The heavy doors of the communal hall slammed shut, the thick wooden bar thudding into place. Outside, the chittering and roars of the Blighted horde were a terrifying symphony of destruction. Inside, the air was thick with fear, smoke, and the smell of blood. About thirty villagers and the Greystone survivors had made it, many of them wounded. Old Man Hemlock and a few women were already tending to the injured with practiced hands.
Kenji lay on the floor, drifting in and out of consciousness. Lyra hovered over him, her light a frantic, pulsing beacon, trying to share her minuscule Aether reserves with him, but it was like trying to fill an ocean with a teaspoon. Martha and Finn were assessing their meager defenses: a few barred windows, the sturdy door.
"How long can we hold out here?" Finn asked, his voice tight with exhaustion.
"Not long enough if that... thing... decides to pay us a visit," Martha said, gesturing vaguely towards the outside. "Our only hope is that it gets what it came for and leaves, or that the Architect here," she glanced at Kenji, "pulls another miracle out of his hat."
Kenji groaned, forcing his eyes open. Elara was kneeling beside him, offering a waterskin. "Drink, child. You have pushed yourself beyond any reasonable limit."
"The Interface... it's... offline," Kenji mumbled, his throat raw. "No Aether... can't... script."
Elara's expression didn't change, but Kenji saw a flicker of deep concern in her ancient eyes. "Then you must rest. Your mind is your weapon, and it needs to recover. We will hold for as long as we can."
The hours that followed were a tense, claustrophobic waiting game. The sounds of the Blighted outside ebbed and flowed. Sometimes, a Skitterer would hurl itself against the door or a shuttered window, making the defenders jump. They could hear the Brood Mother's occasional ground-shaking roars, sometimes closer, sometimes further away.
Kenji, weak as he was, forced his mind to work. Even without the active functions of the SAI, his analytical brain was still processing. Why hadn't the Brood Mother directly attacked the hall? It could surely smash through the doors if it wished. What was its objective?
His passive Aetheric Resonance Scan, though faint and erratic due to his Aetheric exhaustion, was still picking up faint impressions. He focused, trying to filter the chaotic Blight Aether outside. There was something else... a concentration... beneath them?
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[SAI - System Log/Passive Scan - Degraded Mode - ALERT!]
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AETHERIC RESONANCE SCAN (Limited Functionality):
- Ambient Blight Aether: Extremely High (External to Hall)
- ANOMALY DETECTED: Faint, localized Aetheric concentration BENEATH
Communal Hall floor.
- Signature Profile: Clean, Stable, Ancient.
- Further analysis impossible with current user Aether levels (1/100).
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"Elder Elara," Kenji whispered, "is there... anything beneath this hall? An old cellar? A spring?"
Elara looked surprised. "There is an old root cellar, yes, sealed off generations ago. Why do you ask?"
"I'm picking up... a faint, clean Aether signature. From below."
Elara and Martha exchanged a look. "The Heartstone," Martha breathed.
"The what?" Kenji asked.
"The Heartstone of Havenwood," Elara explained, her voice low. "An ancient stone, deep beneath the village center, where the first settlers built their shrine. It is said to be the source of the valley's clean Aether, the reason Havenwood has endured when other settlements fell to blight and decay." She paused. "We always thought it was just a legend to give people hope, though Hemlock swears by its calming influence on his herbs."
A source of clean Aether... concentrated... Kenji's mind, even in its weakened state, began to connect dots. The Blight consumes Aether. The Brood Mother... it's not just rampaging. It's searching. It's targeting the Heartstone.
"That's what it's after," Kenji said, a horrifying certainty dawning on him. "The Brood Mother. It's trying to find the Heartstone to consume it, to corrupt it."
If it succeeded, Havenwood wouldn't just fall; its very essence, its lifeblood, would be extinguished. This was the eye of the storm, and the true target was directly beneath their feet.