The sky cracked.
Not thunder—mana discharge, tearing across the heavens in jagged arcs of violet and blue. Veinhold's sky skiffs spun into formation like vultures circling a carcass, their runed cannons pulsing with restrained fire.
Kael stood at the cliff's edge, the wind flattening his coat against his back. His hair lifted slightly, strands glowing faintly with residual ruin-light. Below, the terrain warped like molten glass—this was no longer the desert they had entered.
"This place changes faster than we breathe," Sera muttered, her hand tightening around her sword hilt.
"Because it knows we're not supposed to be here anymore," Zarith said. "The ruin's shifting to protect itself. It doesn't want witnesses."
Tessia raised one arm, eyes narrowing. "We have company. Three angles."
From the south, the Runeblade scouts approached in precision lines—cloaks drawn, runeblades sheathed but ready. They bore the Academy's crest: silver flame on black.
From the west, Crimson Vultures on armored dune-striders emerged like desert shades, sabers gleaming, mouths hidden behind red scarves. They were mercenaries—professionals. Efficient. Bloodthirsty.
And from above came the low rumble of Veinhold skiffs, their golden banners flaring in the wind. Floating rune-sentinels hovered beside them, scanning the mesa for movement.
Kael didn't blink. He was counting.
Nine skiffs. Twelve scouts. Six mercenary riders.
They had them surrounded.
"You're insane if you think we can fight them all," Dren said, gripping his blade. "This is a firing squad."
"We won't fight them all," Kael said. "Just the right ones."
Thorne stepped beside him like a walking cliff, jaw clenched. "And which ones are the right ones?"
"The ones foolish enough to cross the fracture line."
Kael reached into his coat and drew the shard—a relic from the Archive, its surface pulsing with layered runes. The others didn't recognize it. But Zarith did.
"Is that a mnemonic echo shard?"
Kael didn't answer. He pressed the shard into Zarith's palm.
"Channel it," he said. "Make it believe."
Zarith hesitated only for a heartbeat.
Then the ground sang.
A soundless shockwave erupted from the canyon's mouth—no light, no color, only the distortion of presence. The ruin responded not like a structure, but like a sleeping god suddenly stirred.
All across the mesa, mirrors burst from the ground. Reflective shards. Tall, jagged, shaped like people—illusions of Kael's team stepping, crouching, running, fighting.
"Mirror logic reflections," Kael said. "The ruin's memory replayed in all possible futures… simultaneously."
The enemy saw dozens of Kaels, of Tessias lunging, Dren laughing mid-spin, Thorne slamming illusions with crushing fists.
The Crimson Vultures faltered. Runeblade scouts paused mid-formation. Even the Veinhold skiffs momentarily halted—unsure which reflections were real.
Tessia moved first. She darted into a mirrored cluster and vanished—only to reappear behind two Vultures and slash their ankles open in one breathless motion.
Sera charged a scout unit, parrying one blade before disarming the second with a feint and planting her knee in the man's ribs.
Dren twirled his rune-blade, laughed, and threw it like a spear. It carved through a mirrored Kael—then struck a Runeblade's wrist, cutting through armor and flesh.
Above them, a Veinhold cannon lit up with fire—
Kael turned. "Tessia—arc strike, now!"
Tessia threw a dagger into a crystal reflection at Kael's signal—shattering it. The light scattered, bending the cannon's targeting glyph.
The shot missed. The cannon exploded instead.
"Nice," Dren shouted. "I like your kind of cheating."
But they were being pushed.
For every enemy disoriented, two more closed in.
One Runeblade scout—face hidden behind ritual glyphs—locked onto Sera, rune-sword burning with golden flame. "Sera Malthis. Stand down."
"I'm tired of people saying that," she snarled—and parried him so hard their weapons sparked blue.
Thorne barreled into the Vultures' flank like a siege golem, breaking bones and flipping a rider clean off their strider. Blood soaked into the red sand.
Zarith was behind it all—arms raised, chanting, eyes white with ruin energy.
"Zarith," Kael barked. "Now. Seal it!"
The ground beneath them cracked.
A glyph the size of a plaza erupted into the canyon floor. From below, the mouth of Delta-9 revealed itself—no longer hidden by illusion or time, but burning with invitation.
Kael leapt.
One motion. No hesitation.
Sera followed, teeth gritted. "If we survive this, I'm going to yell at you."
Dren smirked. "If we survive, I'll buy you a drink instead."
Tessia didn't speak. She dropped cleanly over the edge.
Zarith let the spell go and fell backward, the glyph swallowing him in silence.
Thorne brought up the rear—catching a fire bolt from a Veinhold scout with his bare arm before vanishing over the canyon.
And Kael—rune-glow pulsing in his eyes, lips barely parted—watched the chaos for one last second.
"Move your pieces," he murmured. "I'm already twelve turns ahead."
Then he vanished into Delta-9.
The mesa was silent once more—save for the confused screams and clashing blades echoing into dust.
As Kael and his team disappeared into the spiraling depths of Delta-9, the surface stilled—but only for a breath.
Then the ruin shuddered.
The mesa split with a bone-deep groan, like the land itself protesting what had just been awakened. Runes once buried flared to life in fractured spirals, sending pulses of ancient code across the ravaged landscape.
On the cliffs above, the gathered forces of Veinhold, Runeblade Academy, and the Crimson Vultures stood frozen—not in awe, but in a rare, shared understanding.
They had been too slow.
A sky-skiff captain muttered, "That wasn't a collapse… That was a gateway."
From the edge of a ruined outcrop, Commander Vaerin Veyron narrowed his eyes as the last ember of light from Kael's descent vanished beneath the stone.
He clenched his fist, the veins on his arm glowing faintly with inherited rune-blood.
"Send word to Veinhold," he ordered. "Tell them the ghost of Veyron walks again."
A rumble echoed from below.
It wasn't seismic.
It was... breathing.
The ruin was alive—and it had chosen.
Elsewhere…
In the highest towers, in deepest crypts, across maps and war rooms and spirit wells, the world of Exarune responded.
Scrolls lit up. Seers collapsed. Oracles wept blood.
And in the desert sands, where the glyphs of the first era had long been forgotten, one word echoed through ley-lines and whispers alike:
"Candidate."
Delta-9: Subterranean Layer – Lower Threshold
Far below, Kael opened his eyes to an impossible chamber—black stone and memory woven together. His team staggered behind him, breathless, wounded, but alive.
Tessia growled softly. "We lost them."
"No," Kael said quietly. His voice echoed unnaturally.
"They lost the moment they chased us."
Before them, a massive arch stood—half-metal, half-rune, with no visible door… yet the center rippled like liquid glass.
Dren stared. "Is that… a portal?"
"No," Zarith whispered, almost reverent. "That's a trial. A test. Like before… but older."
Kael stepped forward. As he did, the gateway shimmered and responded—not to blood, not to strength, but to will.
The ruin remembered him.
He placed his hand on the surface.
A pulse spread outward—calm, cold, certain.
Then:
[ Candidate Verified. Mind-Class Override: Tier II Clearance Granted. ]
Behind him, the team raised their weapons as the sound of stone shifting echoed behind them. Shapes were descending. Factions were mobilizing.
And in the air, something unseen whispered:
You passed the first game, Kael Veyron.
Now play for something greater.
Kael turned his head slightly.
"We go deeper," he said.
And with that, they stepped through.
Into Delta-9.
Into the unknown.
[ END OF CHAPTER 10 ]