Chapter 194: Wrong Hallway

The heavy stone door scraped backward another three inches.

The gap widened just enough for something massive to force its way through.

A crypt guardian emerged from the darkness. The corpse was far larger than the undead they had fought on the road, wrapped in heavy, tarnished burial armor that had survived surprisingly well. A broken length of iron chain hung from one thick arm. Its other hand gripped the shattered top half of a stone sarcophagus lid, dragging it across the floor.

Arthur looked at the broken stone. So that was what they’d heard beneath the chapel.

The corpse looked far better preserved than the ones above. Dark residue stained the gaps in its armor, and every movement carried more force than the shambling undead on the road.

Emily stepped forward immediately, placing herself squarely between the guardian and the rest of the room. The space was already too tight for Arthur to draw comfortably, and the massive corpse took up most of the remaining clearance.

Arthur backed slowly toward the narrow side passage, creating whatever distance he could. Chloe moved toward the stacked burial shelves, leaving the center open behind Emily.

Arthur got exactly one clean shot.

He drew a treated arrow, anchored, and released the moment the guardian cleared the doorway. The shaft punched straight through a gap in the heavy chest plate, burying itself deep in the rotting tissue beneath.

The creature barely flinched.

It dropped the heavy stone lid, raised the arm wrapped in iron chain, and charged Emily.

Emily met the charge at an angle. The chain slammed against her reinforced forearm, and she turned with the impact, shoving hard against the guardian’s shoulder.

Even then, its sheer mass drove her backward three steps.

Arthur drew a second arrow and tried to find an angle, but the room was too cramped. Emily stayed inside the creature’s reach, forcing it to keep turning toward her, while the scattered piles of old bones ruined Arthur’s remaining firing lanes.

Whisperwind wasn’t going to solve this.

Arthur lowered the bow and drew the Necrotic Dagger in his right hand. He stayed outside the guardian’s reach while Emily kept its attention.

Then the guardian shifted its weight. It swung the heavy chain in a wide, sweeping arc that forced Emily to duck sharply, and its momentum carried it straight past her.

It locked its dead eyes on Arthur.

The guardian lunged.

Arthur backed up a step.

The chain swung toward his head. He shifted his hips, shoved the creature’s upper arm just far enough off line with his left hand, and ducked beneath the swing. He stepped cleanly to the creature’s blind side.

He found the narrow gap where the heavy helm met the back of the neck plate.

Arthur drove the Necrotic Dagger in fast and hard. The dagger’s decay did nothing useful. The steel still cut deep through the rotting muscle holding the neck together.

Arthur ripped the blade out and instantly disengaged, diving backward before the creature could turn.

Morwenna would probably still find something wrong with it.

Emily crashed into the guardian’s back, grabbed the heavy iron helm in both gauntleted hands, and violently twisted.

The damaged neck snapped completely. The helm came away with the skull still inside it and hit the floor with a dull thud.

The massive body collapsed a second later.

Arthur exhaled sharply. The canvas burn around his left wrist had started pulling again after the redirect, and his shoulder stung where he’d clipped the wall on the way back.

Chloe walked over, caught his left hand, and checked the wrist before turning her attention to Emily.

"You lasted longer than I expected," Emily said, kicking the heavy helm away from the body.

"That sounded insulting," Arthur noted.

"It was."

Arthur checked the ruined corpse while Chloe examined the necrotic residue.

Nothing on the corpse resembled the black seep or crust Arthur had seen in Rauk. Just undead.

"Same kind of necrotic residue as the others," Chloe said. "Much stronger."

They moved past the body and finally stepped into the chamber the guardian had forced open.

Arthur didn’t remember this chamber at all.

The room was a mess of half-finished repairs. Damaged burial shelves lined the walls, but several of them had been braced with heavy, rotting timber. An old, tarnished set of iron tools sat forgotten in the corner. Crude chalk marks, likely old repair numbers, were scribbled across the stonework near the ceiling.

The rough passage matched the later repairs around the chamber. Workers had probably cut it after the main route collapsed.

They found two exits leading out of the repair chamber.

Arthur looked at the surrounding architecture, comparing the stone arches to the layout he remembered. The right passage angled downward, which matched the general descent toward the lower crypts.

He pointed right.

They walked for five minutes before Arthur realized the corridor was bending at the wrong angle.

The passage dead-ended abruptly in a small, square burial chamber.

Clatter.

Four ordinary corpses dragged themselves out of the shadows the moment they stepped inside.

Arthur swore under his breath and raised Whisperwind. There was enough room here to use the bow, and he dropped the first two corpses with quick shots before they cleared the center of the room.

The third corpse lunged at Chloe. She shortened her grip and rammed the heavy iron base of the staff straight into its chest, shoving it backward into the wall.

The fourth was already on Emily before she set her feet. Its rotting hand raked across her forearm, tearing through the fabric of her sleeve before she crushed its skull.

The room went quiet.

Chloe caught Emily’s arm before they left the room and pulled the torn sleeve aside.

"Skin’s fine," Chloe said.

Emily pulled her arm back. "Told you."

"You didn’t tell me anything."

"I was going to."

Emily looked down at her torn sleeve, then looked across the small room at Arthur.

"Useful information?" Emily asked.

Arthur looked at the solid stone wall blocking their path.

"Shut up."

Back in the repair chamber, Arthur crouched near the left passage and activated Eagle Eye.

The disturbed dust sharpened into view. Moisture had collected along the bottom of the wall, and repeated scrape marks disappeared into the darkness ahead.

Chloe knelt beside him, holding her hand up. "Airflow."

Emily found a fresh set of jagged scratches near the left wall.

Arthur studied the passage for another second, then stood.

"This one."

The left passage descended sharply, twisting through several rough-cut sections of rock before eventually rejoining smoother, older masonry.

They stepped out of the narrow tunnel and into a wide, familiar corridor.

Arthur recognized the carved archways immediately. They had bypassed the collapsed section and reconnected with the original game route.

He knew where they were now. The lower crypt was close. The boss chamber was deeper, and the route for the Veiled Knife key should branch off somewhere near Saint Orlan’s personal burial chamber.

But as they walked further down the corridor, Arthur stopped.

There was supposed to be a heavy, sealed stone door at the end of this hall. In the game, it was completely impassable, a decorative piece of background architecture that simply marked the edge of the playable area.

The door was standing wide open.

Freezing air flowed up from the darkness below, carrying the faint, heavy sound of stone scraping against stone.

Emily stopped beside him, staring at the open archway.

"Please tell me that’s supposed to be open," Emily said.

Arthur looked at the passage.

"No."