Subterranean tremors surged through the granite floor of the Bleeding Gorge, rattling the loose iron chains pinned against the cliffside.
Sagiri stepped away from Lira's field litter, his boots crunching over pulverized gravel as he approached the bound figure of Rika.
The former alchemical master hung limply within her suppression bindings, her skin mottled with dark veins and her breathing shallow and ragged.
Decades of forbidden organ harvesting had begun to backfire, decaying her vital channels as the facility's containment wards broke.
Kiana followed silently beside Sagiri, her dust-rose eyes solemn as three silver void needles floated in a gentle orbit around her fingertips.
"Why are you standing there, boy?" Rika rasped, coughing dark blood onto the stone. "Finish it. I ordered your squad dissected. I gave Sir Black the formulas."
Sagiri knelt before her, his expression carrying the calm, unyielding gravity of the Last Keeper.
