Chapter 5

The darkness was absolute.

Elara's body slammed against the jagged edges of the stone steps. Every impact sent a sickening crack through her frame. Her left collarbone snapped. Her ribs groaned under the pressure.

As her blood smeared across the ancient stone, the runes carved into the stairs activated.

Eerie, sickly green flames erupted from the rock. The fire didn't burn her skin; it bypassed her flesh completely and seared directly into her soul. It felt like hot acid being poured over her brain.

Elara bit down on her lip so hard she tasted a fresh wave of copper. Her hands shook violently, but she forced her fingers to grip the glass vial in her boot. She yanked it out.

She didn't have the strength to pull the cork. She brought the vial to her mouth and bit down on the stopper, tearing it out with her teeth.

She tipped her head back and swallowed the bitter, sludgy liquid.

Vance's high-tier health potion hit her stomach like a warm fire. The magic rushed through her veins, aggressively knitting her broken bones back together and sealing her internal bleeding.

But the green flames of the stairs kept tearing her apart from the outside. She was trapped in a horrific cycle of healing and breaking.

Suddenly, the silver bracelet on her wrist flared. A brilliant, blinding silver light exploded from the metal, forming a thin, tight membrane around her head and chest, shielding her brain and heart from the soul-fire.

At the same time, the chaos core in her abdomen spun wildly. It acted like a black hole, greedily sucking in the residual energy of the green flames, converting the torture into raw power.

Time lost all meaning.

Finally, the steep incline leveled out. Elara dragged her battered body across the rough stone, leaving a thick trail of blood behind her.

She collapsed onto a flat, rocky outcropping.

Below her was The Abyss. A massive, bottomless canyon filled with churning, toxic black miasma. Freezing rain lashed against her face, stinging her open wounds. She gasped, her lungs burning as she sucked in the foul, heavy air. She was alive.

A shadow detached itself from the rock wall behind her.

Cletus McCoy, a low-ranking Tower guard known for his gambling debts, stepped into the dim light. He hadn't been stationed here. He was a scavenger, sneaking down to the edges of the abyss to strip the corpses of condemned mages for leftover magical artifacts.

When Cletus saw Elara's chest rising and falling, his jaw dropped.

Elara's eyes snapped to him. She tried to push herself up, trying to summon the chaos mana, but her muscles were completely locked. Her body had hit its absolute physical limit. She couldn't move a single finger.

Cletus's shock slowly melted into a cruel, greedy grin.

He walked over to her. Without a word, he lifted his heavy, steel-toed boot and brought it down hard on her freshly healed left leg.

A sharp crack echoed in the rain.

Elara let out a choked, guttural scream. Her vision swam with black spots. She glared up at him, her eyes filled with murderous rage.

"Look at the great prodigy now," Cletus sneered, spitting a wad of phlegm onto the rock next to her face. "Nothing but a dead dog."

He crouched down, his eyes locking onto the silver bracelet on her wrist.

"I'll be taking this," he grunted, grabbing her arm and yanking at the metal.

The second his dirty fingers touched the silver, the bracelet violently discharged. A loud crack of static electricity blasted Cletus's hand.

He shrieked, falling backward. The skin on his fingers was charred black and smoking.

Cletus scrambled to his feet, his face twisted in humiliated rage. He drew a short, jagged dagger from his belt.

"Stupid bitch!" he roared.

Instead of stabbing her, he pulled his leg back and kicked her squarely in the stomach.

The force of the blow sent Elara sliding across the wet stone. Half of her body slipped over the edge of the cliff. The violent wind from the abyss whipped her hair into her eyes.

"Let the beasts at the bottom eat you," Cletus laughed, and he stomped his boot directly onto her chest, shoving her off the ledge.

Elara fell.

The sickening sensation of weightlessness consumed her. Cletus's laughter faded as she plummeted into the thick, swirling black miasma.

The toxic gas rushed into her nose and mouth, but instead of choking her, the chaos core flared to life. It devoured the dark energy like a starving animal, pumping heat back into her freezing limbs.

Just as her consciousness began to slip away, two bright, mechanical beams of light cut through the fog below her.

A massive, patchwork mechanical glider made of scrap metal and glowing runes swooped upward.

Two young people in heavy leather coats were strapped to the frame.

"Got a big piece of trash today!" the pilot, a boy with goggles named Jasper, screamed over the wind.

The co-pilot, a girl named Kira, leaned over the edge and grabbed Elara by the collar of her uniform, hauling her onto the metal deck. Kira's hands immediately glowed with a soothing green light as she pressed them to Elara's bleeding chest.

The glider banked sharply, diving deeper into the unknown darkness of the abyss.