"So this is the 'lake' you told me about that day? Calling it an abyss would probably be more accurate."
The abyss before them was the point where two worlds met, the gateway through which the Void entered the material realm.
Its shape looked exactly like Zihark's mutated eye, as if a giant single eye were hiding underground and peering into the world above.
The moment he saw it, Zihark's heart jolted.
And after hearing what Kai'Sa said, he almost started wondering whether his eye had become a gateway to the Void itself.
But he quickly crushed that thought. If that were true, his body could never have withstood such an overwhelming force.
Just as Zihark was rubbing at his eye, a fierce sense of danger crashed over him.
In the abyss, countless black pupils without souls condensed out of nothing and lifted their gaze upward.
Pale matter spiraled into nauseating shapes, fixing itself into the ugly outlines of newborn creatures.
Hunched spines unfurled and straightened. Swollen limbs stretched out and lengthened. Hooked claws took shape from that liquid sea of madness. Frenzied evolution wove translucent monsters together and gifted them shrill, piercing cries the instant they were born.
Only now did he feel the danger—because those monsters had only just been born.
Watching the voidspawn come into existence sent furnace-hot heat surging through Zihark's body. Kai'Sa trembled faintly beside him, and she clearly did not feel much better.
More than a thousand rustling creatures crawled up out of that sea of madness, straining to get closer to them.
They had come from deep below the earth, or perhaps from somewhere deeper still, traveling in swarms through the cracks between worlds, climbing upward until they reached the surface. They carried a murderous impulse that could never be soothed, forever walking the path of decomposition and ruin.
"Run!"
This time it was Zihark who grabbed Kai'Sa and pulled her away. After two hurried steps, he broke into a sprint, trying desperately to put as much distance between them and the abyss as possible.
After staring into it, Zihark suddenly understood something.
The voidspawn they had encountered before had never been truly motionless.
Their existence had always been driven by purpose.
They were the ones whose endless digging had turned the underground into a place riddled with holes, and the maze of tunnels and caverns they walked through was the work of those creatures.
The underground was far more dangerous than anything they had seen so far.
Before long, the sound of stone being scraped apart started echoing behind them.
The monsters were catching up.
Zihark glanced back, sent out the invisible ripple from his eye, and froze them in place before turning and running again.
But his mind-control had a limited range. The instant the distance widened and the creatures slipped out of it, they resumed the chase at once.
They dashed through one fork after another, but the monsters always managed to find the exact path they had taken.
He had never felt anything unusual when using his own senses like a radar to track prey, but now that he himself had appeared on a predator's radar, he finally understood just how relentless that ability really was.
Another fork appeared in the darkness ahead, and as they ran, both of them prayed this one would finally throw the swarm off their trail.
Kai'Sa always followed Zihark's lead, and he was usually the one who chose which path to take. His perception kept them from stumbling into dead ends where monsters were lying in wait.
But there were exceptions.
Like this time.
He did not sense the danger beneath their feet until he was already standing on top of it.
Then Zihark did something Kai'Sa never could have expected.
In the middle of their sprint, he suddenly flung their clasped hands apart, shoved Kai'Sa away with all his strength, and used the recoil to throw himself in the opposite direction.
That single instant was all it took for death to pounce.
A monster several times larger than the two of them burst up through the rock beneath their feet, its huge jaws slamming shut through the empty air between them.
If Zihark had not sensed the danger at the last moment and pushed her away, at least one of them would have been swallowed whole.
Kai'Sa lost her balance and hit the ground hard, her shoulder bruised by the shower of flying rock.
But compared to the worst possible outcome, that sort of injury meant nothing.
She sprang back up and slashed angrily at the monster's shell.
Her claws carved deep gouges into the chitinous armor, but if she wanted to reach its heart, it was nowhere near enough.
The moment Zihark saw that even Kai'Sa's claws could not tear open the burrowing worm's shell, he gave up any thought of trying with his own.
Her claws had one more layer of dark carapace than his did. If even those could not break through, then his had no chance.
He shouted for Kai'Sa to circle around the burrowing worm and get back to his side, because the voidspawn swarm had already reached the battlefield.
But the instant she moved, the burrowing worm dipped its head toward her. Its eyeless face had nothing on it but a massive gaping mouth, exposing a deep throat lined with sharp fangs and a hose-like tongue probing for a way in.
Its jaws snapped shut.
Kai'Sa was forced to dive backward, barely avoiding those teeth.
But that moment of delay was enough. The enormous swarm of voidspawn had already closed in around her.
"No!"
Zihark's eyes flew wide open. Ripples spread across the abyss-like surface of his left eye, and invisible waves rolled out above the swarm, halting the frenzied creatures just before they could tear Kai'Sa to pieces.
Their hunger made them writhe and shudder, but he calmed them, then directed some of the voidspawn toward the burrowing worm instead.
Zihark could control the voidspawn, but the stronger burrowing worm was completely beyond him. Its huge segmented body blocked the tunnel from wall to wall. If they did not kill it, the two of them would never be able to reach each other.
The maddened voidspawn pounced onto the worm, their needle teeth scraping long marks across its shell. The burrowing worm thrashed violently, twisting its body and trying to shake them loose.
An opening!
While its attention was fixed on the voidspawn, Kai'Sa seized the chance Zihark had created for her and tried to slip around the worm along the tunnel wall.
But just as she was about to make it back—
The worm's shell suddenly sprang open.
Rows of long, narrow, needle-like legs flipped out from inside and stabbed into the rock walls on both sides like locking bolts, sealing off her path completely.
Only then did Kai'Sa realize that the monster's legs had been hidden inside its shell all along.
And it was not just legs.
It had eyes too.
Pitch-black pupils were set along both sides of its segmented body, one pair on every section, and from the very beginning they had been watching her and Zihark separately. The instant either of them tried to move closer to the other, it lashed out with terrifying speed.
The obstacles between them kept piling up, and Kai'Sa was so frantic she was on the verge of tears.
Then she noticed that those needle-legs were thin and looked almost fragile. She immediately wanted to rip them apart and force her way back to Zihark.
But the moment she raised her claws, Zihark stopped her.
"Don't do anything stupid! It's too dangerous!"
The voidspawn under his control could not kill the thick-shelled burrowing worm. That thing blocking the tunnel had become an obstacle they could not cross, so in the end he could only force himself to give the order.
"Kai'Sa, run. Take the other fork. I'll hold the swarm here. Once you're safe, I'll leave by the other path. Don't worry—I'll find you again with my ability."
The instant he finished speaking, the dense swarm around Kai'Sa opened into a narrow passage.
His energy was draining fast. If they did not decide now, neither of them would survive.
"But if I go, you won't be able to shake the swarm!"
Kai'Sa was not stupid. She knew exactly what his plan meant. Whether he intended it that way or not, the result would be the same—he would be the one left behind to draw the pursuit away from her.
"This is the best option! You can get away, and there's still a chance they won't catch me!"
Tears kept spilling from Zihark's aching eye. His eyelids felt as heavy as mountains, ready to slam shut at any second.
But he did not dare let them close.
Not even for an instant.
He was afraid that the moment he blinked, the swarm would break free and tear Kai'Sa to shreds.
And in that moment, when fate came crashing down, ten-year-old Kai'Sa followed her instincts and made her choice.
"I don't want us to split up! I want to stay with you!"
[End of chapter]