Mesopotamia

The battleground of Beneventum still dallied in Rome’s collaborative memory as a strange admixture of triumph and apprehension. Pyrrhus had withdrawn, defeated not by a single decisive blow but by prostration, by the stubborn grind of Roman adaptability, and by the stirring runs of Italian politics that deprived him of abettors . Yet indeed as the bank cleared and the Epirote king sailed down, leaving only fractions of his formerly...

With the appearance of early spring, the denes and plains of southern Italy exfoliate their downtime silence, awakening with the restless murmurs of renewed conflict. The wind that swept across the Ionian seacoast carried with it the smell of blooming vineyards and damp soil, yet beneath this pledge of renewal lay the heavy shadow of war. Farmers returning to their fields set up the earth scarred with the remnants of camps, fosses,...

The ocean, calm and deceptive beneath the rising sun, stretched from the southern tip of Italy to the distant props of Sicily, a liquid trace that would soon carry Rome’s intentions beyond the promontory. For decades, the Italian Republic had concentrated inward, conquering Samnites, subduing Lucanians and Bruttians, and integrating the Greek metropolises of Magna Graecia. Its legions, forged in the gauntlet of Pyrrhus’s juggernaut...

The steps coming down the stairs were n't simply loud; they were incredibly heavy, each one making the rustic way creak as though bearing the weight of commodity far larger than a mortal being. Tarek felt the climate through the floorboards, pulsing up through his shoes and into his bones, each step sounding like it belonged to a critter sculpted out of gravestone and shadow. Arman artificially backed up until his shoulders hit the...

The voice that rumored her name was n’t loud. It was n’t hanging . It was n’t distorted like the critter’s icy, concentrated speech. rather, it sounded soft — far too soft — like a breath pressed gently against her observance, a private murmur meant only for her. The impropriety of its tenderheartedness stupefied Maya’s blood more deeply than any monstrous roar could have. She staggered backward artificially, her heel catching on t...

The bottom bucketed with a metrical shiver, each earthquake deep enough to rattle their bones as though commodity beneath the old structure had awakened from a centuries-long slumber. Dust sifted down from the ceiling in soft argentine wastes, drifting through the fluttering dim light like falling ash. Maya artificially stepped back, nearly tripping over the open tablet lying on the depraved bottom. The signed eye on the runner bli...

The chamber palpitated around them, alive in ways that defied sense. The walls palpitated like breathing meat, rising and falling in an implacable meter that resounded through Maya’s bones, through the soles of her bases, through the veritably gist of her cranium. Every palpitation shook the bottom beneath them, forcing her to hold the tablet tighter, as if sheer force of will could keep them from being swallowed whole. Arman sat f...

The silence after the collapse of the heart was absolute, yet it pressed down on them like a palpable weight, thick and stifling, as if the structure itself exhaled its final judgment. Maya, Arman, and Tarek lay on the bottom of the massive chamber, cases heaving, sweat running in streamlets down their faces, the tablet still gripped tightly against Maya’s casket. Indeed in its stillness, the essay eye flitted noiselessly, a quiet ...

The air outside the chamber felt different, sharp and smelling against their exhausted lungs, carrying with it a weight that was both real and cerebral. Maya stepped cautiously over the cracked, pulsating bottom of the patio’s final platform, the tablet held near to her casket, its sanguine gleam now faint, nearly a twinkle in quiet alignment with her own. Every step resounded through the empty hallways that led down from the destr...

The vale stretched before them, scarred and uneven, remnants of the collapsed structure sprawled like the cadaverous remains of some unconceivable beast. The morning air was cool, crisp, carrying the faint scent of rain and earth, a transitory memorial that the world outside the agony still was, still breathed. Maya, gripping the tablet tightly against her casket, felt the faint palpitation beneath her fritters, nearly like a twink...

The first shafts of morning strained over the crest, washing the vale below in muted gold and casting long murk that twisted across the jagged terrain like faint echoes of the night. Maya pressed the tablet to her casket, feeling its gentle, metrical palpitation beneath her fritters, a quiet twinkle that sounded to attend with her own. Each subtle chirr carried consolation, a memorial that they had survived the structure’s cores, t...

Dawn broke over the vale with a pale, reluctant light, discovering across jagged terrain and shattered modes like the first conservative strokes of a painter’s encounter. Maya stood at the edge of the crest, tablet pressed to her casket, sanguine gleam faint but steady, illuminating her determined face. The remnants of the structure below lay silent, yet every shadow sounded invested with a residual mindfulness that clung stubbornl...

The vale was cloaked in a pale morning mist, tendrils of fog entwining over shattered modes and jagged debris, softening the harsh edges of destruction while amplifying the quiet pressure in the air. Maya stood at the crest, tablet pressed to her casket, sanguine palpitation faint but pertinacious, illuminating the faint outlines of modes and murk that shifted subtly across the terrain. The intelligence bedded in the remnants of th...

The morning mist rolled over the jagged vale like a restless drift, winding through fractured modes and crooked debris, softening the harsh edges while casting long, fluid murk that sounded nearly alive. Maya squinched at the crest, tablet pressed to her casket, its sanguine gleam pulsing noiselessly in meter with the subtle climate she could feel beneath her bases. The intelligence bedded within the remnants of the structure dalli...

The vale was shrouded in a thin, restless mist, entwining through the shattered modes and jagged terrain, casting murk that moved like silent, observing realities. Maya squinched at the edge of a collapsed crest, tablet pressed tightly to her casket, its sanguine gleam pulsing noiselessly, in meter with the residual temblors she could feel through the shattered ground. The structure’s intelligence, though dormant, was patient and e...

A thin robe of mist floated over the vale, entwining through the shattered modes and jagged terrain like liquid murk. The faint hum of residual energy threaded through the crevices, wobbling noiselessly beneath Maya’s bases as she squinched near a tertiary knot. The tablet pressed to her casket palpitated sanguine, faint and steady, reverberating in subtle harmony with the pulsing earth beneath them. The structure’s intelligence, t...

The vale lay shrouded in the pale argentine light of early dawn, mist entwining through fractured modes and jagged terrain, softening the edges of ruin while revealing subtle beats of residual energy. Maya squinched near a tertiary knot, tablet pressed tightly to her casket, its sanguine gleam pulsing noiselessly in meter with the temblors that ran beneath the ground. The structure’s intelligence, dormant yet eternal, remained pati...