Divinity in Doubt
The celebration faded, but the belief remained.
As SAM sat on a woven mat they'd given him—carefully stitched from bark and vines, clearly a prized possession—he began to feel the real burden of their faith.
This wasn't the kind of belief that could be dismissed or explained away. These weren't curious villagers hoping for an answer. These people were desperate. Hungry. Lost. They saw him not as a savior but as their only hope.
"I didn't ask for this," he thought. "I just wanted to escape. Just needed some quick cash and a way out."
He remembered the tech vault. The broken glass. The glowing stone that pulsed like a living heart. He hadn't even believed in the alien rumors that surrounded the Crown. He only wanted to survive.
Now, here he was, worshipped by strangers who had nothing but fire and faith.
He glanced over at Tek, who was drawing something in the dirt with charcoal—a triangle over two circles, with lines bursting outward. A crude but recognizable image of the fire pit. Below it, the boy was sketching SAM's hand with the Crown Stone aglow.
SAM looked away.
"What happens when I disappoint them?"
Karun's Test
Later that evening, as the sun began to dip behind the jagged horizon, Elder Karun sat beside him. Neither spoke for some time.
The old man handed SAM a strip of roasted root wrapped in leaf. It was bitter but filled his stomach. Karun took a deep breath and began to speak—not as a priest to a god, but as an elder to a peer.
SAM didn't understand every word. But the tone was unmistakable.
"Do not fear what they see in you," Karun was saying. "They once feared fire. Then it saved them."
The elder picked up a stick and jabbed it gently into the soil, drawing a wavy line. He pointed to it, then to the fire, then to SAM.
"Power," Karun said, then tapped his own chest. "Wisdom."
He drew another line—this one straight and firm. Then he pointed to his own feet, then to SAM's, and finally to Tek, who was watching from a distance.
Karun tapped the earth.
"Path."
SAM sat back, heart pounding. The old man wasn't just handing him power. He was handing him purpose.
He nodded. Slowly.
"Alright, old man. Let's walk it together."
Teaching the Spark
Over the next two days, SAM took on a role he'd never imagined: teacher.
He began with Tek.
They gathered smooth stones, shells, bones, and scraps of bark. With each item, SAM created a visual symbol—circle for the sun, zigzag for water, triangle for shelter. He carved them into bark sheets, binding them with twine into a primitive codex.
He named it The Fire Book in his mind.
Other children joined in. They giggled and repeated the sounds he made. He taught them numbers using pebbles and direction using stars. It wasn't just a language—it was a way of thinking.
Each night, he updated the codex. And each morning, a few more villagers watched from a distance.
"This is what real change looks like," SAM whispered as he etched a new symbol for "hope."
The Law Echoes
The trial of the meat thief had left ripples.
Though SAM had spared the man, the act had shifted something in the tribe's psyche.
The next time a dispute broke out—two women fighting over a cracked pot—Karun gestured toward the Council Circle. The villagers gathered. There were no screams. No threats.
Instead, they placed the pot between them. Waited.
SAM stood, spoke slowly, drew simple symbols on a piece of bark.
A triangle for the pot. A double line for the number two. A slash for split.
He broke the pot in half and handed one piece to each woman.
At first, silence.
Then, laughter.
It became a legend by nightfall: the god who cracked the earth to settle disputes.
The tribe began watching each other differently. Less suspicion. More structure.
It wasn't just fire that had changed them.
It was order.
Nightfall in the New World
One evening, as SAM sat by the fire, Tek approached carrying a bundle of bark parchment. Drawings.
He handed them to SAM, smiling proudly.
There were images of the firepit, the Council Circle, the meat-drying rack, and in the center of it all—a towering figure with light in his hand.
SAM.
SAM flipped through the pages, stunned.
"He's documenting history," SAM whispered. "We're building a culture."
He hugged the boy tightly.
For the first time, he didn't feel like a fraud.
He felt like a king.
The Silent Stalker Returns
But then… the figure in the woods returned.
Every night, SAM had started setting up a small perimeter. No traps—just markers. Bones dangling from strings, pebbles placed in odd formations, sticks that would crack if stepped on.
Three nights in a row, nothing moved.
Then, on the fourth… a stone was shifted.
He saw it the moment he stepped from his hut.
His blood ran cold.
That night, he sat awake long after the fires died.
And again—he saw it.
A shadow, tall and still, just outside the firelight. Unmoving. Not breathing. Not blinking.
SAM stood. Took one step forward.
The figure took none.
It just… watched.
Then turned. And vanished.
To be continued...