Veil of Deception

The air in the cavern tasted of dust and forgotten ages. Lyra traced the glyphs etched into the obsidian wall, her fingers brushing away centuries of accumulated grime. Each symbol pulsed with a faint, internal luminescence, a ghostly echo of the power that had once flowed through this place. Beside her, Valerius stood guard, his hand resting on the pommel of his sword, his gaze sweeping the shadows with a practiced, unnerving intensity. Outside, the wind howled a mournful dirge, a stark contrast to the heavy, expectant silence within.

"They are old," Lyra murmured, her voice barely a whisper. "Older than the Starborn, older than the gods we know." The glyphs depicted a celestial dance, stars coalescing and then shattering, a cyclical violence that mirrored the tremor that had shaken their world. But beneath the celestial imagery, darker figures writhed, serpentine and vaguely humanoid, their forms indistinct, like nightmares made manifest.

Valerius grunted, his attention fixed on a narrow passage leading deeper into the earth. "What do they mean?"