Chapter 25
RYAN'S RAGE (2)
Ryan suddenly grabbed his face and dropped to his knees like a marionette whose strings had been cut. His body trembled, spine hunched, fingers digging into his own cheeks. His voice came out in a fevered, erratic mumble—words slurred and spilling over one another like a cracked dam releasing a flood of madness.
"No... no... no... I said this wouldn't happen... it... can't happen... not again... I... I... am... a... fool... tricked... tricked... FOOL... don't call me that... fool... no... no...
Don'tcallmeafooldontcallmeafooldontcallmeafooldontcallmeafooldontcallmeafool..."
The tent fell into a cold, suffocating silence.
IAM stood frozen, his body stiff, eyes wide. His facewas now portrait of concern—
Fear.
This wasn't just rage.
This was a break. A tear in the human psyche. Ryan's voice no longer belonged to someone in control of his mind—it echoed with trauma, betrayal, the haunting weight of something far older than what he ever spoke of.
Hen and Kepa were both pale. Their expressions mirrored IAM's, though more contained—more external. They didn't know this man. And now, they weren't sure they wanted to.
But while the two kept their mouths shut, still and cautious, IAM—of course—opened his.
"Actually…" he said, forcing his lips into motion, "I got a better one."
Two sets of eyes reluctantly shifted to him.
"You can't stick Hen up the boss's socket—he'd never fit."
Silence.
IAM cleared his throat awkwardly. "Get it? Because the male hen is called a cock and Ryan talked about shoving his—"
"Yeah," Hen cut in sharply, his voice flat. "We got it."
His eyebrow twitched slightly. Whether it was disbelief, annoyance, or genuine offense, IAM couldn't quite tell.
IAM licked his lips and gave a weak shrug, his heart pounding like a guilty schoolboy who had made the worst joke at the worst funeral.
IAM licks his lips nervously, he now realises that he had no idea how to handle serious situations... Well... Seriously.
Then—suddenly, unnaturally—Ryan let out a deep breath.
He rose slowly, deliberately, still hiding most of his face behind his palms. But when he dropped his hands, a wide, dazzling smile stretched across his face, bright and far too bright.
It was like someone had drawn a cartoon sun over a collapsed, smoking building.
He laughed.
It wasn't hearty. It wasn't warm.
It was brittle. Mechanical.
"Ahhh, don't mind me," he said, waving them off. "Just... had a little moment there, huh? Happens sometimes. You know how it is. Old memories, stress..."
Hen didn't reply. Kepa offered only the tiniest nod.
Ryan chuckled again—too loudly—and placed both hands on his hips.
"Let's keep this between us, alright?" he said cheerfully, like nothing had just happened. "No need for rumors or anything . This little freakout dies in this tent."
The others nodded.
No one spoke.
No one smiled.
They understood the request—and the warning layered underneath it.
When Ryan finally turned away and began busying himself with his bedroll, Hen and Kepa exchanged a look. It was a silent agreement, a mental contract carved in mutual understanding.
Do. Not. Piss. That guy off.
And as their eyes flicked briefly back to IAM, they added another mental note.
Watch out for that one too...
IAM might been an idiot.
But he was the kind of idiot that showed up with a joke at a murder scene.
And that made him dangerous in a whole other way.
By the next day, everyone seemed to have forgotten about the previous night's events and made their way toward the beginning of their classes.
They would have to take daily classes to train themselves as much as possible in the short amount of time they had before they would be sent out on missions.
The classes included theory classes (or information classes), physical classes, and path classes.
In the theory classes, they would learn more about the Deadline creatures and where they came from — even classified information the public didn't know.
In the physical classes, they would have mock fights and participate in missions while actively practicing and testing the limits of their paths.
In the path classes, they would be given advice tailored to their individual paths and offered some form of guidance on how to use them effectively. Obviously, they wouldn't be able to cover every single path — there were too many — but some help was better than none.
The first class that IAM and his tentmates were going to was the theory class, which took place deep inside the fortress-like Dome. The classes they were allowed to attend were located on the lowest floor. They didn't have the qualification, clearance, or even the right to ask what existed on the higher floors.
IAM found himself stepping into a room that, at a glance, looked vaguely like a college lecture hall back on Earth — if Earth had been swallowed by a steel behemoth and redesigned by war-obsessed technocrats.
The seats were organized in tiered rings, rising in layers toward the back, allowing everyone a clear view of the sunken center platform where the instructor would stand. But instead of cozy chairs and wooden desks, every surface was harsh, cold steel — gleaming in some places, dulled and scratched in others.
The floor was matte black and etched with faint lines that pulsed with blue or red energy occasionally — like veins beneath a skin of metal. The air was cool and dry, too sterile to feel natural, and carried the faint hum of electricity running through unseen circuits in the walls and ceiling.
There was a uniform light that made everything look desaturated — washed-out skin tones, grey foggy shadows under the eyes, and a clinical lack of warmth.
There were no windows. No natural light. Just flat slabs of wall with mounted holopanels waiting to project nightmarish educational material.
IAM sat beside Hen and Kepa in a row halfway up the seating tiers. Looking around in awe and amazement.
Everything about this place screamed one thing: You are not meant to feel comfortable here. You are meant to learn fast or die faster.
On the podium in the middle was a man — tall, bony, and almost unnatural in how lean he looked. A descendant of the Giant, he was wiry, like a stretched-out cord of tension. Every step he took crackled with a quiet intensity.
He wore the same regulation hoodie as the others. The three stars embroidered on the red badge gleamed under the sterile dome light like they had been freshly scorched into the fabric.
His hair stuck out in uneven tufts, shadowing a face that looked carved out of old wood. His brown eyes were steady, sharp, with no warmth. Only weight. A heavy, dragging weight.
He gave off a strict and stable vibe, like the kind of man who'd break your bones with nothing more than an order. He didn't yell. He didn't need to. Silence followed him like a loyal dog.
As the crowd of tired, half-worried, half-curious new recruits finally settled into their seats, he watched them quietly — judging, measuring, perhaps mourning the ones who wouldn't make it.
After a full minute of letting the silence marinate like rot in a sealed room, he finally spoke.
His voice was dry. Not weak. Just dry, like heat rolling off cracked desert stone.
"First of all — welcome. I would rather not go into some speech. I am not here to inspire you.... You are not here to survive.... You are here to understand why you probably won't."
He paused.
"My name is Milo Nass. I am an Ascender at the Level of Experience. My path is the Path of Fire." His eyes glinted faintly as if something behind them remembered flames licking at a battlefield.
"I have the pleasure of speaking and divulging the limited — and I emphasize the word limited — information we have about those... abominations."
He took a slow breath, and his tone grew harder, more surgical.
"I hope you're ready... because from this moment forward, the gates of hell close behind you. There is no key. There is no window. There is no exit."
His gaze swept across the room — not menacing, not theatrical, just dead honest.
"Welcome to the place where, once you cross the line, your chances of dying multiply with every second you remain breathing."
"Welcome to the Deadline," he said flatly. "One of many in Holem. And one of the worst."