2024-08-08 22:59:44
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Chapter 396
Caster stepped into the lower lab with Kael Dorn already at work, the room lit by suspended warded lamps that hummed faintly. The ash residue from the recent Ashfall incidents was spread across multiple stone tables, collected in fine sheets, vials, and pressed into shallow basins. Every particle seemed to hold a memory. Caster knelt beside one of the larger trays, fingers hovering above the floating motes, feeling the faint pull of resonance even before touching them.Kael didn’t look up. “We’ve got ash from three separate incidents: the Sixth Ring archive collapse, the old Starlight Observatory, and the new containment wing. They’re all behaving the same.” His hands moved in precise, almost ritualistic gestures, tracing sigils in the air to isolate residual contamination. “If this were just dust, we’d have seen decay patterns by now. But it’s alive, in a sense.”Caster flexed his own fingers, fingertips brushing the ash lightly. The particles shifted instantly, flowing along invi
Chapter 395
Caster moved through the narrow corridors beneath the Sixth Ring, the echo of his boots mingling with the soft hum of containment wards. The stone walls were etched with old sigils, some faintly glowing, others half-erased by decades of cleaning and neglect. He could feel the subtle difference between wards meant to protect and wards meant to observe. Every step reminded him that the Tower watched, even when no one was present.At the end of the hall, a heavy, reinforced door swung open before he reached it. A thin wisp of ash rose from the threshold, carried by currents he could not see. Behind the doorway lay a laboratory unlike any in the Tower. The air was sharp, almost metallic, and the walls were lined with runic filters, purifiers, and warded storage chests. Vials of dark, viscous fluid sat on tables in neat rows, each etched with tiny warnings. At the center stood a man.Kael Dorn did not look up immediately. He adjusted the collar of his black coat and traced a sigil over
Chapter 394
The corridors above the Upper Conclave were narrower than the public floors, carved into the older bones of the Tower. The walls were lined with plates of polished obsidian that swallowed light, reflecting only faint glimmers from floating mana lanterns. Caster moved silently, each step measured. The air smelled faintly of ozone and dust, a reminder of wards that had held decades of containment. A single aide, gloved and expressionless, flanked him and said nothing. At the topmost landing, a set of triple doors swung open before him, revealing a circular chamber no larger than a lecture hall, but lined with layered observation balconies. High above, a web of suspended runes pulsed faintly, invisible to all but those trained to read them. A single figure waited at the center: the High Chancellor of the Tower, robes black trimmed with silver that shimmered like a static field. He gestured for Caster to step forward.“Magus Relan,” the Chancellor said, voice soft but unyielding. “We
Chapter 393
The lower chamber smelled of cold stone and old ash. Even the air felt heavier here, weighted with centuries of unspoken intent. Caster Spellbound, now Magus Relan to most of the Tower, moved silently, boots scraping the polished stone floor only enough to echo faintly. Every step was measured. Every glance swept the room for subtle signs of disturbance.He had been here before, in a dream-like reconnaissance, tracing the ashfall signatures and hidden wards, but this time was different. The air carried a tension beyond the ordinary: the remnants of something alive, aware, and tethered. His Sixth Ring initiation granted him access to the lower vaults, but even the Council’s formal permissions felt like a pretense. The true danger wasn’t in the authorization; it was in what the Tower had buried, and what had waited.Caster paused at the center of the chamber. The portal frame below, Blackthorn-era, warped, and etched with half-finished runes, loomed like a skeleton of ambition. The
Chapter 392
The stone did not crack when Caster pressed his palm against it. It softened. Not like clay. Not like flesh. It gave way the way a memory does when touched too hard.Caster pulled his hand back at once. Dust drifted where his fingers had been. The dust did not fall. It hung, suspended, as if waiting for a cue.He stood alone in the narrow service corridor beneath the Tower’s lower stacks. The air smelled old. Not rot. Not mold. Burned stone. Burned time.A thin line of light ran along the floor, marking where he had traced the false wall hours earlier. Administrative wards. Layered. Careful. Designed to redirect attention, not stop intrusion.Someone expected curiosity. They just did not want it rewarded. Caster stepped forward and pressed his sigil ring to the stone again, slower this time. The ring dimmed. The wall sighed.A seam appeared. Stone folded inward without sound, peeling back into a recessed archway. No hinges. No debris. Just absence where matter decided not to argue.Be
Chapter 391
The first bell of the third watch fades while the Tower still sleeps. Caster stands alone in his assigned chamber, boots planted on cold stone. The lamps are unlit. Ash drifts in slow lines near the ceiling, settling into corners, then lifting again, as if caught in a tide no one else can feel.He closes the door. He seals it with a simple latch, not magic. The wards would notice magic. He breathes once. Then again.His right hand moves to the scar at his wrist. He presses two fingers there, hard enough to blanch the skin. The pain grounds him. He lowers his hand and draws a single glyph in the air with his thumb. It does not glow. It sinks inward, like ink soaking into cloth.The room does not change at first. Then the world splits. The stone walls gain depth, as if layered sheets have slid apart. The air thickens. Sound dulls. The faint hum of the Tower stretches, slows, and breaks into uneven pulses.Caster exhales through his nose and does not blink. Necro-spectral vision settl
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