Chapter 171: Inside The Fortress

After the loud sound of the cannon faded, it was quiet except for a ringing sound. A big cloud of hot dust and ash floated out from the fortress, smelling like burnt metal. In the place where the solid black wall was, there was now a giant, gaping hole, and its edges were glowing and melting.

The team picked themselves up, their ears still buzzing from the blast. Draven stared at the opening, his mouth slightly opened in disbelief. “Well,” he finally managed to say. “You certainly know how to knock.”

Seraph was already on her feet, her expression all business. “The hole won’t stay open forever! Let’s go!”

Jonah felt dizzy. Summoning Atlas, even for a short time, had used more of his energy than he thought it would. He took a deep breath, focusing his mind. In his head, he gave his giant creature one last order. Rest.

Outside, the massive form of Atlas shimmered and dissolved into motes of golden light, disappearing as quickly as it had appeared. The immense pressure on Jonah’s soul lifted, but it left him feeling worn out.

“Move!” Seraph barked, pulling him forward.

They moved quickly through the smoke and ran toward the hole. The heat coming out of the opening was very strong. They had to jump over pieces of melted metal that made popping and hissing sounds on the ground.

One by one, they jumped through the hole and into the fortress.

The change was instant and shocking.

Outside was a messy wasteland of ash and pointy rock. Inside was a world of blinding white.

They stood in a giant place with many levels. The floors, walls, and ceilings were all made of a smooth, white material that shined with the light from above. It was more like a high-tech hospital. It was clean and completely without feeling.

The sounds of their boots echoed in the massive, empty space. A constant, low hum vibrated in the air. It was the sound of powerful machines and life support systems running deep within the walls.

But Jonah heard something else.

It was a sound no one else could hear, a faint whisper in the back of his mind. It was many sounds of pain from trapped and hurting creatures.

“This place is huge,” Vanessa whispered, her eyes wide as she looked around. “It’s a maze.”

“And we’re the rats,” Draven added, his hand gripping his sword tightly.

“Not if I can help it,” Jonah said. He needed a map. He needed to be their guide through this horrible place. He closed his eyes, focusing his power. “Trace, Echo. Deploy.”

Trace landed quietly on the floor, its blue eyes already looking around for traps and alarms. At the same time, his Echo appeared from nowhere and let out a silent pulse of sonar energy.

A three-dimensional map of their immediate area began to form in Jonah’s mind. Corridors branched off in every direction, leading up and down to different levels. It was like a big maze, built to confuse and trap anyone who dared to come in.

“There,” Jonah said, pointing down a long corridor to their left. “That way. There’s a group of soldiers coming from the right. We need to move now.”

They quietly moved into a formation they had practiced. Draven went first, Seraph and Vanessa were in the middle, and Jonah was in the back, guiding them with his eyes closed. He was their navigator, seeing and hearing for them in this unfriendly new place.

“Stairs are fifty feet ahead on your left,” he would whisper. “Wait. There’s a trap on the floor in the middle of the next hall. Stay close to the right wall.”

They moved quietly and quickly through the confusing hallways. Twice, they had to hide in empty rooms as patrols walked by. These soldiers weren’t the clumsy guards from before. They were Thorne’s personal guards. They wore shiny, white armor and moved with sharp motions. Wires connected their helmets to their glowing guns. They seemed more like machines than men.

As they went deeper, the true horror of the facility began to reveal itself.

They passed long hallways with thick glass windows. Behind the glass were rooms for operations, full of scary-looking tools. On the tables were half-done experiments, beasts cut open and connected to buzzing machines.

The psychic whimpering in Jonah’s head grew a little louder.

Then, they entered the main containment wing.

The room was massive, at least five stories high. The walls were filled, from floor to ceiling, with hundreds of glowing stasis pods. Every pod was like a coffin standing on its end, with a glass front that was frosted over.

“What is all this?” Vanessa said, her voice shaking slightly.

Jonah walked slowly towards the nearest pod, a terrible feeling spreading through his chest. He wiped away the frost from the glass with his glove.

And his blood ran cold.

**Inside, floating in a pale blue liquid, was a creature. It was a ugly fusion of different beast parts, crudely stitched together. A wolf’s leg was attached to an insect’s body. A bird’s wing was attached to a reptile’s back.

But that wasn’t what really surprised Jonah.

On the creature’s shoulder, there was a scar. An ugly familiar scar. It was a burned, failed copy of his own God Mark.

He fell back a step, feeling sick to his stomach. He looked at the next pod. And the next. And then the next.

They were all the same.

Each pod contained a different, horrifying monster. Each one was a failed experiment. And every single one of them showed the same broken copy of his power.

The faint, psychic whimpering in his mind suddenly made sense. It was them. It was the pain of a thousand creatures that had been tortured and broken, all in an attempt to copy the magic that lived in his soul.

This wasn’t a laboratory.

It was a graveyard. A graveyard of his own stolen potential. Each pod was a life that had been destroyed in the mad doctor’s quest to turn Jonah’s art into an engine of war.

Draven came up beside him and placed a hand on his shoulder. “Jonah?”

Jonah couldn’t stop looking at the pod in front of him. He stared at the broken creature inside, at the scarred mark that mocked his own power.

“He didn’t just steal my blood,” Jonah said, his voice a low, dangerous whisper. “He stole everything.”

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