Dawn broke over Greenwood Hollow with tentative fingers of light. Nightborne sat cross-legged on the rough-hewn porch of Bertha's inn, cleaning the last traces of spectral residue from his ShadowSteel Daggers. The blades gleamed with an inner darkness that seemed to drink in the morning sun rather than reflect it.
"You're leaving again," Bertha said, not a question but a statement as she placed a steaming bowl of porridge beside him. Her weathered face betrayed no emotion, but her eyes carried the weight of someone who had seen too many warriors walk into darkness.
Nightborne nodded, sliding the daggers into their sheaths with a soft whisper of steel. "The thralls were only sentries. What waits beneath the mountain is far worse."
"Those bones you brought back—" Bertha gestured to the fragment of crown bone he'd extracted from the death knight's helm, now wrapped in cloth on the table between them. "Elder Morrow says they're ancient. Older than the island itself."
Nightborne took a spoonful of porridge, savoring its warmth. After yesterday's battle in the Obsidian Cavern, his body craved substance, even as the darkness within him hummed with restless power.
"The Lich King didn't originate here," he said quietly. "Something drew it to these shores. Something it seeks."
A child's laughter echoed from the village square, where young Emmett was chasing butterflies with a wooden sword. Nightborne watched him, remembering his own childhood—before the shadows had claimed him, before he'd learned to claim them back.
"I found a passage," he continued, turning back to Bertha. "Below the chamber where I defeated the thralls. It leads deeper—much deeper than I expected. I believe it descends to the Whispering Depths."
Bertha's spoon clattered against her bowl. "The Depths? Those are just old tales to frighten children."
"No," Nightborne said, touching the Pocket Abyss Cube at his thigh. It pulsed once in response, a faint echo of void energy. "The Depths are real. They're where the Lich King draws its power. And they're where I need to go."
He finished his porridge in silence, then stood, stretching muscles that were still sore from yesterday's combat. The slash across his shoulder had healed remarkably quickly—another gift from his communion with darkness.
"You should take someone with you," Bertha said, her voice lowering. "Tomas is good with a bow, and Jayna knows healing—"
"No." Nightborne's voice was firm but gentle. "Where I'm going, light is a liability. And I won't risk anyone else."
He checked his supplies: the two daggers, the Pocket Abyss Cube, dried rations, a waterskin, and a small pouch of herbs that Elder Morrow had pressed into his hands the previous evening—"For clarity," the old man had whispered.
As he stepped off the porch, the village stirred to life around him. Farmers headed to their fields, children gathered for lessons under the oak tree, and hunters prepared their traps for the day's catch. A normal day in Greenwood Hollow—possible only because they didn't know what lurked beneath the mountain.
The path to the Obsidian Cavern was familiar now. Nightborne moved with the silence of shadow, his boots barely disturbing the undergrowth. By mid-morning, he stood once more at the yawning entrance, the smell of damp stone and ancient dust wafting from its depths.
This time, he didn't bother with a torch. As he stepped into the darkness, he whispered:
[Dark Domain]
The world shifted into perfect blackness, but to his sight, it became a landscape of varying shadows—each contour and crevice revealing itself in shades of midnight. He moved past the chamber where he had defeated the thralls, their remains now nothing but dust scattered across the stone floor.
At the far end, where he had glimpsed the deeper passageway, he found what he sought—a narrow tunnel that spiraled downward like a throat. The air grew colder as he descended, carrying an ancient smell he couldn't quite place—something between metal and rot.
After what seemed like hours of descent, the tunnel opened into a vast chamber that took his breath away. The ceiling arched hundreds of feet above, supported by massive columns of obsidian that gleamed with embedded crystals. Between the columns, pools of black water lay still as glass, reflecting nothing.
His Dark Domain revealed shapes moving beneath the water's surface—not fish, but something else. Something watching.
"Welcome, night-heir," whispered a voice that seemed to come from everywhere and nowhere.
Nightborne spun, daggers drawn, but found only empty air. The voice laughed—a sound like sand shifting across stone.
"We've waited long for one such as you," it continued. "One who walks with darkness but is not consumed by it."
From the nearest pool, a figure emerged—not rising from the water, but unfolding from it, as if the liquid itself took shape. It resembled a woman, tall and willowy, her skin the color of polished obsidian, her eyes pools of starless night.
"What are you?" Nightborne demanded, keeping his daggers ready.
"We are the Whisperers," she replied, her voice rippling with undertones that made his bones vibrate. "The first shadows cast upon this world. The Lich King seeks to bind us, to use our voices for his resurrection ritual."
Nightborne narrowed his eyes. "Resurrection? The thralls spoke of their King rising."
"Not rising," the Whisperer corrected. "Returning. The one you call the Lich King is merely a shell, a vessel prepared for something far older."
She gestured, and the black water of the pool rippled. Images formed on its surface—a battlefield strewn with corpses, a crown of bone, and a ritual circle carved into living flesh.
"The true King was defeated centuries ago, his essence scattered across the void between worlds. His servants have labored to prepare for his return, gathering fragments of his power from the places where darkness pools."
Nightborne thought of the Pocket Abyss Cube at his side. "And this place—the Whispering Depths—is one such pool."
"The deepest," she agreed. "We have resisted his call, but our strength wanes. With each passing day, more of us are bound to his will."
A sound echoed from deeper in the cavern—the scrape of bone against stone. The Whisperer's form rippled with alarm.
"They come," she hissed. "The Bone Collectors. They harvest our essence for their master's return."
Nightborne felt the darkness within him stir in response to her fear. "How many?"
"Too many for you alone," she said, already beginning to sink back into the water. "Flee, night-heir. Return when you have mastered what sleeps inside you."
But Nightborne stood his ground. "I didn't come this far to retreat."
He drew upon the darkness, feeling it flow through his veins like ice water. The Void Weaving technique he had mastered at the quarry now came to him instinctively, shadow-threads extending from his fingertips to form a web of protection around him.
The first of the Bone Collectors emerged from a side passage—humanoid figures with elongated limbs, their bodies an intricate lattice of yellowed bone and sinew. Where faces should have been, they bore only smooth, featureless ivory masks. In their hands, they carried long hooked poles that glinted with unnatural light.
Nightborne didn't wait for them to approach. He blinked across the chamber, a technique he had refined since his battle with the thralls. His form dissolved into shadow and reappeared behind the lead collector, daggers already slicing through its spine.
The creature made no sound as it collapsed, its bones clattering against the stone. But the others—seven in total—turned with uncanny synchronization, their blank masks fixing on him.
"The night-heir," they whispered in eerie unison. "The master will be pleased."
They attacked as one, their hook-poles sweeping through the air with surprising speed. Nightborne dodged the first, caught the second with a parry from his left dagger, and spun away from the third. The fourth caught him across the shoulder, tearing through his cloak and drawing a line of blood.
Pain flared, but Nightborne channeled it into power. He exhaled darkness, saturating the air around him with void energy. The Bone Collectors hesitated, their movements slowing as if wading through tar.
[Umbral Crescent]
With a sweeping motion of his right arm, Nightborne released a curved blade of pure shadow that sliced through three of the collectors at once. Their bones dissolved into ash, their masks falling to the ground with hollow clatters.
The remaining four spread out, trying to flank him. Nightborne reached for the Pocket Abyss Cube, channeling a fraction of its power into his next attack.
[Void Scythe]
The air split with a sound like reality tearing. A massive crescent of darkness erupted from Nightborne's hands, expanding outward to engulf two more collectors. They didn't even have time to scream as the void claimed them, leaving nothing behind—not even dust.
The last two collectors backed away, their fluid movements now jerky with what might have been fear. Nightborne advanced, his daggers trailing ribbons of shadow.
"Tell your master," he said, his voice resonating with the power of the Depths, "that the night now has a new heir."
He blinked forward, daggers finding the weak points in their bone constructions with surgical precision. As the last collector fell, its mask cracking against the stone, Nightborne felt the darkness within him settle—satisfied but not sated.
From the black pools around him, more Whisperers emerged, their obsidian forms shimmering with cautious hope.
"You have strength," the first Whisperer said, approaching him. "But the Lich King's power grows. The ritual advances with each passing day."
Nightborne wiped his daggers clean on his cloak. "Tell me what I need to know. Where is this ritual taking place?"
"In the Heart of Bone," she replied. "A chamber that exists between worlds, accessible only through the Obsidian Gate."
"And where is this gate?"
The Whisperer's form rippled with uncertainty. "Deeper. Past the Lake of Echoes, through the Corridor of Forgotten Names. But you cannot go alone. The shadows there are not like those you command—they are older, hungrier."
Nightborne thought of the village above, of Bertha's worried eyes and Elder Morrow's knowing gaze. He had promised to return with answers, with a plan to end the threat once and for all.
"I need to know more about what I'm facing," he said. "The true nature of this King. His weaknesses."
The Whisperer glided closer, her form casting no reflection in the black water. "There is a way. The Depths hold memories—echoes of all who have passed through. If you are willing to listen... to merge with the darkness itself... you might hear the voice of one who faced the King before."
Nightborne hesitated. His mastery of darkness had come at a cost—each time he drew upon its power, he felt something within him change, as if the void left its mark upon his soul.
But the alternative was unthinkable. If the Lich King completed its ritual, if the true King returned to the world of the living...
"Show me," he said finally.
The Whisperer extended her hand, her fingers elongating into tendrils of liquid shadow. "Follow me, night-heir. The memories await."
As he followed her deeper into the Whispering Depths, past pools of ancient darkness and columns of crystal-veined obsidian, Nightborne felt the weight of his decision. The darkness had claimed him long ago, but now he would claim its secrets in return.
The path ahead was shrouded in mystery, but one thing was certain—when he emerged from the Depths, either the night would have a new master, or he would have surrendered to its embrace completely.
Behind him, the last fragments of the Bone Collectors dissolved into the stone, their whispers fading into the eternal silence of the deep.