LOGINFar below the ruins. Far beneath Zelios. Deeper than the forgotten library. There existed a place no map dared to name. The Custodians called it simply. The Silent Vault. No lanterns burned there. No torches lit its endless corridors.The darkness itself seemed alive, swallowing every sound that entered. Yet footsteps echoed through it. Measured. Unhurried.Three hooded Custodians descended the ancient staircase without speaking.Each carried an iron lantern whose pale blue flame barely pushed back the darkness. The oldest among them finally stopped before an enormous circular door carved directly into black stone. Unlike every other door beneath the ruins, this one bore no handle. Only countless concentric rings covered in symbols that shifted whenever the light touched them.The eldest Custodian slowly knelt. He placed both hands against the cold stone."We request audience."Silence. Nothing happened. The younger Custodians exchanged uneasy glances.Then. The symbols began to move.
Night had always been Dr. Elias' favorite time to work. The Medical Wing was quiet. No hurried footsteps echoed through the corridors. No anxious hunters lined the examination rooms waiting for treatment. Only the soft glow of oil lanterns illuminated rows of instruments polished so carefully they reflected the light like still water.Elias stood alone before a wooden table scattered with reports. Not injuries.Not patrol logs. Blood. One sheet after another. Each bearing the same name.Lieutenant Sera Ward.He adjusted his glasses and read the latest report for what had to be the twentieth time. The numbers refused to change."The mutation appears... then vanishes."He whispered the words as if speaking them aloud might reveal the answer."No infection behaves like this."His fingers drifted across faded notes written years earlier in another doctor's handwriting. Those pages were older than Sera herself. Older than many of the hunters serving Zelios.Yet the patterns. They were begi
The ruins were quite long before sunrise. Nathan crouched atop the remains of an old watchtower overlooking the valley below. From this height, Helios was invisible beneath the mountains, while the dead city stretched endlessly toward the horizon. His gaze remained fixed on a single structure half buried beneath vines and collapsed stone.The old cathedral. Or what remained of it. The Custodians always returned there. Not because it was sacred. Because it hid one of the oldest entrances to the underground network. Nathan had spent two days watching them. They never traveled in large groups. Never spoke above a whisper. Never left tracks.Even their patrol routes seemed designed to disappear into the landscape itself."They don't guard territory," Nathan murmured to himself. "They guard secrets."He adjusted the old field journal resting on his knee. Its pages were already filled with observations. Three shifts. No visible leader. Rotating lantern signals every four hours. No insignias
Zelios slept. After every night patrol, the underground fortress always settled into an uneasy silence. Corridors that had bustled with hunters and medics only hours earlier now lay nearly deserted. Night lights casting long amber shadows that stretched across the polished floor. Outside, morning sunlight washed over the ruined world.Inside Zelios, thick layers of reinforced stone swallowed the day whole. Sera lay awake on her bed. She had closed her eyes the moment she returned to her room, hoping exhaustion would force her into sleep.It never came. Instead, her mind wandered in endless circles. Dr. Elias' questions. Jonas' confrontation. The strange changes in her blood. And, despite every effort to stop herself.Husen.She turned onto her side with an irritated sigh. "Enough..."The room answered only with silence. She knew she wouldn't sleep. If she remained here, her thoughts would only grow louder. Then another thought surfaced. The files.Project Crimson Hunger.Crimson Blood
The corridors outside the Medical Research Wing had grown quiet again. The questions had ended. The doctors had returned to their laboratories. Commander Aldren had disappeared into another meeting. Yet none of it brought Sera any peace.She walked through Zelios almost mechanically, barely noticing the familiar faces that passed her. Hunters greeted her with quiet nods, technicians hurried between departments carrying reports, and guards changed shifts with practiced precision. Everything around her continued as if nothing had happened.But inside. Nothing felt normal anymore. Every answer she had withheld in the laboratory still echoed inside her mind.Husen. His name surfaced no matter how fiercely she tried to bury it.She unlocked the door to her room and stepped inside. The silence greeted her first. Her weapons rested where she had left them. Fresh patrol gear lay folded neatly on the chair. The lantern by the window burned with its usual warm glow. Everything was exactly as it
The ruins stretched for miles behind him. Collapsed towers, fractured streets, abandoned bridges, and empty valleys blurred together as Husen continued moving until even the scent of battle disappeared into the night. Only then did he stop. He stood before what looked like nothing more than a weathered cliff face, overgrown with vines and hidden behind centuries of moss and broken stone. To anyone passing by, it was simply another forgotten part of the wasteland. Husen reached toward the rock, pushing aside a curtain of hanging vines. A narrow passage revealed itself. Without looking back, he disappeared inside. The tunnel twisted deeper into the mountain before opening into a surprisingly spacious chamber.It was quiet. Warm. Simple. This was home. Not a mansion. Not a castle. Not the ruins of an abandoned city. A cave. One he had carved with his own hands over decades. Every shelf had been cut into solid stone. Every doorway had been shaped patiently, one strike at a time. Water flo







