The acquisition of the second shard fundamentally changed Kael. He didn't just have shadows now; he had the pressure of the deep. When he walked, the mud of the Drowned Reaches hardened beneath his boots, giving him solid footing where there should have been only muck.

But the cost was mental.

As they rode north toward the Jagged Peaks—where Elara's network suspected the third shard had fallen—Kael was plagued by waking dreams. He would be holding the reins of his horse, and suddenly he was sitting on the Ashenmoor Throne, feeling the crushing weight of a crown on his head, hearing the sycophantic praise of a court that had been dead for six centuries.

"You're bleeding," Sera said bluntly on the third afternoon.

Kael wiped his nose. The back of his glove came away smeared with dark, almost black blood. "The power is fighting my body. It wasn't meant to be held by a mortal mind."

"You need to learn to compartmentalize it. Lock the memories away. Focus on the mission."

"Easy for you to say. You don't have an emperor screaming in your head to drown the world."

They camped that night in the ruins of an old watchtower at the base of the mountains. The air grew frigid, biting through their cloaks. But Kael didn't feel the cold. The oceanic pressure inside him kept his blood unnaturally hot.

It was during the second watch, while Sera slept, that the Inquisitor arrived.

No footsteps. No warning. The campfire just instantly snuffed out, plunged into a darkness so absolute it felt heavy.

Kael stood up, drawing his broadsword. The shadows around his hand didn't flare; they recoiled, pushed back by an opposing, superior darkness.

"Executioner," a voice hissed from the void. It sounded like two stones grinding together. "You have been busy."

A figure stepped into the pale moonlight. It was eight feet tall, draped in tattered executioner's robes identical to the ones Kael used to wear, but the hood was replaced by an iron mask bearing no eye holes. A Hollow Inquisitor. The Council of Regents' ultimate weapon—undead constructs forged from the corpses of failed God-Kings, animated by dark sorcery.

"Sera. Wake up," Kael barked, not taking his eyes off the towering monster.

Sera rolled to her feet, knives already in hand.

"The Council sends its regards," the Inquisitor rasped. It raised a weapon—a massive, double-bladed scythe that glowed with a toxic, sickly green aura. "Return the shards. Submit to the void."

"I already have an axe," Kael said gritting his teeth.

The Inquisitor charged. Despite its size, it moved with terrifying speed. The scythe swept in a massive arc aimed to cut Kael in half.

Kael didn't try to block it with his sword; the iron would shatter. He tapped into the second shard, summoning a concentrated wall of hardened black water. The scythe slammed into the barrier, creating a shockwave that threw Sera off her feet.

"Flank it!" Kael yelled, holding the barrier as the Inquisitor pressed its impossible weight against him.

Sera sprinted, bouncing off a ruined wall and driving two blades straight at the back of the Inquisitor's neck. The knives embedded themselves with a thunk, but the monster didn't even flinch.

"No meat. No vitals," Kael realized loudly. "It's just animated armor!"

The Inquisitor violently backhanded Sera, sending her crashing into the stone debris. She didn't get up.

Rage—pure, unadulterated, kingly wrath—spiked in Kael's chest. He dropped the water barrier under the scythe, stepping directly inside the Inquisitor's guard. The shadows on his left arm formed into a localized singularity.

He punched the Inquisitor dead in the center of its iron breastplate.

"Kneel," Kael roared, his voice echoing with the harmonic chorus of dead kings.

The shadow singularity detonated inward. The Inquisitor's chest armor caved in, crushing the necrotic runes powering it. The glowing green aura sputtered and died. The eight-foot monster collapsed, folding like a broken puppet.

Kael fell to his hands and knees, vomiting black blood onto the dirt.

He crawled over to Sera. She was bleeding from a gash on her forehead, but she was breathing.

"Get up," Kael wheezed, pulling her to a sitting position. "We can't stay here. If they sent an Inquisitor, the Regents know exactly where we are."