CHAPTER 239: UNCHAINED

At Elisa’s words, Maggie’s growl thundered through the sealed chamber like a clap of doom.

"Step aside."

Without a heartbeat’s hesitation, she pivoted, all her mass and power condensed into a single spinning motion. The halberd carved a murderous arc through the frigid air, its heavy blade aimed not at the light but at the base of the stone obelisk. She sought no understanding, no negotiation with the unknown. Her primal instinct shrieked a single command: DESTROY THE THREAT.

"MAGGIE, NO!" Elisa’s scream tore from her throat, laced with a terror far greater than the fear of steel.

Too late.

Metal struck stone with a sharp, violent crack, like a bone snapping in half. But instead of the expected echoing impact, an unnatural silence swallowed the sound whole. For a fraction of a second, nothing happened. The blade remained lodged in the obelisk’s base, as if the stone had absorbed the blow.

Then, the fissure at the top of the structure pulsed with blinding, searing light. A shrill moan – coming from everywhere at once, from the walls, the floor, the very air – flooded the chamber. It was no cry of pain, but the sound of awakening, ancient and profound.

The backlash hurled Maggie across the floor. Her halberd remained impaled in the stone like a metallic thorn, while she crashed heavily onto the ground, dazed.

And then chaos.

The light became tangible, a wave of pure force erupting from the obelisk and slamming into Elisa head-on. It did not repel her. It pulled her in.

An invisible current dragged her toward the structure, her boots scraping useless furrows across the stone floor. Her leaden spheres erupted, whirling madly around her with a thunderous roar, scattering shards of green light that twined with the delirious white brilliance. Her eyes flared with unnatural radiance, and a cry escaped her lips – a sound not wholly her own, a mingling of terror and absolute recognition.

"ELISA!" Maggie bellowed, staggering to her feet, her face twisted with horror and guilt.

But Elisa heard nothing. The world had collapsed into a single pulse before her. The void within her howled in joy, screamed in hunger, demanded the contact. It was stronger than her. Far stronger.

Her trembling hand rose against her will. Fingers stretched, not toward the blazing fissure but toward the haft of Maggie’s halberd, still embedded in the stone, acting like a lightning rod channeling the wild energy of the fractured seal.

Her palm closed on the cold metal.

And the world exploded.

A silent discharge, far more violent than the one that had charred the swarm of beetles, erupted from her. It was not electricity, but pure will, magnified, warped, driven insane by contact with the relic. The wave of force smashed into the obelisk.

The stone did not shatter. It... dissolved.

Not into dust, but into millions of fragments of light, scattered in absolute silence, like a mirror breaking in slow motion. Maggie’s halberd, freed, was hurled across the chamber and embedded itself deep in the wall with a dull, shuddering thud.

Where the obelisk had stood, only emptiness remained. An emptiness that pulsed. And at its center, a form.

The colossal silhouette Elisa had glimpsed. But now, fully real.

A giant of stone and shadow, kneeling, head bowed. His armor was black and matte, like obsidian, streaked with pale veins of light that throbbed faintly. Chains of pure energy – the remnants of the seal – still bound his wrists and ankles, but they were unraveling, dissolving into the air like smoke. He did not move. His head stayed lowered, hidden beneath a full helm with only a single narrow slit.

A deathly silence fell. Even Elisa’s spheres had stilled, suspended in the air like insects caught in amber. She knelt gasping, the hand that had touched the metal now burned, blackened, faintly smoking. Her wide eyes fixed on the giant, her mind flooded by something not her own. Shards of memory not hers. Battlefields under a red sky. The bite of frost. Loyalty. Betrayal.

Zirel was the first to break the spell. Curled in the shadow of a rocky outcrop, he stared at the giant with horrified fascination. Then his gaze slid toward Elisa, crumpled and vulnerable, and a calculating gleam ignited in his eyes. The fear of others was one thing. Possessing a weapon like that was another – far more valuable.

"By all the Gods..." Inès whispered, pale as death.

The giant moved.

Only a faint tremor, barely perceptible. A deep exhalation that seemed to rumble from the earth’s core. Cracks split across the stone of his back, dust falling from his shoulders. Then, with crushing slowness – as though time itself dragged at him – he raised his right hand, still bound in the tattered remnants of energy chains.

He did not look at them. His stone fingers, thick as bars, closed slowly over the chest of his armor, where a heart would be. A gesture of oath. Of loyalty. Or of pain.

Then his massive head began to rise. The helm turned, inexorable, and the narrow slit fixed not on Elisa, but on Maggie – who now stood unsteady yet defiant, her face a mask of rage and helpless defiance.

The air grew razor-sharp. What little warmth remained in the chamber was drained away. The giant needed no weapons. His presence alone was war.

Maggie spat on the ground, a gesture of pure instinctive defiance.

"So?" she growled at the thing. "What are you waiting for?"

The giant did not answer. He didn’t need to. The weight of his gaze was answer enough.

And then Elisa spoke, her voice no longer wholly her own, rough, carrying a distant echo.

"He’s not waiting. He’s trying to remember."

All eyes turned to her. She was still kneeling, but now her back was straight. Her gaze, locked on the giant, shone with the same cold light radiating from the stone being.

"He remembers his war. And those who locked him here."

The silence that followed was suffocating. Each breath in the chamber rasped like sandpaper against the lungs. No one moved.

Maggie tightened her grip on nothing — her halberd was still buried in the wall behind her — yet her stance betrayed no hesitation. If the giant advanced, she would throw herself forward with bare hands if need be.

"Elisa," she muttered, her voice strained, as if speaking too loudly might break the fragile stillness. "Step back. Move away from it."