NOVEL NEXT Chapter 121: Another Sanctum...
He placed his palm on the stone, closed his eyes—and for a split moment, time twisted. The air turned sharp. And he saw something:
A tower that cracked the sky.
A world that spun around its gravity.
And a voice—not a word, not a sound—but a presence.
> Come. Bearer of fire. Challenger of fates. Claim what you dare.
Ethan pulled his hand back, fingers shaking slightly.
Then he straightened and turned.
---
The Next March Begins
By the following dawn, the army had been split into two groups: a core detachment that would move with Ethan toward Vorsha, and another group that would remain behind to fortify Groshla and guard the Rune Stone.
Ethan, Kaeryx, Leon, David, Zaul'tra, and twenty of their best moved out first. The path to Vorsha would be slow—not just because of the terrain, but because the Labyrinth was watching.
Already, Ethan could feel its pressure increasing.
And this time, he knew brute strength wouldn't win.
He would have to understand the guardian.
Not destroy it.
Not subdue it.
But resolve it.
As they departed, Kaeryx let out a low, guttural growl—and the sky above them shimmered with runic symbols, as if the Labyrinth itself was opening its next page.
And Ethan, for all his confidence, whispered to himself:
"This one's going to be different…"
The march toward the floating sanctum of Vorsha began in silence. Not for lack of words, but because every step forward seemed to sink them deeper into a world that watched. Even the earth felt alive, humming with faint vibrations like a pulse—ancient and slow, yet aware of their intrusion.
Ethan led the group at a measured pace.
Kaeryx soared above them in a wide arc, wings tucked and body dark against the sky, his mere presence scattering lesser beasts from their path. The dragon's shadow was the only thing louder than the soft crunch of boots and claws against the gravel-and-glass terrain.
Beside Ethan walked David, who occasionally checked the rune compass strapped to his wrist.
"We're heading straight into a convergence zone," he muttered. "Mana flow's erratic. This area's not stable."
Ethan nodded. "Exactly why Vorsha's floating. Gravity around here's warped."
Leon, coming up from the rear with two scouts and a beastkin tracker, pointed to the distance. "See that shimmer? That's not mist. That's space distortion. We step wrong, we might fall into a mana sink."
Zaul'tra, walking with a careful grace despite the weight of his bone-spear, looked pensive. "I've seen something similar once, long ago. A sanctum crushed into itself by gravity storms. A dead one. Abandoned."
"Let's make sure Vorsha doesn't end up like that," Ethan replied. "Or us."
---
Dangers Between
By midday, the landscape had shifted again.
Gone were the thorned trees and humming underbrush—replaced by jagged slate plains and sharp rock spires rising from the earth like the teeth of a long-dead titan. Here, Ethan's mana sense became unreliable. Distortions flickered like illusions, and Kaeryx's calls from above grew more frequent—warning of invisible drop-offs and false paths.
They stopped once to eat in silence, Kaeryx standing like a silent monolith behind them, his aura suppressing even the Labyrinth's ambient pressure.
That night, as they camped beneath a half-crushed arch made of unknown metal, strange lights passed above them. Orbs of flickering red and violet flame—silent, gliding overhead like watchers. The scouts stirred but didn't panic.
"They don't see us," whispered Leon. "Or they don't care."
"Let's hope it stays that way," Ethan murmured.
---
The Labyrinth Responds
Two days in, the party stumbled upon remnants of a failed expedition. Scattered bones. Burned tents. Blackened runes that pulsed faintly with rejected mana.
"Drake-kin," Zaul'tra confirmed, kneeling beside a charred claw. "They never made it to Vorsha."
Ethan inspected the surroundings. "Something drained them. From the inside out."
They moved on with greater caution. From that point on, even the beasts of the wild gave the group wide berth. There was something in the air. A pull. A focus. As though their presence was not just noticed... but anticipated.
---
The Eye of Vorsha
On the fifth day, just before dusk, they reached the last ridge.
The wind here was heavy, spiraling around a canyon of black stone that cracked and shimmered like glass under strain. And there, at its center—floating above a bottomless void—was the Vorsha Sanctum.
A tower of pale white rock and violet-tinged crystal, spinning slowly in place. Runes spiraled down its sides like a waterfall of light. Pillars floated around it, suspended mid-air, connected by narrow stone bridges that warped under the pull of gravity.
Everyone went still.
David was the first to speak. "Looks like a temple built for gods…"
"It is," Ethan said softly, his voice barely audible over the howling wind. "Or at least for something that thinks it is."
Kaeryx descended silently behind them, his claws folding into the stone as he crouched low, tail coiling.
"What's the plan?" Zaul'tra asked, clutching his spear tighter.
Ethan turned to them all.
"We do what we came here to do. I'll go in, as planned. Try to reach the rune stone and claim it. The rest of you provide support. Guard the outer rings. If anything goes wrong—do not enter the sanctum unless I call for you."
"And the guardian?" David asked.
"If it shows," Ethan said calmly, "I'll handle it."
---
They set up camp at the canyon's edge for the night, out of sight. Wards were placed. Kaeryx took watch from above. The group slept uneasily, staring at the floating monolith through narrow gaps in rock, none of them able to ignore the sensation crawling along their skin.
The Sanctum was not asleep.
It was awake.
Watching.
And waiting.
Ethan, lying back against a cold stone wall with his sword at his side and Kaeryx's shadow curling around him, stared up at the starlit ceiling of the Labyrinth.
Tomorrow, everything would change again.
And this time, he felt it in his blood.
Vorsha would not go quietly.
At dawn, the light in the Labyrinth shifted.
Not sunlight—there was no true sky here. But the subtle change in the glow from the runes veining the distant walls, and the fading of the violet haze that loomed over the canyon, signaled something new. Like the Sanctum itself was aware of the day's beginning… and waiting.
Ethan stood at the cliff's edge.
The Vorsha Sanctum hovered above the abyss like a dream layered in crystal and stone. Its bridges shimmered with unstable gravity fields, swirling ever so slightly as if rippling in a pool of mana.
Behind him, his group stood in silence.
David adjusted the straps on his chest plate and stepped forward. "We've never seen anything like this," he said. "Even the Dragonkin Sanctum was grounded. This… feels ancient."
"It is," Zaul'tra added. "This one wasn't built. It was raised. You can feel it. Old power."
Ethan didn't respond right away. He stared at the floating citadel, his mana sense stretching outward. The entire structure pulsed like a living organ—heavy, slow, deliberate. There was intelligence there. Not thought. But memory. Echoes of something that refused to fade.
"This one won't fall easily," Ethan murmured. "It's not going to give me the Rune Stone without a fight."
He turned.
Kaeryx landed beside him, crouched and silent as a monolith. The dragon's golden eyes reflected the spiraling bridges ahead.
"Ready?" David asked.
Ethan nodded once. "Don't follow unless I call. Watch the perimeter. Anything that moves, track it—but do not engage."
They all nodded.
With a flick of his wrist, Ethan summoned a temporary bridge of hardened mana—lightly layered so it wouldn't trigger the Sanctum's more sensitive defenses.
Then, he stepped onto it.
---
Inside the Floating Sanctum
Crossing to Vorsha was like stepping through water made of static.
Each footfall wavered with the pull of the gravity field, and the air thickened the closer he got. The silence deepened. Even his heartbeat felt distant. The only sound was the faint hum of runes winding down the pillars—like whispered prayers etched in time.
When he reached the central platform, Ethan paused.
Above him stood the core tower of the Sanctum, pale and flawless. A staircase spiraled up its outer ring, leading to a single entrance, arched and glowing with restrained mana. Carvings along the stairway's walls depicted winged figures cloaked in flame and chain, their arms raised in supplication or judgment—it was hard to tell which.
As he stepped forward—
The ground trembled.
The Sanctum responded.
From the tower's peak, a beam of light struck the platform in front of him—and from it, descended something else.
A humanoid figure wrapped in tendrils of floating crystal.
No feet touched the ground. Its lower half drifted like mist. Its face was carved from a perfect gemstone mask—faceless, but somehow watching. Two wings formed from refracted light extended from its back, shifting slowly, like they were slicing through time itself.
<Unauthorized presence detected.>
<Sanctum Guardian Protocols Initiated.>A voice echoed not in the air—but in Ethan's bones.
'Damnation'