Chapter 12: Chapter 12: Temple of Hollow Voices

The dawn arrived not with golden rays, but with a grim silver light that bled through the jungle canopy like fog rolling off cold steel.

Abraham stood at the edge of their makeshift camp, adjusting the straps of his satchel and inspecting his staff. A chill passed through him—not the crisp freshness of morning, but the clinging kind, like something watching from beneath the soil.

The forest felt different today—stiller, heavier. Even the birdsong had abandoned them. The trees towered over them like solemn sentinels, their leaves whispering secrets in a language none dared translate.

Abraham’s thoughts were restless. His dreams the night before had been riddled with distorted voices and whispering faces. Tess snored gently behind him, curled in her blanket beside the dying embers of their campfire, while Chop was already awake, his antennae flicking as he stared into the brush.

Maelin arrived with silent grace, emerging from the dense jungle as if she’d simply grown from it. Her bark-skinned form shimmered faintly with morning dew, and she carried no weapon, only her carved wooden staff inlaid with glimmering green veins.

She didn’t greet them with words, only a curt nod, and turned toward the southern path.

Chop led the way, each step a heavy thud on the moss-covered trail. His pincers clicked softly, almost thoughtfully, and his antennae swept the path ahead like divining rods. Its presence was unnervingly quiet today—focused, alert.

Behind him came Tess, half-awake and already grumbling.

“Can we just once have a quest that starts after breakfast? Or at least after second breakfast?”

“You had two rations and half my bread,” Abraham said, deadpan.

“And I’d do it again. With jam,” she replied, rubbing sleep from her eyes and giving Maelin a side-glance. “You know what I miss? Bedrolls that don’t smell like jungle rot.”

Maelin didn’t even turn. “The temple doesn’t keep mortal hours. The less time we spend near its influence, the better."

“Yeah, because ominous haunted temples are well-known for their hospitality,” Tess muttered, tightening her sword belt.

Their journey continued in unusual silence. The forest seemed to hold its breath, as though it too feared what lay ahead. Even insects, usually an unrelenting chorus, had gone mute.

Abraham could feel it now—the pressure building with every step. It was like walking downhill underwater, the resistance unnatural.

A stone marker half-buried in vines signaled the edge of something sacred—or cursed. A symbol etched in blood-red mineral depicted a distorted face with five mouths. Tess stared at it for a moment.

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“Do I want to ask what that means?”

“Echoes of corrupted Green Warden,” Maelin said. “They believed voices were power. Even after their corruption, their humm never stop.”

“Neat,” Tess said. “Still not sleeping tonight.”

Finally, they emerged into a clearing. The jungle ended with an abruptness that felt almost surgical. Trees stopped growing within a perfect circle. Cracked stone and creeping ivy stretched across what must have once been a grand courtyard.

The center held the temple—massive, decayed, but terrifyingly intact.

It jutted from the earth like a broken tooth. The ziggurat structure rose in jagged steps, each level marred with age and claw marks. Faces carved into the stone leered down at them—some beastlings, others distorted by time and madness. Each face bore an expression of agony, mouths frozen mid-scream.

Tess took a step back, involuntarily. “That’s... so many faces.”

Maelin raised her staff, her voice reverent. “This temple was devoted to the Green Warden. When the corruption spread, they didn’t flee. They opened the gates and welcomed it. Believed it would preserve their souls as sound.”

“So now we’re walking into a haunted podcast archive,” Abraham muttered.

As they stepped onto the first stone tier, the air changed. Colder. Staler. A weight fell on Abraham’s shoulders, not physical, but emotional—like stepping into a room where someone had just wept. The scent of mildew and forgotten incense filled his lungs.

The hair on his arms rose.

Chop paused at the archway, antennae twitching. He clicked twice, sharply, and waited.

“There’s movement inside,” Abraham said. “He senses it.”

Tess gripped her sword. “Oh good. I was starting to worry this would be a normal day.”

Inside, the hallway stretched long and narrow, illuminated only by the faint glow of Tess’ summoned fire ball. The walls were carved with lines of scripture in a language none of them could read. Hooded statues flanked the path, their faces hidden beneath crumbling hoods.

The silence was oppressive, broken only by the whisper of footsteps and the soft tap of Chop’s feet.

Maelin ran her hand along the wall. “Memory clings to this place. It’s like walking through someone else’s dream.”

'Or nightmare', Abraham thought.

He cast a minor necromantic spell, weaving threads of green light through the hallway. Traps revealed themselves in subtle shifts—faint pressure plates, hollow tiles. The temple was ancient, but its malice was fresh.

They rounded a corner and came to a chamber filled with flickering blue flames hovering in the air.

The center of the room held a dais upon which floated a skeletal figure draped in ceremonial robes of dry leaves, moss, and silk so faded it looked gray.

Its skull rose slowly. Pale green fire burned in empty sockets.

“Who seeks the silence?” it asked. Its voice echoed not aloud but inside their minds, vibrating like a struck bell.

Maelin stepped forward, firm and unflinching. “We come to silence this place. The corruption must be purged.”

The specter laughed. The sound was wrong—not from a mouth but from the very walls around them, like a joke remembered centuries too late.

“You would silence what remembers? We are the echo. We are all that remains.”

Tess whispered, “Creepy crypt guy’s got a flair for drama.”

The specter raised one hand.

From the walls, floors, and shadows came the echoes. Ghostly beastling-figures; priests, soldiers, children, flickered into existence. Their mouths moved but made no sound. Their eyes glowed with a spectral green hue, and they marched forward, weapons raised, arms outstretched.

Abraham raised his hands. “Hold!”

His magic exploded outward, threads of necromantic energy weaving through the air. Chop lunged forward, his claws glowing with spectral energy, swiping through two of the ghost-figures. They dissolved into mist.

Tess rolled forward, slicing through another with a shimmering strike from her sword. “They’re fragile—but too many!”

Maelin anchored herself on the dais and struck the ground with her staff. Roots burst from the stone, wrapping around the spectral leader and pinning it in place.

Abraham narrowed his eyes. “You’re just echoes. You don’t belong anywhere anymore.”

The specters faltered, and for a heartbeat, Abraham felt something—doubt? Regret?

He slammed his staff down. “BE STILL!”

A pulse of necromantic force exploded from him. The specters froze, light draining from their forms. With a final surge of power, Abraham funneled every thread of his will into silencing them. Not destroying, not banishing, just quieting them.

The room fell still. The flame above the dais flickered and vanished. Only the silence remained, not empty, but peaceful.

Maelin exhaled. “You’ve... silenced them. Not destroyed. You honored their memory.”

“I just asked nicely,” Abraham said with a tired smile. What he did just now drain him so much.

Chop clicked once, almost like approval.

Tess looked around, still holding her sword. “Can we leave before this place decides to remember and make the retarded version of us?”

They turned to go. But far below, in the catacombs beneath the ziggurat, something vast and ancient stirred. Its eyes opened—not with anger, but curiosity.

It had heard the silence.

And it remembered Abraham’s voice.

***