouted in Zirel’s mind: he had found the perfect lever. The fear of the others was a currency far more powerful than gratitude. And he now knew exactly how to make it grow.

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The tunnel reclaimed its dominion around them. The rock swallowed their presence; each step seemed to gnaw a little more strength from their already weary muscles. The smell of burnt chitin gradually faded, replaced by the older, mustier scents of mold and stagnant water. But the shadow of the fight lingered in their throats, as if each had inhaled an invisible ash.

Maggie walked at the front, her figure imposing but heavier than before, as if the halberd leading the way had become a burden. Her steady breath did not mask the tremor in her shoulders. Several times, she turned her head slightly, as if to check Elisa’s position... but her gaze immediately shifted away, avoiding the green light that still pulsed faintly around her.

Inès stumbled, half-caught by Armin, who continued to mumble his incomprehensible phrases. His words, interspersed with stifled laughs, echoed off the stone like a bad prayer. At times, she clenched her teeth to keep from screaming at him to shut up. But she didn’t have the strength.

Zirel, meanwhile, fed on the silence. Every groan, every sigh, every furtive glance toward Elisa was further confirmation for him. The seed he had planted was already bearing fruit. He no longer needed to push it—fear was doing it for him.

Elisa advanced at the rear, outwardly still but inwardly shaken. The spheres followed her obediently, yet she felt their dull resistance, as if they vibrated with an impatience of their own. She thought of the electricity, the discharge, the void that had sucked at her when she released the storm. It was intoxicating... and terrifying. Every passing moment made her feel as though the boundary between her and *it* was fraying.

She found herself straining to hear. Not the footsteps of her companions, but listening for another hum, a resonance, as if the world around them had begun to whisper through the stone. She heard nothing—and that was even worse.

A turn. Then another. The gallery began to slope upward, drier, less suffocating. Maggie slowed, her face hard, and raised a hand. Ahead of them, a whitish glimmer took shape, timid and trembling. A light. Not from the spheres. Not from the lamps. A natural clarity, almost unreal.

"The exit?" Inès breathed, her voice cracked, a thread of hope still piercing through.

No one answered. Each, in their silence, clutched their fear like a talisman. They advanced cautiously, drawn despite themselves toward the pale opening.

And the closer they got, the more the air changed. Cold, sharp, charged with a metallic odor. As if the wind itself had rusted.

Elisa stopped short. Her spheres tightened around her, emitting a dry creak. Her stomach clenched with a visceral premonition. This wasn’t daylight. Not an exit. It was something else.

Zirel saw her hesitation, and his smile returned, thin, cruel.

"Lady Elisa... what have you perceived now?"

But she didn’t answer. Her eyes were fixed on that foreign glow, and in her chest, the void began to roar once more.

They approached, one after the other, with the slowness of condemned men climbing the scaffold. The gallery opened into a circular chamber, its walls smooth as if polished by inhuman hands. And there, in the center, stood the source of the glow.

It wasn’t a fire. Nor an anima gem. It was... something else.

A broken obelisk, barely two meters tall, split at its summit. In the fissure pulsed an unstable white brightness that vibrated like a flame caught in an invisible draft. The light didn’t truly illuminate—it distorted. Shadows stretched askew, outlines wavered, as if the rock itself hesitated to remain solid in its presence.

No one spoke. Even Armin had fallen silent, his eyes consumed by a sickly wonder.

Zirel was the first to step forward. His hand trembled slightly, but his smile was that of a man who had just discovered a forbidden treasure.

"So this is what this stone tomb hides..." he murmured. "A relic."

Elisa felt her heart beat too fast. Her spheres were already buzzing, as if drawn. A force was pulling at her. Not like the insects, not like the beast. More intimate. As if this thing recognized something in her. As if it were calling her by her true name.

Maggie brutally placed a hand on her shoulder, yanking her back to reality.

"Stay back." Her voice was low, sharp. But her eyes, fixed on the obelisk, betrayed a worry she had never shown before.

Inès stifled a nervous sob.

"This... this isn’t human. It’s not for us."

Armin let out a broken laugh.

"No, it’s not for us. *We* are for *it*."

An icy silence followed. Then, with a calculated gesture, Zirel drew his dagger and brought the blade close. The light reacted instantly: an icy wave emanated from the fissure and swept through the room like a breath. The stone cracked under their feet, as if the cavern itself remembered a crushing weight.

Elisa fell to her knees, struck by a blinding vision. In the glow, she felt a beating. A heart. Not alive, but fossilized in time, locked in the stone for centuries. And every ghostly pulse resonated within her, awakening the void that slept in her chest.

She opened her mouth, gasping.

"It’s... a seal. Not an artifact, not really. It’s holding back... something."

Her words echoed in the chamber like a forbidden whisper.

Zirel froze, his eyes blazing with avarice. Maggie tightened her grip on her halberd. Inès began backing toward the entrance, her face ashen.

And in the fissure, the light flickered. Just enough to suggest movement, as if something—a silhouette, an eye, a hand—stirred behind the wall of brilliance.

Elisa held her breath. It wasn’t a hand, nor an eye. Not exactly. It was an impression, a reflection of being, as if the light were trying to give form to a memory buried in the stone.

For the space of a heartbeat, she thought she saw a colossal silhouette, kneeling, its head bowed like a chained prisoner. Then the vision vanished, leaving the fissure pulsing with a blinding glare.

Maggie growled, her voice rough:

"Step back."