Chapter 19: Ep 19 - In Chains , She Wait
The crystal pulsed with a heartbeat that wasn't hers.
Kurumi slammed her hand against the barrier again, raw glyphlight crackling down her arm, but the seal only shimmered in defiance. Her fingers trembled as she pulled them back—burned again. The barrier didn't reject her.
It absorbed her.
She stepped back, gasping. Her breath curled like frost in the stagnant chamber. The air here was too still, too heavy—like it had been mourning for centuries.
Behind her, the great crystal hovered above the abyss of the Spire's Heart. Vines of glyph-veins crawled across its surface—ancient, silver, and corrupted. Inside, barely visible, was the outline of a woman curled in stasis. Crown intact. Eyes closed. Floating in chains made of memory.
Queen Fresha.
Kurumi turned from the crystal. She couldn't take the sight of it. Of her.
She reached for her glyphband again, drawing on her markings—bright pink lines that curled along her collarbone, down her spine, symbols of her rank as a High Glyph Holder. But no matter how much power she summoned, it fizzled when she neared the edge of the platform.
She tried screaming once. Her voice was devoured by the silence.
Then the whisper came.
Like wind through bone.