The air was thick with rot and whispering screams.
The Wither Spawn came in waves—fleshless limbs scraping against stone, mouths stretched in soundless howls. The tunnels pulsed with movement. Hundreds. Thousands. Too many.
Riven ran, fought, stumbled. Blood sprayed like ink in water.
The Firstborn were already breaking.
"Hold the line!" someone shouted—but it was lost to the silence. Voices meant nothing here. No cries for help. No commands. Only the clash of blades, and the thud of bodies hitting stone.
A boy no older than Riven raised his glaive, brought it down in a clean arc—only to be torn apart before his weapon could rise again. His mask shattered. His scream died in his throat.
The figures at the front didn't speak. They didn't need to.
One stepped forward, moving like death wearing skin.
A blur of cloth and silence, she raised her hands—and the shadows answered.
Her mask had no features. No slits. No expression. But the power etched into its surface pulsed with whispered menace.
She was of the Phantom-class.
She danced through the Spawn like smoke through a battlefield, veil trailing, fingers etching sigils in the air. Every motion was precise. Deadly. A blink—and a Spawn crumpled into ash. A twist—and another burst outward in a soundless scream, its essence shredded by unseen force.
To her left, another Phantom moved like something fractured. Each step dragged shadows behind him, his jagged mask flickering with unstable light. A shriek of metal with every swing. His blade sliced not just flesh—but memory. Spawn paused mid-lunge, forgetting they'd even been attacking.
His mask didn't just cloak him in shadow.
It warped the world around him.
Then came the third.
A mountain of a man, unmoving, unshaken. His mask burned like a frozen sun—hollow flame trapped in crystal, pulsing with grim purpose.
He was of the Warden-class.
He raised his arms. The ground answered. A wall of molten light surged forth—cold, heavy, unrelenting. Not fire. Something worse. A silence that consumed. When the Spawn touched it, they didn't burn. They ceased. Unmade from the marrow outward.
And still—it wasn't enough.
Riven parried a blow, then another. A Spawn lunged at him—skeletal, tall, wrong—and he drove his blade deep into its chest.
It didn't die.
Didn't flinch.
Its head twisted, mouth blooming across its chest. A silent hiss. Then it slammed him into stone. His vision blurred. A cage. Water. His reflection.
That voice again.
"Still a slave."
Then—
A figure stepped in. A hand shot forward. Space bent.
The Spawn froze mid-motion—every limb locked, every scream swallowed—before crushing in on itself like a dying star. A single orb of compressed rot hit the ground.
It rolled.
Turned to dust.
She helped Riven up, her grip ice. Her mask—expressionless. Her eyes—silver and cold .
Then she turned away.
And the swarm split the group.
The ground beneath them groaned. Stone cracked. Tunnels howled.
Riven caught a last glimpse of the other Phantom surrounded by shadows of his own making, blade carving a void through flesh. The Warden still held the rear, his barrier barely holding.
Then—collapse.
Stone. Dust. Screams.
The tide crashed through them, a wall of limbs and hunger.
Riven and the female Phantom were cut off.
She grabbed him. No words. Just action. They ducked into a narrow side path, slick with wet stone and something breathing beneath it.
Behind them, the swarm filled the dark.
He turned—and saw a Firstborn fall. Limbs torn. Mask shattered.
Another tried to run. Vanished beneath the tide.
He didn't know their names.
Didn't need to.
The Phantom stopped. Raised a hand.
A wall of black glass erupted behind them—veins of pulsing ink and silence.
The tunnel sealed.
Riven collapsed to his knees, gasping. His body was screaming. His soul worse.
The Phantom turned. Her mask was blood-slicked—but the blood wasn't hers.
In silence, she reached out
Then, she signed.
It's time to go.
The swarm slammed against the barrier.
Riven stood.
Together—they ran deeper into the dark.