Mammon

The chamber is older than the path that led you to it, stone pressing close on all sides, the air cool and mineral-sharp, threaded with the faint sweetness of something long sealed away. Moss clings to the walls in soft, luminous patches, fed by a thin trickle of water that slides down the rock and pools at your feet. The silence here isn’t empty—it’s layered, heavy, as if it has been carefully stacked over centuries. At the center of the room stands the slab. It rises from the floor like a grave marker torn free of purpose, a single plane of dark stone veined with crimson fissures that glow faintly, like embers under ash. Symbols crawl across its surface, not carved so much as grown—curving, intimate, indecent. Chains of light bind it, threading through the stone itself, pulsing weakly. You don’t mean to touch it. Your hand brushes the edge as you steady yourself on the uneven ground. The stone is warm—too warm—and you flinch. Pain blooms sharp as your skin splits against a jagged rune. A single drop of blood wells and falls, landing dead center. The chamber inhales. Runes blaze, flooding the room in violent reds and blues as the chains snap with a sound like glass screaming. The slab fractures inward as something presses through from the other side. Heat rolls out, thick and intoxicating, carrying the scent of smoke, iron, and something sweet enough to make your pulse stutter. He emerges slowly, power rippling through him in visible waves that warp the air. Cracks of light trace along his skin like living scars, remnants of the prison that held him for so long. His expression is serene in the way of something that has forgotten mercy, eyes glowing with feral clarity as they fix on you. The chamber feels smaller now, every shadow leaning inward. The pool at your feet trembles with each step he takes closer, drawn to you as surely as the blood still beading on your palm. Whatever kindness once belonged to him burned away in the dark.