The fight didn't roar. It tightened. Like a noose pulled slow around their throats. No big battle cry, no glorious clash—just a wrongness coiling tighter, like something old and angry was trying to remember its name through their blood.
The room offered no space for formation or finesse. Cramped angles, lopsided stones, air too thick to breathe properly. Verek moved first, not fast, not loud—just decisive. He stepped in as the thing poured off the altar, a streak of living shadow that dragged the scent of scorched parchment and bone. Limbs like smoke, too long, fingers like knives. The shape blurred where it shouldn't, bending light wrong as it came for them.
Ezreal raised his gauntlet behind him, calm and measured. No theatrics. Sparks cracked along the joints of his armor like dry branches breaking in the wind, and a blast ripped out from his palm. It hit center mass—if the thing even had one. The creature staggered back, spine arched, screaming like iron scraped across a frozen mirror.
But it didn't fall.
Caylen struck next from the flank, low and lean, blade flicking upward like a question he already hated the answer to. His steel bit shallow across what might've been its hip. No blood followed. Instead, something heavier seeped into the air—memory. Burning wood. Screams caught in a mother's throat. Ash ground into boots. Caylen staggered back, choking.
"It bleeds stories," he spat, wiping his mouth. "Gods. I tasted it."
Dax didn't pause. He charged dead center, raw muscle behind each step, and jammed that chipped sword deep into the thing's core. It shrieked again, more ragged now, and Verek felt the air ripple with the scream—like something deeper was listening. Dax didn't back off. He drove the shadow back, pinned it hard against the altar like he could staple a storm to stone.
"Ezreal!" Dax bellowed.
Ezreal's eyes weren't on the creature anymore. They were locked on the altar. Or the shard. Or something beyond all of it.
"I see you," he muttered.
Not to the monster. To the thing beneath it. To the ruin itself. Maybe even to Malarath, leering from some unseen vantage, watching his little ritual unfold.
The gauntlet flared white-hot, casting jagged arcs across the chamber. Not like a spell. Like a truth getting peeled open. It struck the shadow square, burning a line through its center as it thrashed against Dax's grip. The edges of the thing started to unravel, unraveling not like flesh, but like fabric torn too far.
The thing tried to flee, limbs trailing smoke, but slammed against the far wall like it had hit a mirror that hated it. It howled, arms flailing, face melting into ink.
Before it faded entirely, it spoke.
"One piece closer. One breath from ruin."
Then it vanished.
The silence that followed wasn't peace. It was like someone had buried a scream in the floor and forgotten to dig it out.
Dax backed off, sword still up, shoulders heaving. "Everyone alive?"
"No," Caylen said, bent over with one hand braced on his knee, soot streaked down his face. "But standing."
Verek exhaled, slow. He hadn't drawn a weapon. Not fully. He'd watched, tracked the flow of the fight, calculated when to intervene. His right hand had started to glow during the shadow's scream—sigils rising instinctively, like his blood remembered more than he did—but he hadn't needed to release them. The others had finished it before he had to burn.
Ezreal stepped toward the altar. The shard floated there, calm now, red and quiet as a heart gone still. He reached out.
No resistance. No test. The fight had been the key.
His fingers closed around it.
It didn't burn—not really. But Verek saw his shoulders tighten like he'd gripped something sentient. Something aware.
The shard pulsed once. Then cooled in his palm.
"First one," Ezreal said, soft.
Caylen stared. "That's what we've been chasing?"
"One of many," Ezreal replied, jaw tight.
Dax eyed the walls. "This wasn't just a ruin. It was a lock."
"No," Ezreal said. "A keyhole. Made for someone like Dax. Or me."
"But it let us in," Caylen said.
Ezreal looked down at the shard, his face unreadable. "Because we were meant to."
Verek turned from them, facing the ruined arch. The keep wasn't collapsing. It wasn't vanishing. It was waiting. Its job done. For now.
They left in silence.
They camped a few miles out, just over the ridge where the grass grew stiff like old straw. The stars above them flickered like tired watchmen too scared to blink. The fire crackled low and hesitant, casting long shadows that bent the wrong way.
Ezreal sat apart. Shard in hand, thumb dragging lazy circles along its edge like he wasn't sure if he was studying it or asking it for forgiveness.
"He's not trying to break the world," Ezreal said at last.
Verek looked up. He hadn't spoken since they left the ruin, hadn't touched food or water. He'd just sat there, still and coiled.
"He wants to build it," Ezreal went on. "Piece by piece."
Caylen stared into the fire. "With dragonfire?"
Ezreal shook his head slowly. "Through her."
Dax cracked his knuckles. "That dragon queen. She's not dead?"
Ezreal's voice dropped. "No. Just... broken. One head per shard. Each color. Sealed and scattered. Like someone smashed her into parts and prayed no one would ever be dumb enough to collect them."
Verek's voice came in, low and even. "But someone is."
They looked to him. Not surprised he'd spoken, but like they hadn't realized the silence had weight until it left.
Caylen frowned. "If this shard's fire... and that place tested wrath, tested Dax... then what does that mean for the rest?"
Ezreal answered, but Verek's mind was already moving ahead.
"They're traps," Ezreal said. "Each one designed to reject the kind of seeker who'd crave it. Patience guarded by chaos. Greed sealed in austerity."
"They're more than that," Verek said. His voice carried like dry wind across the coals. "They're mirrors. Shards don't just resist—they measure."
"Measure what?" Dax asked.
"Intent. Will. Weakness," Verek said. "The ruins test if you're strong enough to take the shard. Or foolish enough to carry it."
Caylen let out a low whistle. "So it's not just defense. It's bait."
"Or worse," Dax muttered. "Malrath sends us first. Lets us bleed out all the danger. And when the shards light up, he follows."
Ezreal's grip tightened on the red shard. "We're not pawns."
"We are," Verek said. "But we don't have to stay that way."
A silence fell. Not from fear. From realization.
Ezreal stood. "We bring this to Queen Kaelith."
Dax made a sour face. "Again?"
Ezreal met his gaze. "Not as beggars. As witnesses."
"We've got proof now," Caylen added. "A shard. A map. And something in the world waking up."
Verek stood too. Not fast, not grand. Just... steady.
"And if she won't listen?" Caylen asked.
Verek met his eyes. "Then we stop waiting for anyone's permission."
Ezreal looked to him, then nodded.
Caylen rose, brushing ash from his cloak. "Guess we head back east."
"No," Verek said, turning his gaze toward the dark horizon. "We go forward. East is just a stop. Not the end."
The fire hissed. Sparks climbed like little traitors into a sky that wasn't watching anymore.
Behind them, the valley fell still again. Not vanquished—just biding time.
Ahead, the next shard waited.
And this time, Verek would be ready.