Chapter Eighteen
The silence inside the chamber felt wrong.
Not peaceful. Not calm. It was the kind of silence that pressed against the ears and made every instinct sharpen. The kind that came before a storm broke across the sky.
Lyra sat on the stone floor beside the artifact, staring into its swirling heart of molten gold and shadow. The light shifted constantly, reflecting across the fractured walls and the broken pillars around us.
The battle with Selunara had left the chamber scarred.
Cracks ran through the stone floor. Entire sections of the walls had collapsed. Burn marks from divine energy still glowed faintly along the surfaces.
Yet the artifact remained standing in the center of it all, pulsing with a steady rhythm like a living heart.
I leaned against a damaged pillar and
