THIS BEAST-TAMER IS A LITTLE STRANGE

Zareth’s slight smile faded. His gaze flicked between Kain and Serena, noting the way they’d both gone rigid. “…What?”

Serena was the one who spoke, her voice colder than the relic’s deepest chambers.

“Idrias is dead.”

The words landed like a hammer blow.

Zareth’s face drained of colour. The others, particularly the remaining two pathfinders of their group, exclaimed in disbelief, their expressions shifting from weary hope to something far heavier.

“How?” Zareth’s voice was barely above a whisper.

Kain hesitated, then reached into his coat. He pulled out the ring—Idrias’ ring—and held it up. The metal gleamed dully in the firelight.

“He gave this to Malzahir before he died. Told him to find us.”

Zareth stared at the ring like it was a ghost. Then his hands slowly curled into fists. “Sonny and Elfie are gone. Idrias is gone.” His voice hardened. “Who else?”

Kain exhaled. “Twelve of us entered. Idrias, Sonny, and Elfie confirmed dead. You four, me, Serena make nine. That leaves three unaccounted for—one Pathfinder and 2 Starchasers.”

The bandaged Starchaser—Lina, Kain finally remembered her name was—swallowed hard. “Valentina, Ryn and Jax…”

Zareth’s expression darkened. “If they’re alive, we find them. If they’re not…” He trailed off, then shook his head. “We need to get out of this damn relic regardless and it should be our first priority.”

Kain nodded, tucking Idrias’ ring away, glad they were on the same page. He had nothing against the missing three, but the chances of them being alive were slim, and who knows the current situation of the empire—they’d been in here for what felt like months.

Although a small part of Kain still felt guilty—and looking at the faces around him, he knew the sentiment was shared.

Every moment they spent searching was a moment they risked another ambush, another death. But leaving their own behind—even if the chances were slim—felt like a betrayal.

Zareth exhaled sharply, rubbing his temples as if trying to stave off a headache from the whiplash of receiving good (the survival of Kain and Serena) and then bad news (the death of Idrias). “We can’t just wander aimlessly anymore. We need a plan.”

Serena, who had been silent since delivering the news about Idrias, finally spoke. “Do you have any leads on the location of the relic core?”

One of the other Pathfinders, a wiry man with a gash across his cheek reached into his tattered coat and pulled out a folded piece of parchment. Kain thought his name was James… or maybe Jamie? “We found this in one of the chambers. It’s incomplete, but…”

He unfolded it carefully, revealing a section of the relic’s layout. The ink was faded in places, the edges torn, but one location was clearly marked—a chamber deep within the relic’s heart, labelled in ancient script.

“You believe that this is where the core of this relic is located?” Kain asked.

The Pathfinder shrugged. “It’s the only thing that stands out. And if it’s not the core, it’s something important.”

Unfortunately, it was torn in such a way that none of the caverns and tunnels that actually appeared on the map resembled anything that Kain or the others had come across—therefore, they had no idea of where to even start.

‘Wait…’

Kain leaned forward, studying the map. “Do you think this is a match?” Kain turned to Serena. The others looked confused, having no idea what he was talking about, but Serena immediately understood.

While scavenging the different caverns they’d come across a torn piece of paper that had some nearby tunnels marked down. Since it showed their surroundings clearly, they decided to take it—the texture and lines on that paper looked like it could be one of the missing pieces of this same map.

Serena quickly retrieved the paper from her own space ring and held it against the map found by Zareth and the others.

“It looks like it could be a match…but there are still some parts missing—parts that connect the two parts of the map together.”

Malzahir stood up abruptly and also looked closer at the map.

Zareth and the others tensed up. After all, even though they could sense that Malzahir had no power, they weren’t familiar with him. What if he went crazy and threw their only map into the flames?

Kain quickly raised a hand and gestured for them to calm down. He’d gotten along with Malzahir long enough to know his character.

“Malzahir was trusted by Idrias to bring his items to us—I think that speaks volumes about his character.”

Although a little hesitant, the others slowly sat back down from where they had already been about to jump up, and Kain handed the two map fragments to Malzahir.

Malzahir took the pieces nervously, fidgeting under the intense gazes of people he could sense were even stronger than himself at his peak.

However, after a deep breath, he calmed down and focused on the map.

Then he gestured to Kain’s coat pocket, “Ring…please?”

Kain immediately handed Idrias’ space ring over in understanding, and Malzahir’s eyes became hazy and unfocused as his consciousness seemed to have penetrated into the ring.

Before long a piece of paper vaguely shaped like a crescent and containing several lines appeared in his hand—a piece of paper that was similar in colouration and texture to the map.

Honestly, Kain had briefly glanced at that fragment when he’d first gotten the ring, but never once did he connect it with being a missing piece of a map.

But Malzahir, alone with nothing but this ring for god knows how long, had spent more time examining every little item left behind by Idrias than probably Serena and Kain combined.

Everyone watched with bated breath as the oddly shaped fragment fit perfectly to fill in the missing sections of the map.

‘We had our map. We had our path. Now, we’d see how many more names would be added to the list of the dead before this was over.’

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