The frost surges from the seam and climbs Kynes's veins in bright, sickly threads. For a heartbeat, the chamber seems to recognize him more than it recognizes the stone.
The Entity
There. The lock was never the floor. It is you.
Bren recoils as the glow settles under Kynes's skin, and the old bowing place finally shows its lesson. It was never testing strength alone, it was testing what could be taken without breaking the body.
The Entity
Your frost, your seam, your yield. I kept what bowed first.
Kynes
It is tied to me.
The chamber answers with a colder pulse, as if the truth has tightened every hidden latch at once. Bren steps nearer, face pale, one hand lifting toward Kynes as the parasite's claim becomes plain.
Bren
Kynes, it is feeding on you.
The frost keeps shining, no longer a warning in the stone, but a harvested piece of Kynes's own soul pressed into the shape of a lock.
✓ Quest Accepted
Sever the parasitic tether
✓ Quest Accepted
Learn what the Entity has taken from Kynes
“Nonverbaly I summon sea of shadows and have them go after parasite I might have”
SUCCESS (Legendary Willpower, rolled -2)
Kynes drives his will inward, and the shadows answer like a tide under ice.
They pour across his skin in black sheets, then sink into the bright frost threads with a hungry hiss.
The parasite jerks loose, dragged out of the seam and shredded into vapor before it can cling back to him.
Bren lowers her hand on a sharp exhale, watching the frost drain from Kynes's veins.
The Entity
Wasteful. You cut away what was already yours.
The chamber goes very still. The hearth runes stay indifferent, but a strip of pale frost peels from Kynes's side and drops like spent glass.
Quest Complete
Sever the parasitic tether
“And what did you take from me eh?" I ask as I tilt my head”
SUCCESS (Legendary Willpower, rolled +0)
Kynes
And what did you take from me?
Kynes tilts his head, staff steady, eyes fixed on the vapor above the spire base.
The Entity
Harvest. Pressure. The portion of you that fed the chamber and kept it listening.
The Entity
Not your name. Not your will. The paid weight behind them.
The cold vapor curls tighter, and the answering hush of the chamber makes the words feel carved into stone.
The Entity
You cut the tether. That is why you still stand.
Bren
So that is what the frost was doing to him. A drain, not a mark.
Bren looks from Kynes to the drifting black mist, her relief sharpened by grim understanding.
Quest Complete
Learn what the Entity has taken from Kynes
New Gift: Entity-Memory Reclamation Insight