The Day Death Died

The Day Death Died - Chapter 31

Pandora's Box was heavier than I had expected. Its dark, gleaming surface was cold against my skin, and the strange symbols etched into its metal seemed to pulse faintly, as if alive. I could feel the raw, chaotic power within it—an ancient energy that threatened to unravel everything if it wasn't contained. But it wasn't just the weight of the box in my hands that bore down on me. It was the weight of everything that had led us here: the destruction in my town, the souls of those trapped by the Keres, and the unknown consequences of what we were about to do.

I glanced at Edwin as we hurried through the shadowed tunnels, retracing our steps through the labyrinth of the Cimmerian Abyss. The oppressive atmosphere hadn't lifted. If anything, it felt thicker, more suffocating. The abyss itself seemed aware that something had been taken from its depths—something it wasn't willing to let go of easily.

He was silent, his gaze flicking around every shadowed corner, every twist in the path. He moved with the same grim determination as before, but there was something else in his posture now—a tension, an urgency that hadn't been there before. His scythe was held ready in his hand, but I could see the tightness in his grip. Even Death seemed nervous.

"What are you thinking?" I asked, my voice breaking the silence.

He didn't respond right away, his eyes still scanning the shadows. After a beat, he sighed. "I'm thinking we've stolen something Tartarus doesn't want us to have."

"I know. It feels like it's trying to push us out, or keep us in," I said, the air growing thicker with each breath. "Do you think we'll be able to leave?"

"If we're fast enough," he replied, though there was a hesitation in his voice that made my stomach twist. "The abyss has a way of playing tricks with time. It might try to trap us in a loop, but we'll make it. We have to."

We had no other choice.

The path ahead was darker than before, the once-familiar cavernous walls now twisted and warped by the living shadows of Tartarus. The ground beneath our feet felt unstable, as though it could collapse at any moment. The air buzzed with the whispers of the souls trapped in this place—angry, resentful, bitter murmurs that scratched at the edge of my mind, threatening to pull me under.

"Stay focused," Edwin warned, noticing my faltering steps. "Ignore them. They'll try to distract you, try to drag you down."

I nodded, clutching the box tighter to my chest, feeling its cold metal surface press against me like an anchor. I had to stay grounded. If I lost focus now, we might never make it out.

The path ahead opened up into a wider chamber, the darkness swirling like thick smoke. The ground trembled beneath our feet, the vibrations growing stronger with each passing second.

"We need to hurry," Edwin said, his voice tense.

We crossed the chamber quickly, but the shadows were growing thicker, closing in around us. It felt like the very walls of Tartarus were shifting, trying to seal us inside, to make sure we couldn't escape with what we had taken.

"Edwin," I whispered, my heart pounding in my chest as I glanced over my shoulder. The shadows behind us writhed like a living thing, undulating and creeping forward. "We have to move faster."

Without another word, Edwin broke into a sprint, and I followed suit, the box heavy in my arms as I ran. The walls blurred past us, the dark path twisting and bending in unnatural ways. The once-solid ground beneath our feet rippled like water, forcing us to dodge and weave around cracks and fissures that opened up in the stone.

The tunnel ahead forked into three different paths, each one darker and more foreboding than the last.

"Which way?" I shouted, my voice echoing off the walls.