Four sewn-mouth bodies guarded the next hall. Their pale faces looked human until the black thread tightened through their lips, and each one held a white rod wrapped in damp strips from the listening tissue under the floor.
The hall behind them rose beyond the reach of the light. Old fist marks, boot scars, and claw cuts covered the black walls, but every dent ended shallow and smooth, as if the stone had softened after each strike.
Jaro kept his voice low. "Lower crews called white-rod enforcers hushers because one rod could quiet a work row until an overseer arrived. I never saw the rod carried by a body like this, and four of them would have emptied a yard without help."
The burned-scalp woman remembered the name. "A husher came after a man lost three fingers and started shouting. Its rod took every nearby voice, so the overseer left him bleeding beside the press. These bodies will aim for anyone who can tell the others what happened."
Renn moved the cloth beneath his coat. "I can count through touch, but remember who stands on either side. If my voice disappears, pass the answer along."
Vaela watched the nearest rod touch the floor. The old marks around its tip faded until only smooth stone remained. "They can close the buried cups and weaken whatever hits this hall. Keep the rods away from the floor, and do not trust a wound merely because the wall hides its mark."
Orrek shifted the chain to his waist. "I can take a rod low if Kael turns the hands. My shoulder will not survive a strike from above."
The first body slid forward and struck Kael across the ribs.
THUD!
Pain spread through his old fractures, but the hall swallowed the echo and smoothed the scrape beneath his heel. A second rod hit his forearm.
BANG!
Kael felt bone ring inside his flesh. The wall erased the sound before the formation could hear what the blow had done.
The Sovereign Root opened.
Kael chose Velocity Movement Authority to enter before the rods closed around him, Gravity Vector Impact to give every blow a direction the hall could not hide, and Primordial Marrow Layer to brace the bones already carrying too many fractures.
ALLOCATE!
====================================================================
[ SOVEREIGN ROOT INTERFACE OVERLAY ]
--------------------------------------------------------------------
≫ HOSTILE PRESSURE DETECTED: No-Response Hall Impact Suppression
≫ EXISTENTIAL SHARDS EXTRACTED: +3
≫ UNALLOCATED EXISTENTIAL SHARDS: 3
--------------------------------------------------------------------
▶ MANUAL ALLOCATION COMMAND RECEIVED
▶ SHARD ALLOCATION REGISTERED: +3 TOTAL
▶ ALLOCATION DISTRIBUTION:
- Gravity Vector Impact -> 48
- Velocity Movement Authority -> 45
- Primordial Marrow Layer -> 32
--------------------------------------------------------------------
≫ UNALLOCATED EXISTENTIAL SHARDS: 0
====================================================================
The next rod started toward his knee. Kael stepped inside its arc and drove his forehead through the body’s sewn mouth.
CRACK!
Pale fluid sprayed across his face. The black stitches snapped, revealing a folded white strip where the tongue should have been. Kael caught the strip between two fingers while the body tried to retreat.
RIP!
He tore it free. The body convulsed, and the nearest section of wall rippled as though the missing strip had been attached to it.
The other three attacked together. Kael took the first rod across his shoulder, turned with the impact, and drove his weight into the second body.
BOOM!
Its chest collapsed. Kael followed it into the wall and struck the sternum again before the stone could smooth the damage.
BOOM!
The body burst through its pale coat. White fluid, black veins, and folded strips struck the wall, leaving a dent deep enough for Renn to see from the passage.
"The mark is still there," Renn said. "Keep answering when you hit them, because the wall is slower while the rods are raised."
A loose black thread reached toward his throat. Vaela found the moving seam and cut it.
SLICE!
The thread fell beside Jaro’s boot. He stamped before it could curl around his ankle.
SQUELCH!
"It was moving toward Renn," Jaro said, breathing too fast, "and I have it under my heel, but somebody needs to cut the end near the wall."
Vaela severed the second end while Orrek moved between Jaro and the remaining rod bearer.
Two bodies crossed their rods and struck the floor. Every old mark in the hall began to fade, including the dent behind the corpse.
Kael closed his fist around the folded strip. Its wet edges cut his palm, but he kept it from dissolving and charged before the rods could touch down again.
His fist broke the first shaft.
BANG!
His knee entered pale ribs.
CRACK!
His heel crushed an ankle.
SNAP!
His hand closed around the narrow throat.
CRUSH!
The body fell because both legs had stopped working. Kael tore the remaining rod from its hands and broke it across his knee.
CRACK!
The last two bodies turned away from him and aimed their rods at the formation. Pressure crossed the hall, dulling the workers’ faces even while the broken bodies lay in front of them.
The burned-scalp woman stared at the blood near her boot. "I saw him kill them, but the room keeps making the bodies look old. Renn, tell me what happened before I lose it."
Renn bit his tongue until blood sharpened his voice. "Two bodies are down, two rods are broken, and Kael is standing between us and the others. Touch the person beside you while I say it again."
The survivors linked wrists and sleeves. Their answers gave the fight a shape the hall could not smooth from one mind at a time.
Kael turned toward the nearest wall. Thousands of small mouths pressed beneath the black surface, each sewn shut around a folded strip. The mouths nearest the rods were closing the dents and drinking the sound from every impact.
Vaela moved beside him. "The rods feed those mouths through the floor. Break a cluster while the bodies are busy, and the damage should remain long enough for everyone to see it."
Kael drove the broken rod into the wall.
CRACK!
Three mouths split around the shaft. Pale fluid ran down the stone, but the openings tried to close over the rod. Kael hammered it deeper.
BANG!
The wall screamed.
SCREECH!
Every survivor heard it. The blood near their boots darkened again, and the broken bodies looked newly dead instead of abandoned.
Orrek dragged another rod from the floor and carried it to the opposite wall. His shoulder dipped before he could raise the point, so Vaela braced his elbow and cut a circle around the mouths he had chosen.
"Hold the shaft below your ribs," she said. "Sova can drive with you, and I will keep the seam from closing on your hands."
Sova joined him at the base. Their combined weight forced the rod through the exposed mouths.
THUNK!
The wall bled around them. Orrek released the shaft before his shoulder tore again, while Sova stayed on it until the opening stopped moving.
Jaro found a folded strip beside the first corpse. "The wall keeps trying to pull this back. I can hold it here, although I would rather not carry it anywhere near my skin."
"Press it against an unmarked section," Vaela said. "We need the mouths beneath the clean stone to open."
Jaro slapped the strip onto the wall and jumped aside. The surface pushed it outward, exposing a ring of hidden lips. Kael punched the strip flat.
BOOM!
The clean stone dented. A whole row of mouths opened, coughing pale fluid and scraps of old thread across the floor.
The last standing body charged Renn. Orrek caught its ankle with the chain, Sova pulled the opposite leg, and Vaela cut the thread running from its rod into the wall. Kael reached it before the mouth could close.
He drove his heel through the jaw.
CRUNCH!
The body collapsed beside Renn without touching him. Its white rod rolled across the floor and stopped against the count cloth.
Vaela pulled Renn away from the rod and checked Kael. One strike had bruised an old rib break, and another left his forearm swelling. His calf remained closed because he had not forced Gravemarrow Arrival Step.
"The arm can still close, but the bone took the full rod," she said while wrapping it. "Use the other hand for the wall, and keep this one away from another direct strike."
Orrek had reopened the puncture beside his shoulder while driving the rod with Sova. Vaela tightened his wrap next, and Sova took the chain until he could settle the load around his waist again.
Renn made every survivor name one visible result while they crossed: a wall dent, a broken rod, white fluid, a split jaw, a blood smear, or an opened mouth. The task sounded simple, but the hall weakened whenever several people held the same memory through different details.
Vaela gathered three folded strips with the tip of her blade, wrapped them in cloth, and secured them inside her belt. "These remain dangerous, but the next chamber may contain the same tissue. I will carry them until we have firm ground and enough light to examine the threads."
Jaro watched the damp bundle disappear beneath her coat. "Keep them away from the bowl and from any part of me expected to sleep later."
The bowl boy took Jaro’s sleeve and guided him around the nearest corpse before his attention wandered back to the walls.
Orrek dragged each body away from the black surface so the mouths could not pull the folded strips back inside. The corpses were light once emptied, but the broken rods remained heavy enough to score the floor.
The formation left its own marks as it crossed. A bloody thumbprint, a scraped boot, and one dark streak from Orrek’s chain remained visible after Kael broke the final cluster of mouths.
Renn counted the standing survivors at the far end.
"Twenty-one people crossed, and everyone can still name something the hall tried to hide."
The walls tightened around the count, but the open mouths could no longer swallow it. Above the formation, a row of pale eyes opened in the darkness and began following Renn’s voice.
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