The cohort had left the Breeding Nest, but the echoes of the horrific battle still lingered within it’s depth.

Inside, the battlefield remained a grotesque memory carved into stone.

Chunks of flesh clung to the fleshly ground like refuse that refused to decay. Several tentacles faintly twitched before finally surrendering to stillness.

Broken horns lay scattered among the shattered bone fragments, half-buried in blackened sludge.

The cavern floor itself had become a corrupted mosiac of blood and ash, where black ichor seeped into cracks as though the mountain itself was slowly being infected.

The air was even worse.

It carried a thick, suffocating stench of rot and burnt flesh that lingered in every breath, heavy enough to coat the throat and resist being swallow away.

And yet... Above all of these, watching from a jagged outcrop embedded high within the cavern walls, a pair of emerald eyes observed everything with quiet focus.

The playful youth from earlier crouched there effortlessly, one leg hanging over the abyss while the other supported his weight. Shadows clung to him like obedient fabric, hiding him from sight even in the faintest flickers of the crimson light.

He had been there since the beginning...

He had watched the battle erupted; watched the five monsters descend, and watched as death nearly swallow the entire group whole.

He didn’t move; not once at all. This was not because he was indifferent.

Far from that. Instead, it is because he was observing.

Asterion’s command had been simple: "Observe them for a month."

At first, that order has seemed like punishment disguised as instructions.

A group of arrivals struggling in the Nether Lands? Nothing more than fleeting entertainment before inevitable death.

Though he had deemed them strong, it still didn’t change the fact that they were predictable and disposable.

Yet now, his expression had changed completely.

Gone was the laziness that once defined his features; instead, it had been replaced by a sharpened focus as he recalled what he witnessed...

The five monstrosities alone had defied his understanding...

In Aetherium, only beasts known as Anima could generate Aether Cores. This was not some sort of speculation or myth, it was foundational knowledge.

And yet, these creatures had shattered that foundation effortlessly. They are clearly artificial lifeforms and yet, they were able to produce Cores like any other Anima.

This could only mean one thing; the Sauryeans were investing far more into these Nests than the Sanctuary realized.

But even that revelation had paled in comparison to what happened afterward.

That silver-haired Knight...

He had known that something was different about that lad. But this...

This went beyond the concept of difference. It was unique... No, also not that.

It was basically defying every known knowledge about Soul Essences in Aetherium... It was unprecedented!

The playful youth’s grin slowly returned as the memory replayed itself in his mind...

A Soul Essence evolving...?

An evolution that wasn’t through rituals; neither was it through Ascension Potions, nor any known refined alchemical procedures...

Instead, it was through something as crude as crushing an Aether Core. A Rank One Core for that matter!

That shouldn’t have been possible.

And yet it had happened.

Even now, it nearly made him life from the sheer incongruity of it...

Yet the phenomenal evolution wasn’t even the funniest part itself, instead, it was the ignorance that surrounded it.

Essence Runes...?

The group had assumed that was the plausible explanation.

His grin widened slightly as he thought. If only they understood what Essence Runes really were...

Then they would never gave reached such a conclusion.

That phenomenon was not a misunderstood Rune function. It was something else entirely.

Something that was absent from recorded history. Something that shouldn’t exist under any known system of Aetheric cultivation.

Something that should be classified as... Forbidden.

The youth tilted his head slightly.

"Just what exactly are you?" He muttered.

His gaze lingered on the tunnel the group disappeared into.

Perhaps the real anomaly wasn’t just the Knight alone; perhaps it was the fact that the cohort were still together at all...

Each member of the group were of different origins; of different backgrounds, different temperaments, and of different levels of strength and instability.

Yet somehow, despite all this contrariety, they still moved and function as a unit.

That alone was unusual for new arrivals in the Nether Lands.

"Just what other surprises do you have for me?" The youth pondered with his hand on his chin, while he look at that tunnel thoughtfully.

Then slowly, his body shifted and the shadows around him thickened instantly.

His form blurred, and like a chameleon adapting perfectly to it’s surroundings, the playful youth vanished seamlessly into darkness before silently trailing after the group once more...

*****

Outside, the world was no less merciful.

The cohort had only just emerged from the mountain when the weight of the Nether Lands pressed against them once more.

Crimson fog drifted endlessly between twisted trees that bent unnaturally toward the sanguine sky like skeletal hands frozen mid-reach.

The forest stretched in all directions, suffocating in its stillness, and broken only be the occasional crack of distant crimson lightning that lit it in violent flashes.

The was still cold. Not refreshingly cold, but the kind of chill that seeped into the bones and reminded one that warmth was a privilege easily taken away.

The oppressive pressure of the cavern was gone. Yet in its place stood something else; a quieter and wider dread.

The forest did not trap them in stone walls. It simply remained them instead that they were small; that anything could be watching, and they would never know.

The cohort stepped fully into the forest, each one adjusting instinctively to the change in atmosphere...

No one spoke at first as silence reigned over them. The silence was not the absence of peace, it was the one of recovery...

And as usual, Veyrath was the first to break it.

The failed Alchemist suddenly dropped to his knees with a dramatic exhaustion and pressed his hands into the crimson soil...

"I almost forgot how much I missed this place." He breathed out, his voice filled with exaggerated relief.

Then without hesitation... He leaned forward and kissed the ground.

No one mocked him or reacted with disgust. They could all empathize with him.

That cavern had been worse, much worse than anything they’d faced since arriving in the Nether Lands.

Valmyr exhaled heavily and leaned against a twisted tree trunk.

"I genuinely thought we were going to die in there." He breathed out.

Kaeloris adjusted his spectacles lightly. "Well, statistically speaking, our survival probability was catastrophically low."

Valmyr let out a hollow laugh. "I still can’t get used to the way you speak. Can you translate all that into normal speech?"

Kaeloris glanced at him and replied. "It means we almost died."

Caelestra slowly lowered herself onto a broken stone slab nearby, exhaling as she stretched her limbs.

"Guys, I can’t feel my legs properly." She admitted.

Veyrath replied playfully. "That is because you kept on moving like a frontline soldier, swinging you Chest like a war hammer."

Vaelorin stared at him strangely. "Her Chest...?"

Veyrath glared at him. "...You know what I mean."

Vaelorin nodded, clearly unconvinced. "Huh-uh. I believe you..."

Meanwhile, Aureleah stood slightly apart from the group. As always, she was silent and composed.

Her younger sister remained close beside her, practically inseparable as she had mostly been. Sylveris didn’t speak much either, but her presence stayed firmly anchored to Aureleah’s side.

Aureleah’s gaze drifted briefly across the forest before returning forward. Her expression remained calm but something sharp lurked within her silver eyes.

It was the kind of quiet awareness that forms when the world stops behaving predictably.

Behind them, Regaleon also stood slightly apart, his Halberd resting in his hand...

He said nothing but he listened and observed.

The exhaustion was clear in everyone now that the adrenaline and excitement had faded. Shoulders were sagged, breathing was slow, and even their voices lacked their earlier edges.

But the Nether Lands did not allow recovery easily, nor did it tolerate pauses. It only allowed progression... And strength.

Regaleon stepped forward, his gaze moving across the forest as if assessing the terrain for threats.

Then he swept his gaze across the group. "We can’t rest now. We will only do that when we reach the Cave."

Hearing that, no one argued or questioned him. They simply nodded and slowly, one by one, they began moving again...

Deeper into the crimson fog, where twisted trees swallowed their silhouettes.

And quietly, the Crimson Forest closer behind them once more.