Day thirteen was brutal.
The fever had peaked. His body was drenched in sweat that wouldn't cool. Every breath scraped against his lungs, a raw, jagged ache that never left. His vision wavered, eyelids trembling beneath their weight. Each pulse of his heart sent sparks of pain across his chest — the burn had gone dark now, edges curling like brittle leaves.
He needed food.
He needed air.
He needed anything.
He shifted, gritting his teeth, careful not to put pressure on his twisted ankle. The bone had settled somewhat — swollen, stiff, but not screaming. Compared to the fever, it felt like a victory.
He stood. Slowly. Weakly.
Every joint creaked. His bones groaned like rusted iron.
He stumbled to the corner and unbuckled his pants.
When he pissed, it came out thick. Crimson.
He stared.
He didn't need a degree to know what that meant.
His kidneys were failing. His body was devouring itself.
Still, he finished. Still, he stayed upright just long enough to buckle his pants again. Then collapsed, gasping, back to the floor.
Standing for a minute had drained him.
The trapdoor creaked.
He didn't look at first. He didn't care.
But the air changed. Warped.
Boots scraped metal.
He looked up, blinking through haze.
The guy named Admin.
Again.
A silhouette in shadow, confident, bored.
"You're still alive?" the man laughed. "You cockroach types always take the longest to die."
Kai said nothing. He glared.
The admin chuckled. "Don't look at me like that, mutt."
Spit landed on Kai's shoulder.
"Pitiful little beast."
Then the trapdoor slammed.
Darkness fell again.
But Kai didn't fall asleep — not yet. He collapsed into unconsciousness, ripped into the dream like a body pulled underwater.
---
The Dream
It was cold.
The world was white, marble stretching in all directions, edged with black cracks. Snowflakes fell — but when they landed, they didn't melt. They burned.
Kai stood barefoot. Shirtless. His chest wound was gone, but he felt the fever still, buzzing behind his eyes like flies.
He walked.
No sound.
Until it came.
"Hey."
He turned.
Neo stood just behind him — not dressed for snow, not reacting to the cold. Just watching him with tired, frustrated eyes. His face was drawn. Older. Not by age, but by something heavier.
"You're not real," Kai said.
Neo ignored him. "You're going to die."
"I know."
"No, you don't. Not yet. You think you do. But you don't. Not until you've decided what you're dying for."
Kai blinked.
Neo stepped closer, hands shaking with restraint. "I shouldn't be here. But you're fading. You're not breathing right. You've got blood in your piss, your lungs are full of heat, and your heart's slowing. You need to wake up."
The sky cracked above them — white turning red.
Neo's voice rose, panicked now.
"Kai. Wake up. They're going to kill you."
"What—"
"Wake up!"
---
He woke gasping.
It was like his mind entered overdrive.
Eyes wide.
Chest heaving.
Pain. Real pain. The fever was still there — but it didn't matter.
Because something had been thrown down.
Something heavy.
The trapdoor was swinging shut.
A thud echoed across the pit — a solid impact.
He rolled just in time. His shoulder scraped stone. His ribs screamed. But he avoided it.
He blinked. It was a crate. Not supplies. Not food.
A weapon.
A rusted alliance box — used to carry spirit-bound chains. It cracked open from the impact, revealing jagged metal and embedded nails. It had been dropped to crush him.
His breathing turned ragged.
He dragged himself away from the impact zone, shaking.
They were trying to kill him now.
No more patience. No more games.
Just execution.
He made it to the far wall and collapsed, clutching his stomach.
His chest hurt more than ever — every breath rattled.
He laid flat. No energy left to sit. His skin burned and froze at once.
"Flicker," he whispered.
The ember glowed.
"Are we going to die down here?" he asked again
One pulse.
Then two.
Kai shut his eyes.
And sighed.
---
The pit blurred.
Not the walls — those stayed. But their meaning warped. The stone seemed to breathe now, slow and hungry, like a lung underfoot. The shadows bled across the floor, stretching farther than they should've. He stared too long at one, and it blinked back.
Kai coughed.
Or laughed.
He wasn't sure anymore.
His hands wouldn't stop shaking. Not from cold — he wasn't cold. He was burning. Inside. His thoughts itched. His tongue felt like someone else's, too thick for his mouth. He tried to swallow and nearly choked. The sweat on his skin had turned sticky, sour. His chest wheezed when he breathed, as if there were something in there with him.
He didn't remember how long it had been since the crate fell. He didn't remember standing. Or crawling. Or saying Flicker's name. But the ember was still there. Watching. Maybe whispering.
Or maybe it was the corpse.
It spoke sometimes now.
Little things. Just fragments.
"Nice weather, isn't it?"
"Your fault."
"Could've killed him. Should've killed him."
Kai nodded. "Yeah."
He didn't know who he was agreeing with.
Maybe all of them.
Maybe none.
His fingers tapped against the wall — not to mark time. Just to hear sound. The stone sounded different now. More hollow. Like it wasn't stone anymore, just shell. If he pushed hard enough, he might fall through it. End up somewhere quieter.
He turned to the wall. Put his ear against it. Listened.
Someone was breathing on the other side.
He smiled. Crooked. Bloody.
"I see you."
His own voice sounded far away, like it came from under water.
He tried to sit up.
Fell.
Tried again.
Fell harder.
The world tilted. The ceiling melted downward like wax.
And then he heard footsteps.
Hundreds of them. Children. Soldiers. Maybe shoes. Maybe hooves.
He covered his ears.
Still there.
He pressed his forehead to the floor and whispered to Flicker.
But even the ember had gone dim.
He closed his eyes.
The scent of rot, blood, and metal flooded him.
He was a child again.
He was a god.
He was dirt.
"Neo?" he whispered.
But it wasn't a question. It wasn't a name. It was a taste. It was hunger.
He tried to laugh again.
And this time it worked.
The sound bounced off the walls like glass shattering.
Then he forgot why he was laughing. Or who he was.
So he just... kept doing it.