All Chapters of CHAINS OF ETERNITY : Chapter 11 - Chapter 20

🌑 Chains of EternityThe mist lay heavy over the wasteland, curling around broken stones and thorn-choked paths as if the world itself sought to blind them. The party trudged forward in silence, each step dragging with the weight of exhaustion.Kael’s chains stirred restlessly at his side, slithering across the ground like serpents. They pulsed faintly, a rhythm that matched the hollow ache in his chest. The hunger had become constant now, no longer striking in sudden waves but gnawing with every heartbeat. He clenched his jaw, forcing himself to stay in line, but his eyes wandered too often—lingering on Brann’s thick neck, on the blue vein beating along Liora’s wrist when she wiped sweat from her brow.He tore his gaze away. Not them. Never them.But the chains did not agree.---They stopped to rest at the edge of a half-collapsed archway, a ruin that jutted from the earth like the bones of a long-dead giant. Brann dropped his pack to the ground with a growl.“This pace will kill u

🌑 Chains of EternityThe world had changed.Kael’s vision was swallowed by a suffocating darkness that was not mere absence of light, but something heavier, alive, pressing down on his lungs. He staggered, the echo of the coliseum’s collapse ringing in his ears. When his knees touched the ground, it was not stone beneath him but a shifting, spongy surface that pulsed faintly like flesh.His heart hammered. The others were scattered around him—Seris, upright and calm but with her hand gripping the edge of her cloak so tightly her knuckles turned white. Brann crouched low, scanning the darkness, a blade in his hand already trembling under the weight of his breathing. Liora lay sprawled, pale, clutching her chest as though each inhale cost her a piece of her soul.The chains around Kael stirred. Not just rattling this time—whispering. He froze. The sound wasn’t metal on stone but words. Faint. Hungry. He clenched his fists. Not now. Not here.“What is this place?” Brann’s voice cracked

🌑 Chains of EternityThe world split open, not with the roar of an explosion but with the soft sigh of a door closing. Kael staggered forward, his boots scraping against stone that hadn’t been there a moment before. The coliseum, the night sky, the shattered earth—all of it was gone.Instead, they stood in a corridor that stretched into eternity, walls of obsidian glass pulsing faintly with a dull inner glow. The air was thick, humming with a vibration that seemed to bypass the ears and nestle straight into the skull. Every breath felt stolen, as though the air resisted them, clinging like tar before being dragged into unwilling lungs.Kael turned his head, eyes narrowing. Brann was already on guard, sword raised, his stance tight with paranoia. Seris, pale but unyielding, let her fingers trace the black glass wall, her lips pressed thin. Liora clung to her staff, wide-eyed, her breaths shallow and uneven. The silence pressed in on them like an invisible fist.And then, softly, it be

🌑 Chains of EternityThe world did not shatter so much as invert.Kael stumbled, his boots skidding against something slick and glassy. The air had no weight, yet it pressed down on his chest, a suffocating contradiction. Around him, the others reeled, their forms stretched and fragmented like reflections seen in broken glass.The ground itself was a mirror—endless, seamless, reflecting them not once, but a thousand times. Each reflection was wrong: Mira’s mirrored selves all wept blood; Doran’s reflections smiled cruelly, their axes dripping with gore; Selene’s doubles whispered to each other with forked tongues. Talia’s mirrors flickered between a child and a corpse.And Kael—Kael’s reflections were chained. Every one of them bound, dragged by shadows into pits without end.Selene steadied herself, her knuckles white on her blade. “This is Truth?” Her voice was brittle, daring the labyrinth to answer.Mira was already trembling. “No… no, I can’t—” Her voice cracked as one of her mi

🌑 Chains of EternityThe mirrors no longer looked like mirrors.What had once been flat panes of glass were now quivering surfaces, alive, as though the labyrinth itself was breathing. The ripples spread from one reflection to another until the walls shimmered like a dark ocean, swallowing light and sense alike.Mira’s reflection leaned forward, her face pressing against the glass until the surface stretched with her cheek and lips. Its voice no longer whispered—it hissed, sharp enough to cut:“You never saved anyone. Not your mother. Not your brother. Not even yourself.”Mira’s sob caught in her throat, but when Kael reached toward her shoulder, she flinched back—eyes wide, mistrust blossoming like a wound. For just a heartbeat, she didn’t see Kael. She saw another reflection.The labyrinth had begun to win.Doran’s axe slammed down again, his roar shaking the chamber. But Kael noticed the hesitation this time—Doran’s strikes weren’t aimed at the doubles anymore. He was staring at K