Then, the passage opened, spilling him into a well-lit amphitheater. He blinked, adjusting to the sudden brightness, and his gaze dropped to the scene unfolding below. An altar dominated the center of the room, draped in shadows, its surface cold and gleaming. And there - splayed across it, bound by tendrils of darkness that writhed like living ropes - lay a figure, unmoving.

Surrounding the altar in a twisted pentagram formation were hooded figures, their faces obscured beneath heavy cowls. Each one chanted in an unfamiliar, guttural dialect, the words alien and jagged, tearing through the air with malicious intent. He couldn’t understand the language, but the intent was clear - it was dark, oppressive, vibrating with a sinister energy that crept into his bones.

Jaeden stood there, hidden in the shadows of an alcove, taking it all in. A morbid thought flashed through his mind - something wicked this way comes, and he had to stifle a dark chuckle. The old man’s words came back to him, a warning to observe, to be patient. But something in Jaeden balked at that. Sometimes, there wasn’t time to think; sometimes, all you could do was act. Like swerving in heavy traffic to avoid a crash - instinct, reflex. No thought involved.

Then again, he realized, if someone was well-prepared, if they’d trained, then every split-second reaction wasn’t a decision. It was the culmination of every thought, every calculation made beforehand. He could almost hear the old man’s voice again, half amused, half admonishing.

Jaeden’s gaze drifted over the ritual below, his eyes narrowing as he took in the intricate pattern formed by the cultists around the altar. The design echoed an unsettling blend of symbols - a pentagram, maybe a twisted version of Solomon’s Seal.

His focus shifted to the figure bound at the altar's center. She was young, perhaps his age, her head moving fitfully from side to side, eyes wild with terror. She was bound, not merely by ropes, but by dark, snaking tendrils that writhed around her wrists and ankles, stretched taut to splay her limbs. The coils wrapped along her arms, down her legs, around her torso, leaving her head free, though her every glance radiated fear.

Jaeden clenched his fist around the hilt of his Orichalcum Blade, the weight of her silent plea settling on him like a vice. He knew he had to get her out, but the how of it loomed, uncertain. One wrong move, and he’d be facing a dozen - no, make that a baker’s dozen - cloaked cultists. He glanced around the amphitheater, hoping to spot something useful. The seating encircled the stage in classic Greek fashion, stone benches carved in descending rings, but there was nothing else. No cover, no vantage point.

He glanced down at himself - rough crocodile leather armor layered with bones he’d salvaged from his earlier battles. He’d padded it to muffle the inevitable clattering, but the armor was still too noisy for stealth. His mind flashed to a gaming session with an old friend, who’d once tried sneaking around in full plate armor. It had been laughably impossible, every step a clanging chorus of failure. Deciding he couldn’t risk even the smallest noise, Jaeden slipped back into the corridor, shrugging off the armor with reluctant care.

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Now stripped down to his essentials, he gripped his gladius and a dagger with a jagged, hook-like blade he’d fashioned from the tooth of a particularly venomous snake. Light as he could be, he crept back to the amphitheater’s edge. His focus narrowed, his intention sharpened - Be unseen. Be unheard. Be unnoticed. He willed himself into the shadows, pressing into every patch of darkness as he slipped down the side aisle. A satisfied smirk tugged at his lips when his skill tab showed his survival skills climbing steadily with each step. The running log of his stats progression flickered before his eyes, a reassuring, almost addictive reminder of his growing strength. The boost from his Omnist talent was noticeable.

Shifting tactics, he swapped out the dagger he held for the Prismata shards he’d gained in the Dead Corridors -Unlife, Undeath, Shadow, and Spectral. In his other hand he still held his Orichalcum Sword of Asterius; an enchanted elemental blade.

The shards pulsed with energy, and he hoped their latent power would lend him the aura of obscurity he needed, something to mask his presence from the acolytes. But as he drew closer, he realized it might all be unnecessary; the cultists were so immersed in their chanting that he could’ve practically walked up humming a tune without drawing a glance.

Then he saw it - a shadow shifting behind the altar, growing darker, denser, until it coalesced into a towering figure, half-hidden by the smoke and shadows. The figure’s form was indistinct, as though sculpted from the darkness itself, but the demonic contours of its face became all too clear as it turned. Eyes like black coals, sharp and unforgiving, seemed to bore into Jaeden from across the distance.

“Perfect,” he muttered under his breath. “Nothing says ‘I’ve got this’ like a demon materializing mid-ritual.”

The figure’s face twisted, a cruel smile stretching across its features, revealing fangs that gleamed in the dim torchlight.

Jaeden’s instincts prickled, urging him to try to make sense of the twisted figure before him. He focused, summoning the Assessment ability - a skill he still wasn’t used to using in situations like this, but one that might offer him even the smallest advantage. His vision sharpened, narrowing in on the cultist as a faint blue aura flickered over his eyes.

Assessment activated.

For a split second, the ability flared to life, skimming over the figure’s outline and gathering stray threads of information. But almost immediately, the aura flickered, struggling against an overwhelming darkness that resisted, deflecting his gaze as if the entity itself were somehow… rejecting scrutiny. What he did manage to catch was fragmented, distorted, as though he were peering through a fractured mirror.

Assessment Failed.

A sliver of information slipped through, barely a whisper in his mind:

Entity: Unknown

Nature: Infernal/Unbound

Threat Level: Critical

Weakness: ???

Status: Partial Possession

Current State: Actively draining life force.

And then - nothing. His vision snapped back, leaving a faint, metallic taste in his mouth, as if his attempt to pry into the creature’s nature had cost him something intangible. The resistance he’d sensed, that aura of raw hostility, made it clear - this was no ordinary demon, nor even a mere possessing spirit. Whatever it was, it was resisting him in ways he hadn’t thought possible.

For a moment, he considered trying again, but the sense of malice that had pushed back against him lingered, almost taunting him to probe further. He resisted. Focus, Jaeden, he reminded himself. He knew enough - this was something ancient, something powerful enough to shroud itself even against direct assessment. Whatever advantage he’d hoped for had crumbled, leaving only his instincts to guide him.

Gritting his teeth, Jaeden let the glow fade from his vision. Guess I’ll have to find out the hard way.