Dungeon King: The Hidden Ruler-Chapter 72: [The Heir of Thornspine 6] The Final Bloom

The corridor stretched ahead—and the whispers followed.

There had once been three voices in the Deathsong: a piercing high tone, a guttural hum, and the ceaseless whisper beneath. Each born of a resonance node. Two were gone now.

The soprano had fallen with the Wildfang Node. The bass had died with the Warden’s Bloom.

Only the whisper remained.

Not from behind. Not from the walls. From everywhere.

They were no longer ambiance. No longer echoes.

They were targeted.

Soft, beckoning phrases trailed at the edges of each mind:

"You shouldn’t have come."

"She sees you."

"The third heart is waiting."

The Deathsong had narrowed to this one final tone, stripped of its harmonies, baring the marrow beneath the choir.

The hall twisted subtly as they walked—too long, too narrow, yet somehow also tilting at a downward slant that hadn’t been there before.

The air thickened with each step, heavy with the scent of wet bark, fermented sap, and something sharp and metallic beneath it all—like blood left too long in the sun.

The light grew strange: phosphorescent moss throbbed faintly along the walls, and lines of pulsing vine-veins snaked underfoot like capillaries through marble.

The portraits on the wall had changed. Beneath them, the wallpaper writhed in slow, pulsing waves—as if something beneath the surface clawed toward light.

Where once noble faces might have peered down, now there were only blooming flowers and faceless vines painted in unnatural oils.

Some frames bled dark sap.

One canvas twitched, and for a moment, a thin root pushed through the painted eye—weeping clear sap that dripped with the slow cadence of a clock winding down.

But the team moved with precision.

Duskrunner padded ahead, muscles tense, his paws silent despite the warped wood beneath them. He sniffed the air often—but the scent wasn’t something that could be tracked.

Phantom Seer drifted near the wall, its form shifting irregularly. It didn’t speak, but its mirage shimmered faintly with combat readiness.

Seneschal remained at the center of the group. His bark-shaped mace, dulled and shaped more like a sword forged from timber, dragged slightly against the floor, marking a quiet trail behind them, each step a beat in a ritual he’d marched in dozens of times before.

Root-Soul moved on the right, half-flanked. Her vines curled and shifted with the same tension as a drawn bowstring. Her head tilted occasionally, listening to the whispers as if recognizing the voices.

Then Raven spoke.

"Seer. Anything psychic? Illusion traps?"

The Phantom Seer paused a beat, flickering in place. When it responded, the voice did not echo—it simply was, delivered directly into Raven’s mind:

"No illusion. No projection. This is real."

Raven’s hand closed around the grip of his dagger.

"Then let’s stay ready," he muttered. "It’s watching."

The corridor ended at a towering pair of doors—twice the height of any Raven had seen in the manor. Ironwood, silver-veined, choked in layers of vinebone that pulsed faintly with a heartbeat that wasn’t his.

He stepped closer, only to find them sealed tight. No handle. No keyhole. Just roots.

A sound came from behind them—not the whispers this time, but a footfall. Deliberate. Soft.

Raven turned.

Eldryn stood at the edge of the corridor’s gloom, her hands clasped before her.

"Before you face the final... being that waits beyond that door, I want you to know... I am forever in your debt."

She took a breath. Her voice softened.

"The last heart beats loudest... and she clings to it. I tried to sever it long ago. I failed. You must not."

Raven frowned. This wasn’t in the beta. No dialogue like this.

"What do you mean?"

Eldryn hesitated. Her gaze dropped.

"Some roots go deeper than others," she said softly. "Whatever is behind that door... it wasn’t always what it is now."

She looked up, locking eyes with him.

"If I told you more, you might hesitate. And you can’t afford to."

She stepped aside, placing one hand lightly on the door. The vines recoiled at her touch.

"Please. Just know that ending it... will end it for all of us."

Raven didn’t move at first.

He stared at her hand on the vines, at the way they recoiled—obedient, familiar.

You’re not telling me everything, he thought, but his face gave nothing away.

Still, he kept his voice low, steady.

"Doesn’t matter."

He stepped forward, eyes fixed on the sealed door.

"I’m here to finish it."

The door opened with a sound like bone splitting beneath damp soil.

Raven stepped in first, blades drawn. The others followed in silence.

The final chamber of the Thornspine Estate was no throne room. fгee𝑤ebɳoveɭ.cøm

It was a laboratory—twisted, vast, and alive.

Alchemical glass lay shattered across twisted workbenches, fused into the roots that had overtaken the stone. Bronze canisters jutted from the walls like broken lungs, still venting soft green mist that smelled of crushed herbs and rot. Strange contraptions, part mechanical and part fungal, twitched along the perimeter—pressurized pipes wrapped in vines, glowing with internal chemical flow.

A scaffold of surgical platforms curved around the back wall, where half-formed plant constructs still slumped in vine-cages, twitching faintly. Their bodies pulsed with residual aether. Spilled journals lay open on the floor, their ink melted and pages eaten through by creeping mycelium.

The space stretched high into a black dome, where glowing fungi clung to the ceiling like stars in a rotted sky. Roots hung like chandeliers, dripping faint bioluminescence. Cracked alchemy benches curved in a half-circle along the far wall, swallowed in moss and crawling petals. Everywhere, the ground was uneven, bloated with tangled vines and pulsing fungal sacs.

No music played. The Deathsong had stopped.

Instead, the room breathed.

As the team crossed the threshold, a low, mechanical click echoed through the chamber.

A half-second later, the trap sprang.

Four enormous bone-thorns surged upward from hidden slots in the floor, slamming into position with a jarring crack, their jagged edges dripping sap like fresh fangs. Vines coiled instantly around the entryway, sealing it shut with a choking hiss.

The air pressure shifted—too fast. A gust of warm, fungal breath rushed through the room like the inhale of something waking up.

Duskrunner snarled and whipped his head toward the door. Root-Soul’s vines flared around her like thorns on instinct. Seneschal raised his mace slightly, his stance tightening—not fear, but recognition. Phantom Seer shimmered, briefly splitting into three false copies that remerged in a blink.

Raven didn’t flinch.

He’d seen enough dungeon fails to know a fight was guaranteed when the exits locked themselves. The door slammed behind them, vines knitting shut.

From beyond the sealed entrance, a voice called out—muffled, distorted, warped by root and stone:

"Lady Ostreva... you did it again..."

A pause.

"Lady Ostreva!"

Eldryn’s voice. But the tone? Raven couldn’t place it. Joy? Grief? Reverence?

He scanned the walls, the twisted machinery, the shifting vines.

The layout was too calculated. Every piece of machinery was angled inward, like surgical equipment laid out for an operation that never ended. Each platform, each slumped vine-cage, faced the center.

The scent hung like vapor—rot layered over antiseptic. A sterile decay. Like something meant to grow under control, until it didn’t.

This wasn’t a garden.

It was a laboratory meant to birth monsters.

Is this a trap? he thought. Did she bring us here to finish the job... or feed it?

A soft movement stirred in the center of the darkness.

The vines parted.

And from them stepped the final curse of the manor.

Lady Ostreva of Thornspine.

The Thorn-Crowned Matriarch.

She walked as if floating. Her feet did not move. The roots beneath her shifted, carrying her like a procession.

Her body was regal—a tall silhouette wrapped in blooming robes of thorn and silk. Her face was half-covered by a mask of living bark and petals. From her brow curled a crown of bleached white vines, grown from her own skull.

She looked at Raven. And then past him.

And give him a cold satisfied smile.

The vines parted—not in reverence, but like autopsy flaps peeled back.

And from them stepped the final curse of the manor.

Lady Ostreva did not walk. The roots moved her, sliding her across the floor like a specimen on a surgical tray.

She stood tall, draped in blooming robes that twitched and pulsed with breathless life. Thorns curled from her joints like sutures. Her mask was not worn, but grown—half-petal, half-skull. And from her brow spiraled a crown of bleached vinebone, as if the forest had crowned its own executioner.

It feels like the laboratory pulsed around her.

She studied Raven and his companions—not with hatred. With clinical interest. A scholar evaluating new material.

Her voice was dry and exacting. Not emotional. Measured.

"So... my daughter brings me another fresh harvest."

"How curious. How late."

"You will serve, I think. The prior subjects lacked... variance."

She turned slightly, addressing no one, or perhaps the roots themselves.

"Begin recording."

[Dungeon Boss Detected]

Lady Ostreva, Thorn-Crowned Matriarch

Core Abilities:

Regal Bloom – Field Domination

Exploding mushroom spores claim the arena, inflicting stacking Rejection (DoT debuff).

At 3 stacks: Spitebloom Rash (5% HP poison over 6s, stackable 3x).

Crimson Thornlash – Living Blade Assault, a precision vine-strike.

If moving → Stagger + Bleed.

If standing → Stun + Thornwrap DoT (5s).

Bleeding targets emit Barbed Sickness — infects nearby allies.

Scent of Trespass – Hunted by the HiveMarks one player.

5s of internal DoT.

At the end: explodes in spores, poisoning nearby allies.

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