Reincarnated as an Elf Prince-Chapter 226: Chambers (1)

He thought about it.

Then. "Now I just carry it."

Luneth nodded. "So do I."

That answer made more sense than anything else she’d ever said.

They both knew the difference between a lesson and a scar.

Lindarion looked at her again.

Her hood was down. Hair pulled back. Silver-blonde strands catching the wind slightly. Her cheeks were pale, but not washed-out. Her eyes were too focused for that. Too steady.

He remembered the night she didn’t sleep. The breath that hitched behind her teeth. The way she looked at the rune like it had already spoken to her in a voice she couldn’t unhear.

"You’re not okay," he said quietly.

"No," she replied. "I’m not."

"But you’re coming anyway."

"I always was."

There was a beat of silence.

Then she looked at him again, something different in her eyes now.

Not softness.

Just something she wasn’t hiding.

"And when you come out of there," she said, "if you’re still you—then we talk."

He tilted his head. "About what?"

She gave the smallest smile.

But it was there.

"About what happens after surviving."

He didn’t smile back.

But something in his chest did shift.

A little.

He nodded once.

Then pushed off the stone.

"Then I guess I’ll try not to die."

Luneth turned with him.

"Good."

They didn’t walk back together.

But they moved at the same pace.

And when the others turned to gather behind him, no one questioned why Luneth was already at his side.

Not even Erebus.

Because now they all understood what kind of people entered a sealed ruin with nothing but history and fire in their bones.

—

The mountain swallowed sound after the first thirty steps.

No echoes. No wind. No signs of movement except their own.

Lindarion moved first, flanked by Lira and Luneth. Erebus walked several paces ahead, silent as a shadow. Sylric trailed to the left, muttering observations to himself.

Stitch kept behind with the equipment case strapped to his shoulder, one hand always near the largest vial on his belt.

The chamber was further than he remembered.

Or maybe it was just heavier this time.

The pressure hadn’t lessened. If anything, it had become more deliberate. Every footstep hummed back with a strange cadence, like they were being counted.

Lindarion tightened his coat at the collar. He didn’t feel cold, but something in his mana core was reacting, slow pulses against his chest, warning with rhythm instead of words.

The carved tunnel twisted once, then opened.

The rune chamber waited at the end.

Same as before.

Still perfect.

Still sealed.

Still not silent.

This time, they all heard it.

Not a sound. Not exactly.

More like... resistance. Like air that didn’t want them in it.

Stitch whispered, "It’s active."

"No glow," Lira said.

"Doesn’t need it," Sylric muttered. "Feel that?"

"Mana rejection," Lindarion said. "It’s filtering us."

Luneth stepped in behind him, slow and sure.

Her posture shifted halfway in.

Like gravity had just turned upside down.

She didn’t speak.

But he could feel it too.

This place wasn’t built to welcome anyone.

It was built to separate.

—

They reached the seam.

Still at the center.

Still curved.

Still exact.

Lindarion stepped forward alone.

The others waited behind.

He knelt, pressed his hand to the stone.

This time, it was warm.

And this time, it pulsed back.

Not violently.

Not suddenly.

But deliberately.

A heartbeat.

His core answered.

Not with a surge.

With a lock-click sensation in his spine. Like two frequencies aligning.

He exhaled once.

His vision blurred, not from pain, but from something pulling. A pressure around his affinity strands. Fire. Void. Darkness. Divine. All of it. Coiling. Listening.

He said nothing.

Didn’t move.

Waited.

Then the rune began to breathe.

—

It didn’t glow.

It shifted.

The carved lines didn’t change, they deepened. Like the stone had only been pretending to be dormant, and now it was rolling back a layer of itself.

The seam cracked inward.

Softly.

A hiss of escaping pressure followed. Not steam. Not air.

Sound.

Not spoken.

Just a vibration so low it made his bones ache.

He stood.

Staggered once.

Luneth caught his arm, steady.

He nodded to her.

She let go.

The seam uncurled like petals.

A stairwell descended.

Black. Spiral. Silent.

"Stay sharp," Sylric muttered, pulling his coat tight. "This is where most stories get real quiet before they die."

Lindarion stepped down first.

Erebus followed without a word.

Then the rest.

The steps weren’t stone anymore.

They were something else.

Dark.

Metallic.

Cold.

The walls pulsed gently.

Not light.

Just recognition.

The further they went, the less they felt like themselves.

—

At the bottom was another chamber.

Circular.

Unlit.

Empty.

Except the floor.

Which had no seams.

Only a symbol.

The rune.

Not carved.

Burned in.

Void affinity bled into every edge of it.

Lindarion stepped forward. The moment his boot touched the line, the chamber reacted.

Mana flared.

Not from him.

From the walls.

From the air.

Pressure slammed into his chest like weight and wind combined.

Everyone staggered.

Except Erebus.

He didn’t flinch.

Stitch shouted, "Back out?"

"No," Lindarion said. "Stay."

His core flared.

The chamber responded.

The rune breathed.

And then the walls split open.

Vertical seams tore through the chamber, revealing passages, twelve of them. Thin lines of light barely outlining their shapes.

Each one different.

Each one waiting.

Lira stepped to his side. "Which one’s ours?"

He didn’t know.

But his body did.

The third from the left burned beneath his ribs like a name.

He turned.

Stepped toward it.

Didn’t ask the others to follow.

They did anyway.

—

The third passage called to him.

Not with sound. Not with light.

With weight.

Like gravity had been rewired behind that arch, and only he could feel the pull.

Lindarion stepped toward it.

The others followed, no questions, no shuffle of gear, no last-minute objections. Only the quiet sound of footsteps on black stone.

The archway wasn’t grand.

It was narrow. Slanted slightly to the left. Angled like it had grown crooked from time instead of design.

But every line of it felt exact.

Carved not for travelers.

Carved for a sequence.

They crossed through.

No flare of magic.

No activation pulse.

The world just... shifted.

Behind them, the twelve-door chamber fell away.

Ahead, only silence.

And a hall.

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