Round 363

The stone passageways breathed around them, walls pulsing with sickly green light that seemed to feed on their terror. Each step forward required concentration, the floor undulating like a living thing beneath their feet—Abby's especially, her small frame unaccustomed to such instability. The creature held them close, its grip possessive and insistent, guiding them deeper into the chamber's depths.

Silra felt the corruption spreading through her system with each beat of her heart, but she maintained her focus on the task at hand—finding those damned Starheart fragments before the entity consumed them both entirely. The walls' synchronized breathing had stopped now, replaced by a low pulsing hum that seemed to count down the seconds until whatever waited below made its move.

Abby pressed herself against Silra's back, trying to maintain contact only through their merged forms and not risk direct skin-to-skin contact that might accelerate the corruption's spread. The viscous fluid coating her legs felt alive, tendrils of it reaching up to caress her exposed skin before being forcefully slapped away by Silra's will.

They descended the staircase slowly, each step a labor as the floor tried to buck them off balance. The walls here were different—less stone and more living tissue that seemed to breathe in sync with whatever controlled this place. Abby could feel her heart pounding in her chest, fear making it difficult to think clearly.

What if Silra can't hold out? What if I accidentally touch the wrong thing and become corrupted too? How do we fight something that adapts to magic and controls the very walls around us?

The questions swirled in her mind, unanswerable and terrifying. All she could do was trust in Silra's strength and pray they found a way out of this nightmare before it was too late.

Two hours and forty-seven minutes left. If we're lucky.