Dr. Amara Voss crawled through the catacombs of Metramoor, her breath shallow in the cold, stale air. Above her, the modern city pulsed with life. Below, the past whispered.
Her lamp flickered, casting trembling shadows over statues with parted lips.
“You abandoned him,” a marble child hissed.
Amara stiffened. The curse of Metramoor’s statues was cruel but simple: they vocalized buried sins.
She kept moving. The Silent King’s crown was real—she could feel it. And if she found it, history would remember her name.
Behind her, Kael’s voice rang out. “Got it.”
She turned. Her partner held the crown aloft, his fingers running over the worn metal. But instead of triumph, his smirk sent a chill down her spine.
“You think I’d share glory with a fraud?” he sneered.
Amara’s stomach lurched.
Kael tossed a brittle scroll at her feet. Her forged credentials. The lie he’d helped create. “You never belonged here, Amara. You’re a footnote. I’ll make sure you stay one.”
The statues inhaled. Their voices rose in a terrible symphony.
“Traitor.”
“Liar.”
“Usurper.”
Amara’s pulse pounded. If she was going to be erased, she’d choose how.
She slammed her fist into the nearest pillar. The catacombs trembled.
Cracks spiderwebbed across the stone. The statues’ eyes glowed as centuries of silence shattered.
Kael stumbled, crown slipping from his grasp. “What are you doing?” he gasped.
The statues answered for her.
“Revolution.”
Stone hands erupted from the ground, dragging Kael into the abyss. His screams echoed, swallowed by the chorus of the condemned.
Amara snatched up the crown. The air buzzed with power. Then, a whisper—soft, knowing.
"Change your story."
The Silent King’s voice.
She clenched her jaw. Then, with a sharp inhale, she shattered the crown against the floor.
The statues fell silent.
Aboveground, as the ruins collapsed, something else cracked open. The city’s streets filled with protesters. Leaders fell. Corrupt histories crumbled. None of them knew what she had done—only that something had shifted.
Amara didn’t stay to watch. She walked away, her past buried in the rubble.
But this time, her name was etched in something truer than stone.