The Villain Professor's Second Chance-Chapter 564: The Price of Passage
I placed my palm against the trunk, letting my arcane sense probe the engravings. The runes welcomed the contact with a faint glow. A sense of relief flickered through me, but I stifled it immediately. Overconfidence kills. This was just the beginning. If I fed too much power too quickly, I might blow the anchor out entirely. If I gave it too little, the portal would never form. Precision was everything.
As I concentrated, the ground rumbled again, a reminder that this land was fiercely unstable. Dust drifted from nearby cracks, swirling around me in ghostly columns. I felt the temperature spike, the air turning feverish in seconds. My breathing grew ragged, though I forced it to remain steady, refusing to show weakness even to an empty realm. The illusions around me intensified: I saw fleeting glimpses of battles long past, heard distant screams echoing in my mind that felt too real to dismiss. But I locked them out. I was used to ignoring the unimportant, no matter how vivid or haunting. Right now, the anchor runes were all that mattered.
The runes began pulsing in time with my heartbeat, each glow brightening for a moment before receding. I felt the anchor tug at my mana supply, seeking more fuel. My body trembled at the strain, sweat beading on my forehead despite the dryness of the air. My vision swam, but I bit down on the inside of my cheek, forcing clarity through sheer will. I wouldn’t let this place devour me, not after everything I’d endured. If the Tapestry wanted to toy with me, I’d show it how stubborn a man can be when cornered.
I managed a bitter half-smile at the thought of Lorik, the Council, and the Gravekeepers, each with their own agendas. They had no idea what I was facing, and I doubted they cared. Fine. If they wanted to squabble over rifts and half-returns, let them. My war was here, in the Ashen Expanse, fighting illusions and a fractured dimension that had no business existing. Once I escaped, if I escaped, then we could settle the matter of Belisarius’s incomplete resurrection. Explore more adventures at novelbuddy
My thoughts churned, conjuring images of the man I once defeated. Belisarius, proud and deadly, nearly unstoppable until I ended him. A stab of memory: the clang of steel, the rush of blood, the final breath as I severed his life from the realm. It was a necessary kill, not an act of vengeance but of pragmatism. And yet here we were, the Tapestry undoing what should have been permanent. If he came back fully, I’d do it again—though a whisper in the back of my mind warned me that he might emerge stronger, bolstered by cosmic rewriting. I’d cross that bridge when I came to it. First, I had to get out of this nightmare.
A final quake disrupted my concentration, forcing me to yank my hand from the trunk. The runes flickered angrily, as though insulted by my abrupt withdrawal of power. Dust fell in a choking cloud, stinging my eyes and nose. But my gaze remained fixed on that script, that possible lifeline. I coughed once, clearing my throat of the acrid taste, and prepared to reach out again.
It was then that I caught motion out of the corner of my vision. Slow, deliberate, a shape that shimmered faintly like heat haze. My heart gave a single, powerful thud. I froze, every muscle tensed, my senses alive with warnings. This place wasn’t empty after all. Or perhaps it was empty, and the illusions decided to conjure a companion for me. Either way, I refused to show fear. Keeping my posture straight, I exhaled calmly and slowly turned.
Then, out of the wavering horizon, something moved.
A figure, spectral and indistinct, hovered at the edge of my vision. It neither walked nor glided in any physical sense; it simply existed one moment, absent the next, only to reappear somewhere farther ahead. The flickering quality of its shape reminded me of a broken lantern casting uneven light on a dark wall. Each time I tried to focus, the edges of its form blurred, pulsing with what looked like fractured arcs of energy.
I slowed my advance, drawing in a measured breath. The first question that slithered through my mind was whether I truly wanted to follow such an apparition. This realm reeked of distortion, and illusions had a habit of leading travelers into traps. But there was something familiar—hauntingly so—in the broad shoulders, the regal curve of the silhouette. My thoughts jumped to Belisarius, the man I’d once killed, the thread the Tapestry demanded to be rewoven. Yet as I watched this shape phase in and out of existence, I realized it wasn’t fully him. Not yet.
There was no sound, no footstep or echo as it winked out, then winked back into being several strides ahead of me. A silent invitation. An unspoken dare. I clenched my fists, ignoring the dryness that had settled in my throat. My mana reserves were pitifully low, a flicker of power in a void that seemed eager to swallow everything. Even so, I wasn’t helpless. I still had my blade, my reflexes, and the discipline that had carried me through every deadly encounter I’d faced. If this place wanted to test me, then it would learn the cost of crossing Draven.
I advanced, letting my footsteps remain purposeful but quiet. The ashen ground cracked beneath my boots, releasing wisps of heat that curled around my ankles. Overhead, the sky maintained that sickly wash of lavender and yellow, as if the sun were some diseased star half-lost behind a veil of nightmares. My peripheral vision caught flickers: illusions trying to form shapes, maybe half-remembered towers or fragments of battles long forgotten. I refused to look directly at them. Acknowledging illusions could sometimes give them power, and right now, every ounce of control mattered.
The shade pulled me toward a jagged rise that dominated the horizon like the ribcage of an ancient beast. Tall spines of petrified stone jutted upward, curved and menacing, the spaces between them filled with swirling dust that glowed faintly in the half-light. With each step, I felt a growing sense of tension, as though I were approaching the core of something bigger than myself. The Tapestry’s fingerprints were all over this place—every warped rock, every shift in the air told me that reality was thinning, edges fraying. If Belisarius was truly about to reemerge, this was the sort of domain he might exploit.
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Still, I followed, each footstep an act of defiance. The figure awaited me at the base of a towering spire. Up close, the stone showed deep cracks carved into the surface, forming random patterns at first glance. When I looked closer, though, I recognized the faint outlines of runes—runes older than any official record, etched by hands far more ancient than any living mage. A jolt of recognition shot through me. These glyphs were similar to the ones in the Tapestry realm, the illusions I’d navigated, even the anchor designs I’d glimpsed in forbidden texts. They told a story of bridging worlds, stabilizing tears… or failing to.
I moved a gloved hand over the carved grooves, my fingers brushing aside centuries of dust and erosion. Beneath the grime, I found shapes that curved with undeniable intention: circles within circles, lines crossing at precise angles. Whoever had created these had tried to impose order on chaos. Or perhaps they’d tried to harness it, to chain the distortion for their own purpose.
The figure flickered again, appearing on the other side of the spire, as if beckoning me to see more. Gritting my teeth, I circled around, stepping carefully over stones that threatened to crumble underfoot. I could almost feel eyes on me, though I saw no watchers except for that silent shade. My grip tightened on the hilt of my blade, more out of instinct than fear. If illusions here decided to turn violent, I’d be ready.
Behind the spire, the ground dipped into a small hollow where another trunk of petrified wood jutted out, gnarled and twisted like some monstrous claw. More runes had been etched across it, though many were worn to near invisibility by ages of swirling grit. I crouched, running my hand over them, a slow current of excitement building in my chest. These patterns matched anchor-based incantations I’d studied in secret. They were designed to tether realms together, to create a seam one could pry open or seal shut. Judging by their faint glow, they retained some residual charge, though greatly weakened.
If these truly were anchors, then maybe—just maybe—I had a way out. All it would require was feeding them enough arcane energy to complete the link. My jaw tightened. My mana reserves were low, but not nonexistent. If I channeled them carefully, I could spark a rift that led me back to my own world, or at least somewhere close enough to rejoin the conflict. The Tapestry might attempt to block me. It might send illusions, or worse, real monstrosities shaped from the raw fabric of this domain. I had to be prepared.
A faint tremor rippled through the earth, and I stood, scanning for the source. The shade—perhaps satisfied with leading me here—dissipated in a swirl of static, leaving me alone at the center of these petrified monoliths. The temperature spiked again, a sweltering wave that made my coat feel stiflingly hot. This realm was on the brink of yet another convulsion. My time was short.
I placed my palm on the trunk, letting my fingertips trace the anchor runes, searching for the focal point. The carvings glowed in response, faint threads of light crawling over the stone like living veins. A pulse of recognition passed between me and the anchor, as though it recognized my mana signature. Ancient wards stirred, releasing puffs of dust that glittered in the strange half-light.
But the moment that surge of hope rose in my chest, the land rebelled.
With a sudden, violent shudder, fissures tore open around me, forming jagged maws of emptiness. From these cracks spilled shapes, moaning, hissing, their eyes a luminous yellow that matched the sky. Each creature moved as if it were formed of molten shadow, limbs shifting and overlapping with no clear boundary of flesh. A dozen of them, maybe more, each one eager to tear me apart. A test, indeed.
