Chapter 10: The Depths That Do Not Pray
The air changed the moment Lucien stepped off the cliff.
He did not fall.
The mist rose to meet him.
Cold wrapped around his body like wet silk, thick with distorted mana currents that bent gravity just enough to make direction meaningless. For a heartbeat, Lucien felt weightless—suspended between descent and ascent—before the world reasserted itself with cruel indifference.
Stone slammed into his back.
Lucien rolled instinctively, coughing as the impact knocked the breath from his lungs. He came to rest against a fractured pillar half-buried in ash-gray dust, chest heaving as his senses recalibrated.
Silence.
Not the peaceful kind.
The kind that listened.
Lucien pushed himself upright slowly, wincing as dull pain flared along his spine. He ran a quick internal check—no broken bones, nothing critical. Luck had softened the landing just enough.
Just enough.
He exhaled.
"…Alright," he muttered. "That could've been worse."
The mist thinned gradually, revealing the space around him.
He stood within a vast subterranean basin, its boundaries stretching beyond what the dim ambient light allowed him to see. The ground was layered with smooth black stone etched with faint, irregular veins of pale blue mana that pulsed like a slow heartbeat. Massive archways rose from the basin floor, their surfaces carved with symbols too eroded to read, yet too deliberate to ignore.
Above him, the chasm yawned open like a wound in the world.
Below—
Lucien frowned.
There was no below.
The basin simply continued, sloping gently into darkness.
"This isn't natural," he said quietly.
Luck pulsed.
Neutral.
No guidance.
Lucien's fingers tightened around the hilt of his sword.
That, more than anything, unsettled him.
He walked.
Not cautiously.
Deliberately.
Each step echoed softly against the stone, the sound carrying far longer than it should have. Lucien counted his breaths, his pace, the rhythm of his own presence in the space.
No monsters appeared.
No traps triggered.
No whispers clawed at his mind.
That was wrong.
Forbidden zones were never quiet without reason.
Lucien stopped near one of the archways and placed his palm against the stone.
Cold.
Smooth.
Then—resistance.
Not physical.
Conceptual.
The stone did not reject him.
It measured him.
Lucien withdrew his hand slowly.
"…You're evaluating," he murmured.
The archway responded with a faint hum.
A path opened.
Not visibly.
But undeniably.
Lucien followed it.
The corridor beyond the archway twisted subtly, curving in ways that did not align with geometry. Lucien felt it as a mild pressure behind his eyes, a reminder that space here obeyed older rules.
His luck pulsed once.
Then again.
Weaker.
Lucien noticed immediately.
"…You don't like this place," he said softly.
For the first time since his reincarnation, luck did not answer.
Lucien swallowed.
That meant one thing.
He was on his own.
The trial began without announcement.
The floor ahead fractured silently, stone segments rising and rearranging themselves into a wide circular platform suspended over nothingness. At its center stood a figure.
Humanoid.
Motionless.
Carved entirely from pale stone.
Lucien halted at the edge.
The figure's eyes ignited with soft blue light.
"Trial of Continuance," a voice echoed—not aloud, but inside his skull.
Lucien exhaled slowly.
"Of course it is."
The construct moved.
Not fast.
Not slow.
Perfectly timed.
It stepped forward, and Lucien felt pressure slam into his body—not force, but intent. The air itself resisted him, weighing down his limbs as if daring him to falter.
Lucien stepped onto the platform.
The moment both feet touched stone, the world snapped shut around him.
The construct attacked.
Lucien parried instinctively, steel ringing sharply as blade met stone. The impact numbed his arm, vibration traveling up to his shoulder.
Dense, he thought. Very dense.
The construct followed up immediately, its movements fluid and relentless, strikes flowing from one to the next without pause. Lucien retreated step by step, analyzing, adapting.
No mana flare.
No elemental signature.
Just raw, controlled motion.
Lucien tried to reinforce his body with mana.
The reinforcement sputtered.
Failed.
His eyes widened slightly.
"…Mana suppression," he muttered.
Not total.
Selective.
The construct was forcing him to fight on his own terms.
Lucien adjusted instantly.
He stopped relying on enhancement.
Stopped trying to overpower.
He let his body move the way it remembered.
Old instincts rose—balance, distance, timing refined across a lifetime he rarely thought about.
Steel rang again.
Lucien slipped inside the construct's guard and struck at the neck joint.
The blade slid off uselessly.
The construct countered, smashing its fist into Lucien's ribs.
Pain exploded.
Lucien flew backward, skidding across the platform and barely stopping himself before the edge.
He coughed, blood flecking his lips.
"…Alright," he breathed. "You hit hard."
The construct advanced again.
Lucien's eyes sharpened.
Then let's change the terms.
He stepped forward instead of back.
The construct swung.
Lucien ducked beneath it, spun, and kicked the construct's knee—not to break it, but to misalign it. The stone joint shifted just enough to disrupt balance.
Lucien struck again—this time at the ankle, then the hip, then the spine.
Not force.
Precision.
The construct staggered.
Lucien didn't let up.
He moved in a blur of controlled violence, blade flashing, footwork flawless. Each strike exploited micro-fractures, stress points created by the construct's own movement.
Finally—
The construct froze.
Cracks spiderwebbed across its body.
Then it collapsed inward, disintegrating into dust.
Lucien stood alone on the platform, chest heaving, sweat dripping down his temples.
Silence returned.
"Trial complete."
Lucien exhaled slowly and straightened.
"That's it?" he asked.
The platform dissolved.
Lucien dropped—only to land gently back on solid ground as the basin reformed around him.
The archways pulsed faintly.
One of them glowed brighter than the rest.
Lucien approached it cautiously.
A symbol etched itself into the stone above the arch—one he did recognize now.
A mark associated with continuance, not conquest.
Survival.
Endurance.
Lucien reached out and touched it.
This time, the stone did not resist.
It accepted.
A faint warmth spread through his chest—not luck, but something adjacent to it. A stabilizing influence, subtle yet firm.
Lucien closed his eyes briefly.
"…So you test those who don't break," he murmured.
No answer came.
But the path ahead opened.
Lucien stepped through.
Far above, in places where light still ruled, ripples spread through systems long thought dormant.
Ancient seals shifted.
Old observers stirred.
And somewhere deep within the forbidden depths, something that had not seen a human in centuries marked Lucien Veyr as acceptable.
Not chosen.
Not favored.
But allowed to continue.
Lucien walked on, unaware of the weight of that distinction.
He only knew one thing.
This place would not kill him quickly.
Which meant it intended to test him slowly.