Burn moved swiftly through the underground corridor, his metal heeled boots eg faintly against the stone floor.

  The passage was surprisingly well-maintained for something carved into the heart of a cliff. No loose rubble ging beams—someone had put care into keeping this ptact, which, given the circumstances, was more uling than reassuring.

  It wasn’t the kind of pce that whispered "fotten refuge." No, this was a hidden artery of purpose, pulsing just beh the surface of the Inkian capital’s northern cliffs.

  The air grew heavier with each step he took, thick with the faint, rancid tang of corrupted mana. Burn’s golden eyes narrowed as he followed the faint traces of energy, a trail left behind by the kidnapped First Prince of Inkia and the Elven Princess.

  He desded deeper and deeper, the corridor sloping subtly downward. With every twist and turn, the walls seemed to close in, the shadows stretg unnaturally long.

  Eventually, the narrow hallened into a cavernous chamber. Burn paused just long enough to take it in, though his expression didn’t so much as flicker. His sharp gaze swept over the sight before him, cataloging every grotesque detail.

  Humans shuffled about like the walking dead, their bodies filthy and gaunt, clothed in rags barely worthy of the hey moved meically, scooping viscous dark liquid fre, ominous vats into small, gss-like tainers. The liquid was foul, shimmering with a malevolent light that seemed to pulse with an almost se hunger.

  The sves didn’t speak, didn’t look up. Their eyes were dull, their faces sck—shadows of humanity hollowed out by prolonged exposure to corrupted mana. It wasn’t just their bodies that had decayed but their minds as well, eroded bit by bit until all that remained was blind obedience.

  Burn’s lips pressed into a thin line as he observed the process. The small tainers, once filled, were carried—by hand, o an intricate vessel in the ter of the chamber. A hulking mae bristling with runes aal pipes, it hummed with unnatural energy.

  The moment a tainer ced into the vessel, the runes activated, casting eerie light across the chamber. The liquid inside torted and twisted unnaturally, shrieking as though alive.

  Then, with a fsh, it transformed into a multicolored jewel—a beautiful, polished trihat would lht at home on a noble’s mantlepiece or around the neck of some unsuspeg socialite.

  Burn exhaled sharply, his breath ing out like a hiss. The se was grotesque, a was almost mogly elegant in its execution. A factory from the abyss, ing out corruption disguised as beauty.

  The sves opped. There was ation, no questioning of what they were doing. Their hands moved meically, their eyes unseeing.

  If Burn hadn’t knower, he might have mistaken them folems—mindless structs built for menial bor. But no, these were people—people broken so thhly that they’d been reduced to cogs in a mae.

  Burn took a step forward, the sound of his boots cutting sharply through the oppressive hum of the chamber. None of the workers looked his way; they were tooo noti intruder.

  The dragon horn sword in his grip twitched faintly, responding to his mood, as though eager to rend the entire operation apart. Burn tightened his hold, his jaw g as he forced the on’s instincts baot yet.

  His gaze swept over the chamber o time, his eyes lingering on the glimmering jewels being stacked ly in crates. Such a fine product from such foul ins. It was almost poeti its repulsiveness.

  Burn moved, his boots treading lightly over the cold stone floor, carefully avoiding the scattered puddles of bck liquid that shimmered faintly in the dim light.

  The oppressive hum of the chamber buzzed faintly behind him as he pressed forward, his golden eyes fixed on the faint trail of mana he had been following. The traces were faint but clear, unmistakably leading deeper into the heart of this subterranean byrinth.

  He came to a stop as the trail ended abruptly in ay chamber. The stillness in the air was a trast to the noise and chaos of the factory behind him. Burn’s sharp gaze swept the room, his dragon horn sword held loosely at his side, its faint glow casting long, jagged shadows on the walls.

  Nothing. Not a sirace of the First Prince or the Elven Princess. Just stone walls, eerie silence, and the heavy, oppressive weight of corrupted mana lingering in the air like an uninvited guest overstaying its wele.

  Burn exhaled sharply, frustration flickering in his golden eyes. But then something caught his attention—a glint of light. He turned his head and saw it: a gss window built into the far wall, a view into the adjat chamber.

  He stepped closer, his boots clig softly against the stone. When he reached the window, his eyes widened slightly.

  Oher side, a ptform inscribed with glowing runes and intricate magic circles took ter stage. The air around it shimmered faintly with dark energy, the runes pulsing rhythmically like a beati.

  A line of sves, the same gaunt, hollow-eyed figures he had seen earlier, shuffled forward, one by oheir movements were sluggish, as if each step required a moal effort. As each of them stepped onto the ptform, the magic circles fred to life, enveloping them in a dark, simmering light.

  Burn’s jaw tightened as he watched the process unfold. The corrupted mana that had seeped into their bodies was drawn out, siphoned away by the magic circle in a grotesque dispy of purification.

  The dark energy swirled and coalesced before vanishiirely, leaving the sves physically unharmed—or at least as unharmed as anyone could be after hours of exposure to such toxic filth.

  Then, one by ohe sves stepped off the ptform and trudged back the way they came, presumably to tiheir work. The cycle was as clear as it was cruel: work, absorb corruption, purge it, repeat.

  Burn’s sharp gaze narrowed, his mind rag as he pieced together the implications. So that was how these sves mao avoid succumbing to the poison ht.

  Unlike his father, who had been gravely ill from prolonged exposure to corrupted mana, these workers were kept just healthy enough to fun. A twisted sort of maintenance—a grotesque workaround that kept their bodies intact, while their minds…

  Burn’s thoughts trailed off as a bitter memory surfaced, unbidden. The runaway sve he had entered once. A man who had escaped a pce like this, his body intact but his mind shattered, broken beyond repair.

  The sve had spoken in fragmented words, barely coherent, his eyes vat and lifeless. The horror in that man’s gaze was something Burn hadn’t fotten.

  “Save my someone, he said.”

  Someone of his was still… here, somewhere.

  He exhaled sharply, a sardonic edge creeping into his thoughts. Of course. Why waste good workers when you turn them into reusable tools? Keep them standing, keep them w. Never mind the cost of their humanity—that’s just an unfortunate side effect.

  Burn’s grip on his sword tightehe faint glow of the dragon horn bde brightening in respoo his simmering anger. He took o look at the ptform, watg as another sve stepped forward to have their body sed of corruption, their mind slipping further into the void with every cycle.

  “Efficy,” Burn muttered, his voice low and sharp. “They’ve turned suffering into a process. How... admirable.”

  As Burn strode purposefully back toward the corridor, the faint echoes of his boots on stone were interrupted by a sudden flicker of light against his chest. His sharp eyes darted downward as the locket he wlowed faintly, theo life with a pulsing, urgent light.

  Burn froze, his free hand shot to the locket. He grasped it tightly, his sharp features darkening as a jarring wave of mana coursed through his body.

  It was a sensation unlike anything he had felt before. A fluctuatioid votile, rippling through his Vision for the first time.

  “Man…!”

  Time was running out.