The gate pulsed again.
Not violently. Not invitingly.
It was a reminder.
The hunters moved with practiced efficiency, setting markers into the ground around the platform. Thin rods sank into stone, humming faintly as they anchored the surrounding space. Kael watched closely. Every movement had purpose. Every tool responded to the distortion, not the other way around.
Stabilization wasn't control.
It was negotiation.
"Rules are simple," the older hunter said, fastening a final clamp into place. "Once we go in, we don't split unless necessary. No heroics. No improvising unless you're ready to pay for it."
His eyes flicked briefly to Kael.
"No offense."
"None taken," Kael replied.
Another pulse rippled through the gate.
This one felt… tighter.
The hum inside Kael sharpened, the silence reacting without command again. It pressed inward, coiling close to his core as if bracing.
The hunter noticed.
"You're sensitive to it," he said.
Kael nodded. "It's loud."
The man grimaced. "That's not good."
He gestured toward the gate. "Early-stage stabilized breaches usually start low. Tier-one scouts. Fast. Fragile. They test the environment before heavier entities push through."
Kael's gaze stayed fixed on the distortion.
"And if they don't?"
"Then it wasn't early-stage," the hunter said flatly.
The platform trembled.
This time, Kael felt the shift before the hunters did.
"Something's wrong," he said.
Too late.
The gate tore open.
Not wider—deeper.
The distortion inverted, folding inward instead of expanding outward, and something spilled through—not one form, but several, their silhouettes overlapping as they forced themselves into the same space.
They hit the ground running.
Four shapes, low to the ground, limbs too many and too jointed, bodies wrapped in shifting layers of hardened shadow. Their movement was jerky, unnatural—not fast, but relentless.
"Scouts!" one of the hunters shouted.
Weapons came out.
The first creature lunged.
Steel met it—and slid off.
The blade didn't fail.
The world did.
The creature rebounded instantly, claws tearing into stone where the hunter had stood a moment before. Kael moved without thinking.
Silence snapped into place.
He crossed the distance in a blur, his movement erasing warning entirely. His strike wasn't aimed at the creature's body, but at the space beneath it—collapsing its footing mid-leap.
The thing slammed into the ground hard enough to shatter the stone beneath it.
Kael didn't stop.
He pivoted, shifting his weight sharply as another creature lunged from the side. He stepped through its attack, shoulder brushing past its form as the silence compressed violently around him.
The creature staggered.
Then folded inward.
It didn't bleed.
It failed.
"Unarmed!" someone shouted. "He's unarmed!"
Kael ignored it.
A third creature surged forward.
Kael felt it then—the limit.
The silence resisted him.
Not refusing.
Warning.
He pushed anyway.
The cost hit immediately.
A sharp, blinding pressure exploded behind his eyes, and for a heartbeat, sound vanished completely. Not just externally.
Internally.
Kael stumbled.
The creature struck.
Kael twisted just enough that the blow tore through his shoulder instead of his chest. Pain flared white-hot, grounding him violently back into the world.
Sound returned in a rush.
Shouts.
Metal.
Impact.
Kael gritted his teeth and stayed upright.
So this was the boundary.
Silence could carry him far—but not endlessly.
Not without something else to anchor it.
The hunters rallied, finishing the remaining creatures with coordinated strikes, exploiting the instability Kael had created.
The clearing fell quiet again.
This time, it wasn't Kael's doing.
The older hunter stared at him.
"You shouldn't be alive," he said.
Kael pressed a hand to his bleeding shoulder, breathing carefully.
"I know."
Behind them, the gate pulsed again.
Slower now.
Heavier.
The scouts were gone.
Which meant something else was preparing to come through.