Even Death Grew Tired of Killing Me-Chapter 64 - 59 - Astrae’s Struggle

[Theo – First POV]

We stayed still for a few more minutes after everything settled.

I pushed myself up slowly, testing my balance, waiting for dizziness that never came. My body felt tired but functional. My head felt... quieter. Too quiet.

"You good?" Kyrene asked, watching me carefully.

"I think so," I replied, though even as I said it, I wasn’t completely sure.

Astrae studied my face as if searching for something she could not name. "You collapsed," she murmured. Her voice was steadier now, but there was still weakness beneath it. "Your mind was attacked."

"I remember the sound," I admitted. "After that... it’s blurry."

It was more than blurry. It was like someone had taken a knife and sliced away pieces of a picture. I could sense gaps, thin spaces where something should exist.

And behind it all, for no clear reason, I kept seeing a pair of amethyst colored eyes.

Familiar.

Painfully familiar.

Every time the image flashed in my mind, my chest tightened. It was not sharp pain, not physical. It felt like loss and longing mixed together, and I had no idea why.

I rubbed my temple. "Do we move?"

Kyrene nodded. "Yeah. Staying here too long is not smart."

Astrae pushed herself up carefully. She was still pale, but her posture had regained some of its old strength. There was pride in the way she stood, even when exhausted.

We began walking again.

The corridors felt endless. The stone walls were damp and uneven, carved in ways that did not follow normal architecture. It felt less like a palace basement and more like something that had grown under it.

I tried to track direction, count turns, remember the path we took. After a while, I gave up. It all blurred together.

We did not even know how long we had been down there. Hours, maybe longer. Time felt strange underground.

Kyrene slowed first.

"Stop," he said quietly. "We need to rest."

"We can keep moving," I insisted. "If we stop too long..."

"You’re not thinking straight," he cut in, not harsh, just firm. "It’s been a while, we’ve fought enough unspeakable beings and maybe there’s more, we need to recover just in case. Food can wait. We just need a short break to prepare what might await us."

Astrae did not argue. She walked toward a darker corner of the hallway and lowered herself carefully to the ground. She curled slightly on her side, eyes closing almost immediately. Even resting, she held herself with dignity.

Kyrene leaned back against the wall across from her, arms crossing over his chest. His eyes closed as well, though I knew he was not fully asleep.

I sat down between them and stared at the stone floor.

The hallway was quiet, too quiet. Dust hung faintly in the air. Somewhere far off, water dripped at slow intervals.

And underneath everything, I could still hear it.

A faint ringing.

Not loud, not even a constant ringjng. But it was there.

The echo of the Thrall’s voice, like a phantom bell vibrating inside my skull.

I pressed my fingers against my ears, but that did nothing. It wasn’t sound anymore. It was memory or something like it.

I lowered my hands and leaned my head back against the wall.

What am I even doing?

That thought had been circling me for days, maybe longer.

My original purpose was clear. Find a way to reverse my parents’ deaths. Find a major god, someone powerful enough to bend something that should not be bent.

And yet here I was.

Deep inside a kingdom’s hidden prison, risking my life and Kyrene’s life for an immortal sealed goddess, I had known only a few months.

I glanced at Astrae.

She looked fragile like this. Smaller than she usually did. But she had fought beside me, protected me, trusted me.

Still.

She was not my responsibility.

Kyrene was.

I looked at him.

He was just a kid. Younger than me by years. Adopted into my family because my parents had seen something in him they believed was worth saving.

And now I had dragged him into this. Even though I know he’s more than capable of protecting himself.

Aetherfall was swallowing me slowly. Every time I tried to step toward my true goal, something else pulled me sideways. Another crisis. Another fight.

It felt like I was being led somewhere.

And I did not know by whom.

The amethyst eyes flashed again.

My chest tightened.

Why does it hurt?

I exhaled slowly and forced myself to breathe evenly.

Time passed. Maybe an hour. Maybe two. It was impossible to tell without sunlight.

At some point, my eyes drifted closed.

The next thing I knew, the ground shifted.

It was subtle at first, like a low vibration traveling through the stone. Then it grew stronger.

Dust fell from the ceiling in thin streams.

I opened my eyes immediately. Kyrene was already on his feet.

"What is that?" Astrae pushed herself up, alert.

The rumbling intensified.

The exact section of hallway we were resting in trembled violently. Small stones broke loose and clattered to the floor. The walls groaned like something enormous was turning beneath them.

"This place is moving," I muttered.

Before we could reposition, the floor beneath Astrae cracked.

She was standing a few steps away from us.

"Astrae!" I shouted.

The stone split cleanly under her feet. It did not crumble randomly. It opened in a straight line, as if someone had drawn it that way.

She barely had time to look at us before the ground dropped.

The slab beneath her tilted and vanished downward, swallowing her whole.

Her fingers scraped against the edge for half a second.

Then she was gone. 𝑓𝘳𝘦𝑒𝑤𝑒𝘣𝘯ℴ𝘷𝘦𝓁.𝑐𝑜𝑚

The opening sealed immediately.

"No!" I lunged forward, but the stone had already fused back together. There was no seam. No crack. Just solid floor as if nothing had happened.

"Kyrene!"

"I’m here," he snapped, already moving toward me.

The rumbling grew louder.

A massive wall descended from above between the space where Astrae had fallen and where we stood. It slammed down with a deafening impact, sealing off that entire section.

The force of it knocked me back a step.

"Damn it!" I struck the wall with my fist. It didn’t even vibrate.

The ground shifted again.

This time the hallway itself began to slide.

The walls rotated slowly, stones grinding against each other with mechanical precision. The path ahead twisted, splitting and reconnecting like pieces of a puzzle being rearranged.

"They’re separating us," Kyrene said sharply.

"Or guiding us to their trap," I replied under my breath.

The floor beneath us tilted slightly, forcing us to adjust our stance. Dust filled the air, making it hard to see.

We tried to run back the way we came, but that path was already gone. A new corridor replaced it, narrower and darker.

"This isn’t random," I muttered. "It’s obviously deliberate."

Kyrene grabbed my sleeve as another wall slid into place behind us, cutting off retreat.

"We’re being led somewhere," he said quietly.

The rumbling finally stopped.

Silence returned.

We stood in a different hallway entirely.

Astrae was gone.

The space where she had been was sealed by layers of stone thicker than before. No cracks. No weakness.

I swallowed.

"Astrae!" I shouted anyway, though I knew it was pointless.

No reply came back.

Kyrene’s jaw tightened. "We’ll find her."

I nodded, though unease coiled in my stomach.

This place wasn’t just defending itself.

It was choosing.

And I had the growing feeling we were exactly where it wanted us to be.

~~~

[Third POV – Astrae]

The fall did not last long.

Astrae hit stone hard, shoulder first, the impact knocking the air out of her lungs. Pain shot down her arm and across her ribs, sharp and grounding. She rolled instinctively, boots scraping against rough ground, and forced herself upright.

The space she had been dropped into was circular and enclosed, wider than the corridors above but lower in height. The ceiling arched like the inside of a rib cage. The walls were lined with dark metal ribs fused into stone, and faint runes crawled across the surface like slow moving scars.

The air felt wrong.

Heavy and Thick.

She drew in a breath and immediately felt resistance, as if something invisible was pressing against her chest.

And then she heard it, a slow, grinding step.

Astrae straightened.

From the far side of the chamber, shapes emerged.

They were massive. Taller than any mortal construct she had seen, broader than palace gates. Their bodies were formed from obsidian bone fused with void-metal plating, surfaces dull and black with faint crimson cracks running through them. Runes moved across their limbs, not etched but crawling, shifting in patterns that reacted to her presence.

Nullbone Wardens.

She knew what they were the moment she saw them.

Anti-divine constructs.

Built not to kill gods quickly, but to exhaust them. To contain them. To make them kneel.

"So," she murmured under her breath, wiping blood from the corner of her mouth. "You were prepared for me."

The first Warden stepped forward.

The ground trembled under its weight.

It did not rush, not even roar.

It simply advanced.

Astrae reached inward, pulling at what little of her authority she could still access. The moment she did, the runes on the Wardens flared.

Her chest tightened.

Her energy did not flow cleanly. It dragged, like lifting something submerged in mud.

The aura around them intensified. The cost of even breathing as a goddess felt heavier.

She clenched her jaw.

"Fine," she whispered. "Then we do this properly."

The nearest Warden raised one enormous arm and brought it down.

Astrae dove sideways. The impact cracked the stone where she had stood, shards flying outward. The shockwave alone rattled her bones.

She rolled and came up on one knee, summoning a blade of pale light into her hand.

The moment it formed, the air hissed.

The Warden’s runes brightened again, draining her output. The blade flickered, thinner than it should have been.

Near-immunity to holy effects.

She cursed softly.

The second Warden moved in from the side, blocking her retreat.

They were not fast, but they were precise.

Astrae darted forward instead of back, closing distance before they could box her in. She leapt, driving her blade into the joint of the first Warden’s knee.

The strike landed cleanly.

The result was disappointing.

Instead of shattering, the obsidian bone absorbed most of the force. A thin crack formed, but the runes immediately crawled over it, reinforcing the damage.

The Warden’s other arm swung across.

It clipped her midair.

The blow felt like being struck by a collapsing wall. She slammed into the chamber floor, skidding across stone until her back hit the far wall.

Pain exploded through her spine.

For a second, her vision went white.

She forced herself up before the Wardens could close in.

They were slow, but their reach was immense. If she let them corner her, it would be over.

Think.

Raw power will not work.

She inhaled slowly, forcing her mind past the exhaustion and pain.

Their aura dampens divine energy. It increases cost and reduces output.

But it does not eliminate it.

She shifted tactics.

Instead of channeling outward in large bursts, she condensed her power inward, reinforcing muscle and bone rather than projecting it.

The pressure around her lessened slightly.

The first Warden charged this time, surprisingly quick for its size.

Astrae pivoted, sliding beneath the arc of its arm and driving her heel into the back of its knee joint, targeting the crack she had made earlier. The impact deepened the fracture.

Before the runes could fully mend it, she plunged her blade into the gap and twisted.

The light did not explode outward.

It compressed.

The crack widened.

The Warden staggered for the first time.

The second Warden reached her from behind and seized her by the shoulder.

Its grip was crushing.

Void-metal fingers dug into her flesh, suppressing energy at the point of contact. Her blade flickered violently.

Astrae hissed in pain.

The Warden lifted her effortlessly and slammed her into the ground.

The breath left her lungs in a ragged gasp.

The aura intensified, draining more from her with each second she remained pinned.

She felt it clearly now.

This chamber was designed for beings like her.

For gods who relied on authority and radiant force.

She spat blood onto the stone and laughed hoarsely.

"You built cages for gods," she muttered. "But you forgot something..."

She released her blade entirely.

Instead of holding the construct of light, she let it disperse and redirected every remaining ounce of strength into her physical body.

Warbound Herald.

Last Stand.

Her domain had never been overwhelming radiance.

It had been endurance.

She twisted violently under the Warden’s grip, forcing one arm free despite the crushing pressure. Her fingers hooked into the thin crack at its wrist joint and she pulled.

Bone scraped against bone.

The Warden tried to adjust, but she rolled with it, dragging her body around its arm and using its own weight against it.

With a guttural cry, she wrenched sideways.

The damaged knee gave way at the same moment.

The first Warden collapsed, its massive form crashing into the second and throwing its balance off.

Astrae shoved herself away and staggered to her feet.

Her breathing was ragged. Blood ran down her arm and across her ribs. Every movement hurt.

But both Wardens were on one knee now.

She did not give them time to rise.

She summoned her blade again, smaller this time, denser, and drove it directly into the cracked knee joint of the first Warden.

The crack split fully.

The leg severed at the joint, obsidian bone shattering and spilling black dust across the floor.

The Warden toppled.

It did not die. It did not dissolve.

But it could no longer stand.

The second Warden surged forward in rage, runes flaring violently.

It slammed its fist into her side.

The impact sent her flying.

She hit the wall hard enough to feel something in her ribs shift wrong.

For a moment, she could not move.

The Warden advanced again, raising both arms for a final crushing blow.

Astrae forced herself up, vision swimming, body screaming.

She could not overpower it.

She could outlast it.

As its arms descended, she stepped into the strike instead of away.

She drove her blade into the center of its chest, not for light, not for holy force, but for leverage.

The impact crushed her shoulder and drove her to one knee.

But the blade lodged between plates of obsidian bone.

She twisted, climbing the weapon as if it were a ladder, dragging herself upward and jamming her knee into the thin seam beneath its chin.

With a final surge of everything she had left, she detonated the compressed energy inward.

The Warden’s head snapped back.

Cracks spidered across its torso.

The runes flared wildly and then flickered.

The construct froze.

Then collapsed forward, its upper body shattering against the stone.

Silence fell.

Astrae remained kneeling where she was, blade dissolving from her hand as she exhaled slowly.

Both Wardens lay broken.

Not entirely destroyed, but disabled.

She tried to stand.

Her legs trembled.

She managed it anyway.

Barely.

Blood stained the floor around her boots. Her breathing was uneven, her body battered and drained.

She had won.

Only just.

And she knew with a sinking certainty that if there were more of them, she would not survive another round.