My Shard Bearer System - Elias's Legacy
Chapter 172: Child’s Mistakes

Chapter 172: Child’s Mistakes

He nodded once, sharp and tight, then turned toward the dark stretch of corridor ahead.

Junjio’s portal Ikona hovered shakily at his side, the ring of light trembling in rhythm with his hands.

"Hurry, Elias. Please," Junjio whispered, voice cracking under the strain. "He’s all I have left."

The desperation behind those words lingered even after Elias pushed forward, boots striking the steel floor in steady, hollow beats.

The overhead pipes blurred past, their slick reflections scattering across the walls, but Elias barely noticed. His focus tunneled ahead, drawn tighter with every step.

The air was heavier here, steeped in oil and something harder to name. His shard thrummed in his chest — insistent, urgent.

Who am I supposed to save? he thought

The thought dug in deep, refusing to let go.

The corridor stretched longer than it should have, clean and sterile in a way that didn’t belong.

Muted lights buzzed overhead, casting dull shadows that seemed to mock the chaos they’d left behind.

Now and then a conduit sparked against the wall — faint, almost deliberate, like the Cube itself was whispering something he wasn’t meant to hear.

Elias pressed forward, the questions pulling tighter inside him.

Goji’s the key, he told himself again, the words looping over and over.

But doubt coiled in the cracks.

What if this is a trap? What if Vira’s pulling the strings? What if Asurik’s been lying from the start?

Dot’s soft hum steadied him against the spiral, her glow brushing faint warmth against the edge of his sight.

Still, the weight of those he’d left behind clung to him with every step.

Kikaru’s pale glare, sharp and defiant even through the haze of blood loss.

Faye’s trembling hands, her shallow breaths catching in fear.

Tidwell’s wounds, bleeding through the crude bandages they hadn’t had time to replace.

Paul’s quiet doubt, lingering in the strained edge of his voice.

Wes’s steady challenge, his stare hard even as his Ikona flickered dimly against the walls.

The timer pulsed hotter in Elias’s mind — seven minutes left.

Each second ground deeper into his body, making the corridor stretch longer, the air heavier, the floor under his boots harder to lift from.

The hallway finally ended at a sealed door, the panel beside it dead and dark, casting faint shadows that pooled across the floor.

A low hum bled from the steel — not loud, but steady enough to feel in the bones.

Elias slowed, standing a few steps short of the door, breathing hard without meaning to.

Asurik moved without hesitation, slamming his fist into the side panel.

The lock hissed.

The door slid open with a mechanical grind, revealing a stark, stripped-down room beyond.

A single cot was pushed against the wall, the sheets tucked with military precision beneath a flickering overhead light.

At the center of the room stood Junjio’s father, still and composed, his graying hair tied neatly back, dark eyes meeting theirs without a flicker of fear.

Goji rose with slow, deliberate movements, the kind of measured calm that spoke of a man with nothing left to fear.

A faint smile tugged at the corners of his mouth — not mocking, not warm, just... detached.

"Thank you for stopping by, Asurik," he said, voice smooth and untouched by the chaos outside these walls.

He shifted his gaze to Elias without missing a beat.

"Oh, Elias. You again."

The smile didn’t falter.

"How did you end up tangled in all this?"

Junjio broke first.

The boy bolted forward, tears cutting fresh tracks down his face as he threw himself into his father’s arms.

The sudden, raw sobs shattered the sterile stillness, filling the room with something almost too human to fit inside these walls.

His small frame trembled against Goji’s chest, the portal Ikona pulsing faintly at his shoulder — the light struggling, flickering with every shaking breath.

For a moment, the cold atmosphere cracked, and the brutal edge that had carried them this far seemed to soften, just a little.

Elias stood frozen, questions and emotions crashing hard inside his skull.

Confusion churned with anger, betrayal twisting tighter around his thoughts.

"What the hell is going on?" he snapped, his voice hitting the steel walls like a shot.

His shard hammered in his chest, syncing painfully with the timer’s relentless beat — six minutes left.

The conduits overhead hummed a low, steady note, threading tension through the edges of the room like a blade pressed against skin.

Asurik’s magma Ikona had dimmed considerably, its molten glow now subdued. He leaned against the doorway, his posture casual, though his voice carried a subtle weight. "Goji and your father went way back, Elias," he began, his tone low and unhurried. "When I found him here, I started planning. Getting him out, getting myself out of this prison."

There was a cold, deliberate edge to his words, one that hinted at the rebellion he had sparked with Jasmine and Culdrin. The weight of the truth pressed into the room, thickening the air, but Elias couldn’t yet grasp the full scope of it. The conduits’ faint hum remained, a mocking undertone to the scene unfolding before him.

Elias’s fury erupted, raw and unrestrained. His fists clenched so tightly that his knuckles turned white, his entire frame trembling with the force of his anger. "Prison?" he shouted, the word slicing through the sterile air.

"Cube X isn’t some dungeon—it’s precautionary! Not a damn cage!" His voice rose, his pulse hammering, each word heavier than the last. "People are dying out there! Burned alive, torn apart—slaughtered—just so you could sneak out? You had the chance to grab Junjio quietly! To avoid the chaos, the bloodshed!" His words cracked at the edges, the weight of the horrors he’d seen dragging them down.

The screams from the hub still echoed in his mind—Jasmine’s blistered, crumpled body; Culdrin’s bones reduced to viscous sludge; Vira’s grotesque puppets, their twisted, bloody forms jerking to her will. He saw it all again in vivid flashes, a waking nightmare he couldn’t shake.