Chapter 83 — Nessis
The HUD appeared without being summoned.
It always appeared without being summoned — that was the specific trait of Steve's broken system, which fulfilled none of the functions it was supposed to but never missed an opportunity to show up when the information was the worst possible.
**[LEVELING SYSTEM: AUTO-DESTRUCTION IN 6 DAYS]**
Steve stared at the numbers for a second.
Then he looked away toward the trees of the underground forest sliding past on both sides, with that dark-green shade that belonged to no forest he had ever known, and tried not to think about what six days meant in practical terms.
It didn't work.
*Six days.* The thought didn't arrive in a calm voice — it arrived as pressure, as something pushing from the inside out with no exit. *I have to get out of here. I have to find a way. I have to—*
He glanced back on reflex.
Dagon was three metres directly behind him, in that posture of someone who was not watching but was watching all the same, brown eyes fixed on Steve with the specific attention of a person who had learned to anticipate certain kinds of movement.
— Any problem, kid?
Steve looked forward again.
*Fuck it.*
The thought formed with the specific clarity of a decision made before it was fully processed. *I'll try. Worst case, it doesn't work, and I'm exactly where I am now. But I can't just stand here waiting for six days to run out without doing anything.*
The forest had a spot on the left where the trees grew closer together, a pocket of dense vegetation that created enough cover for — if he ran fast enough, if the angle was right, if Dagon's attention slipped for a single second—
Steve ran.
His feet left the path before any other part of his body had registered the decision to run, with that specific momentum of a choice that precedes the ability to question it. The forest rushed toward him at speed — branches, thick undergrowth, the uneven floor of the underground forest changing texture beneath his feet—
There was a sword pointed at his forehead.
Steve stopped.
Dagon was in front of him. Not in front in the sense that he had run there — he was simply there, with that quality of presence Steve still could not fully process, one that did not obey the laws of movement human bodies were supposed to obey. The sword did not tremble. His eyes held no anger — only the expression of someone making a factual statement he would have preferred not to make.
— Run one more time — Dagon said — and I'll speed up your death.
Steve did not answer.
The sword lowered. Dagon steered him back onto the path with the gesture of a shepherd who does not need to touch the animal to communicate direction, and Steve went because the alternative was literally pointed at his head.
The group continued walking as if nothing had happened. Keara stared straight ahead with excessive determination. Orzun studied a tree with sudden and disproportionate interest. Jelim did not glance sideways.
Steve walked beside Yelra in silence for thirty full seconds.
— Why me — he said at last, voice low enough not to reach the others. The anger in his voice was not performative. It was the real anger of someone trying to understand the logic of a situation that had no satisfactory logic. — Why do I have to accept all of this just because I'm weak.
No one answered. Because it had not been a question for anyone in particular.
But the thoughts kept coming. *Six days. I have to escape. I can pretend I have stomach pain — distract them, find a moment, if I can get someone to—*
*And how exactly do you plan on doing that?*
Steve stopped mid-step.
The voice had not come from outside.
It was not Jelim — the modulation was different, more direct, without the calculated weight Jelim's voice always carried.
— Jelim? — he said under his breath.
*No.*
A single word. With that specific tone of someone slightly annoyed at being mistaken for someone else.
*It's me. Yelra.*
Steve looked at Yelra beside him.
She was looking forward. Mouth closed. Absolutely no facial movement that matched a conversation.
— Yelra — Steve said, in a completely normal voice.
Yelra turned her head.
*Don't speak out loud —* the voice arrived with that light urgency of someone trying to teach an obvious protocol. *They'll think you're having a breakdown.*
— Who are you? — Steve said, still in a completely normal voice. — I don't know any Yelra.
*Hmm.* A pause with the specific weight of someone reconsidering their assessment of another person. *I am the Nessira.*
— The Nessira — Steve repeated.
*With an annoyed tone* was an insufficient description for what came next.
— WHAT DO YOU MEAN "ONLY YOU"?
Yelra's voice came out loud, completely audible, with that volume of anger that had not been calculated but had burst out before any filter could catch it. Her fist clenched at her side. The expression that crossed her face for half a second before she controlled it was that of someone who had been genuinely insulted in a way she had not expected.
The entire group turned.
Keara with wide eyes. Orzun with his hand on his knives by reflex before realising there was no visible threat. Jelim with her head tilted in the posture of someone calculating what had just happened.
Dagon stopped completely.
— What's going on over there?
— Nothing — Steve said, who was in shock.
— Nothing — Yelra said, breathing a little faster than usual.
*Sorry —* the voice arrived in Steve's mind, now in a completely different tone, with the specific quality of someone who had lost control in a way she had not intended and was genuinely embarrassed about it. *I can't control the anger when I'm ignored like that.*
— You're crazy — Steve said, this time in a low voice.
*Possibly.* A pause. *But the immediate problem is you. Do you have an escape plan?*
Steve looked forward. At Dagon's back. At the forest on both sides. At the HUD that had flashed the six days briefly before disappearing again.
*I'm going to pretend I have stomach pain —* he thought, with the quality of a thought that had not yet fully realised it was being read. *If you help me distract Dagon for thirty seconds—*
*Count me in —* Yelra said.
Steve felt something loosen slightly in his chest. Not complete relief — only the version of relief that comes from realising you are not completely alone in a given absurd situation.
*On my signal —* he began.
— Steve is planning another escape.
Yelra's voice came out clear, completely audible, in the specific tone of a factual announcement from someone informing the relevant parties of pertinent information.
Steve froze.
It was not immediate shock. It was that specific brain process of receiving information, trying to process it, meeting resistance because the information made no logical sense, and repeating the cycle before arriving at any result.
— My God — slipped out in a very low voice.
Dagon had turned. He was walking toward Steve with the expression of someone who had reached the specific limit of a certain kind of patience and was calculating the most efficient response to the problem.
His hand went to his sword.
— I've had enough—
— That won't be necessary, Dagon.
Yelra stepped forward. Her voice came out completely calm, with the quality of someone who was not making a request but presenting a more efficient solution.
— Tie a rope between our hands. That way it becomes impossible for him to try again.
Dagon stood still.
He looked at Yelra. At Steve. At the rope Orzun was already pulling from his pack with the specific speed of a young orc who had been waiting for anything useful to do.
He stayed like that long enough for it to become uncomfortable.
Then he took the rope.
The rope was perhaps sixty centimetres long between their wrists — enough to walk without tripping over each other, not enough for anything that required distance.
Steve walked in silence for two full minutes, with the silence of someone organising exactly what he wanted to say before saying it so it would not come out wrong.
Yelra walked beside him, in the posture of someone who was not sorry but was prepared for the conversation she knew was coming.
— You know — Steve said at last, in a completely controlled voice — that I was trying not to die.
*I know.*
— And that you just made that a lot harder.
*I made it less likely.* A pause. *There's a difference.*
Steve breathed deeply through his nose.
*If you had tried to run a second time —* the voice continued in his mind — *Dagon would have used the sword. Not as a threat this time.*
Steve did not answer immediately.
Because he knew it was true. He had seen Dagon's eyes. He had seen the difference between calculated threat and real limit.
— So — he said — why. Why do you care if I die or not.
The silence that followed was different from the others. Not the silence of an answer being built. The silence of an answer that already existed and was being weighed for how much honesty it would contain.
*Because I know how you feel.*
The voice came lower. With the quality of something said carefully.
*Being treated like a piece. Like a resource. Like something others move wherever they need it.* A pause. *It may not seem like it, but I know exactly what that's like.*
Steve glanced at her sideways.
Yelra kept looking forward. Her profile held the expression of someone who had said something true and was waiting to see what the other person would do with it.
— When we reach your people's village — Steve said — you'll help me get out.
*Yes.*
— Why.
*I already told you.*
— I want to hear it again.
Yelra turned her face toward him. Her green eyes held their own light that was not reflection but production, faint and constant, like something underneath that never fully went out.
*Because I can.* A minimal pause. *And because it's the right thing.*
Steve stayed silent for a moment.
— I hope that's true.
*Trust me —* Yelra said. And the corner of her mouth moved slightly.
They walked for a while longer — Steve did not know exactly how long, because the Underworld had that quality of sunless places where time behaved differently from what was expected — before Yelra spoke again, this time in the tone of someone answering a question that had not been asked out loud but was clearly present.
*You want to know about the system.*
Steve had been thinking exactly that. He said nothing, which was confirmation enough.
*There are three predominant forms of evolution in this world.* The voice now had a different rhythm — not conversation, closer to something that had been thought about many times before being spoken. *The most common is the Leveling System. Defined classes — swordsman, assassin, mage, cleric, manipulator, adaptable, and many others. Evolution through accumulation of experience. The system everyone who comes from other worlds receives.* A pause. *Partially.*
— Partially — Steve said under his breath.
*The Leveling System was built for this world. Outsiders receive an adapted version — functional, but not complete. Like a tool made for a hand with slightly different dimensions.*
*The second is the Percentual System.*
The voice changed tone. Slightly more careful.
*It was built specifically for humans who might try to approach the greatness of the beings above everything. It evolves through a special attribute — energy, chaos, sound, other essences. It is rare. Few humans have ever fully developed it. They became legends. Most don't even know it exists.*
Steve felt something in his chest that was not exactly pride but was adjacent to it — and then felt shame for feeling it.
— So my percentual system is permanently deactivated because—
*Your vital energy is too weak to support it.* Direct. Without softening. *If you had gone beyond ten percent, the essence of chaos would have corroded what you were before you had a chance to become what you could be. Stopping was the correct outcome. Even if you didn't choose to stop.*
Steve processed that.
— And the third.
*The third has no name that works in a language you know.* A long pause. *It has to do with total concentration and balance of a being through deep meditation. Not of days. Of decades. Of centuries.*
The voice grew quieter.
*It is from this third that the ones who are truly above us come. The ones who built the rules everyone else follows without realising they are rules.*
— How old are you? — Steve asked.
*One thousand and seventeen years.* Completely matter-of-fact. *And I am one of the youngest in my people.*
Steve looked at her.
He looked at the face that appeared sixteen, seventeen at most, with that specific beauty of something made differently from the normal — and tried to do the maths between what he saw and what he had just heard.
— One thousand — he repeated, in a voice that came out involuntarily loud.
The entire group looked at him.
— What's going on over there? — Dagon said, with the attention of someone who had already been paying close enough attention to this particular boy not to ignore decontextualised sounds.
— Nothing — Steve said quickly. — I asked Yelra how old the forest is.
Dagon stared at him for exactly two seconds.
Then turned forward again.
*One thousand and seventeen —* Yelra repeated, in the tone of someone continuing a conversation that had not been interrupted. *And note that I'm not even especially old for my people. There are those who have lived five times that long.*
*The power of chaos inside you —* she continued, and her tone grew more serious — *came from my people. We were cursed with it. It is not a power we chose — it is part of what we are, in the same way fire is part of what a flame is, even though the fire burns.*
*In the fight at the Temple of the Death Cult, when the two entities collided — my corrupted version and yours — the chaos transferred part of my essence to you. That is why your percentual system activated in that specific way. That is why the dark versions you saw on the thrones — mine and yours — are uncontrolled chaos. The opposite of what we are when we are in balance.*
Steve let that settle for a moment.
— So I have a part of you in my head — he said.
*And I have a part of you in mine.* The voice carried that slight weight of something true that the speaker was still processing. *Including memories I would rather not have.*
— What memories.
*Any. From the kingdom of Thornvale.*
Heat rose up Steve's neck immediately and completely.
— Don't talk nonsense — he said, voice low and urgent.
*They are not nonsense. I saw everything. The bracelet. The walk. The—*
— Shut up.
*— the kiss that wasn't exactly consensual on your part but clearly wasn't completely unwanted—*
— I SAID SHUT UP.
The group turned again.
Steve's face was a shade the Underworld had never seen and probably had no classification in the runes on the walls.
— I was… thinking out loud — he said, to no one in particular.
Group silence that did not believe him but had decided not to press.
How can you see that —* Steve said mentally, with urgency that had no way to express itself without moving his mouth.
*We share the same essence —* Yelra said, and there was enough contained amusement in her voice to be detectable. *I can see where you are. Where you were. Some things more clearly than others.* A pause. *I tried to speak to you through dreams and visions many times. But you—*
*Never understood anything —* Steve said, remembering.
*Never understood absolutely anything —* Yelra confirmed. *Which is impressive, honestly, given the effort I put in.*
— I had no way of knowing — Steve said, very quietly.
*You didn't —* Yelra agreed, and this time her tone held no judgement. Only gentle fact. *It's a lot to process all at once. Take it easy.*
Steve stayed silent for a moment.
Then, with the quality of a question that arrived before any decision to ask it:
— Why did your people leave their origins to come here?
The silence that followed was different from all the others.
Yelra looked forward. Her profile changed — not dramatically, not with the kind of change that announces itself. Only that specific subtraction of presence that happens when someone closes around something they do not want to expose.
Steve saw it.
— If you don't want to talk about it — he said — you don't have to.
Yelra remained silent for another moment.
*Thank you for the understanding.*
The voice came out lower than it had been at any point in the chapter. With the quality of something said carefully by someone not used to receiving that kind of consideration without having asked for it.
Steve did not answer.
Sometimes the right silence weighed more than any reply.
More time passed.
Steve did not know exactly how much. Six days had become seven hours in his perception, which he knew was not the correct way to measure time but was the only way he could manage when time carried this specific weight.
The forest grew thicker. The trees became taller, the trunks wider, the space between them more inhabited by that pale-blue light dripping from the runes in patterns that were beginning to seem less random and more deliberate — as if the stone itself were signalling something to anyone who knew how to read it.
Then Yelra stopped.
— We can stop here.
It was not an announcement. It was a fact placed in the air with the naturalness of someone who knew exactly where she was.
She took two steps forward, separating herself from the group, toward the point where the trees closed completely. The space there was dense, impenetrable in appearance — a wall of vegetation and rock that let nothing through.
Yelra raised her hand.
What happened next was not an explosion or a collapse. It was quieter than that. The air in front of her contracted in a way air does not contract — a curvature, like the surface of water that something had passed through from below, circular ripples expanding from the point where her fingers touched reality.
The space… opened.
Not a door. Not a portal. Simply the revelation that what had looked like solid forest was a layer — and that beneath that layer was something else entirely.
The light that arrived was not the pale-blue of runes.
It was golden. Warm. With that specific quality of light that came from neither stone nor crystal nor any magic system built by human hands — light that came from a place that had existed long enough to have developed its own luminosity.
The group stood motionless.
Even Dagon stood motionless.
What lay before them was not a village. It was not a city in any sense Steve knew the word. It was civilisation in the most exact sense of the word — an organisation of space and matter that reflected a specific vision of how to exist in the world, one that had been developed over enough time for every detail to have a reason for being.
The buildings were white stone and worked marble with the precision of architecture that used not tools but will — smooth columns that rose to heights that did not match the scale of the Underworld they had crossed, arches that did not completely obey gravity, open courtyards where the golden light pooled in gently pulsing pools. Tapestries that were not woven but suspended in the air by some principle Steve could not name. Gardens where plants grew that were not the plants of the underground forest — older, with the quality of something cultivated for millennia by hands that knew exactly what they were doing.
And people.
Or what seemed to be people, until a longer look revealed the differences — the way they moved, with that specific grace of something that did not need to conserve motion because motion cost differently when one had lived a thousand years; the light in their eyes that was not a reflection of any external source; the skin that held that particular pallor of something which had never needed the sun to exist yet had learned to glow on its own.
Orzun was not breathing.
Steve realised it because he himself was not breathing either.
Keara had her hand raised in a position that was neither spell nor defence — it was simply the hand position of a person who had grown so still so quickly that the gesture she had been making remained suspended in the air.
Jelim, the last person in the group Steve would have expected to show an expression beyond indifference, had a different quality in her eyes. Not admiration. Recognition — as if what lay before them matched something that had existed before only as an idea and had now taken physical form.
Dagon stared forward for a long moment.
Then he looked at Yelra.
— How long have you waited to bring someone here? — he asked, his voice low.
Yelra did not answer immediately.
— Long enough — she said at last. With that quality of an answer that is complete even when it is short.
She turned to the group.
— Welcome to Nessis.