Ezra narrowed his eyes, irritated. 'Care to explain?' he asked with a touch of cynicism.
After all, he took pride in his skills. He was a scout, a guide, someone trained to read an environment better than most.
"Simple," Mazzareth replied. "Instead of telling you, I'll show you. Use your Vis."
Ezra scoffed. "I don't have a Codex, remember? Or have the millennia made you senile?"
"That's why humans die so early…" Mazzareth's mental sigh echoed heavily.
"Who told you you can only use Vis after awakening a Codex? Hmm? Who wrote that law?"
Ezra hesitated. The question felt absurd, like someone asking why he could see. It was common knowledge.
"Boy… just because most people awaken a Codex before manipulating Vis doesn't make the order a universal rule."
"A Codex channels Vis through the Laws it contains. It's a compass. A mold. Your portal to access the strength of a Law. An amplifier. But it's not the starting point."
"You already feel Vis. That means, at some level, you can manipulate it. Your body is yours. The one who defines your limits is you, not some schoolbook."
Ezra swallowed hard. 'But how...? I've never heard anything like—'
"Of course you haven't. Because if the weak knew this… the strong would lose control."
Ezra clenched his teeth. 'So, survival of the fittest, then…?'
"Close," Mazzareth replied, with a dry chuckle. "But still wrong."
"Ever heard of the Law of Knowledge? Knowledge is power.
Well… there's a less friendly version of it:
The Law of Others' Knowledge: Too much knowledge in the wrong hands leads to certain ruin."
Ezra remained silent. Mazzareth continued, now almost amused:
"Or better yet, my favorite, The Law of the Intelligent Villain:
Never give power to someone who might steal it from you."
Ezra was still listening, but a muffled sound from the other side of the door made his blood run cold. Footsteps. Voices. And the metallic clink of something being prepared.
His chest tightened.
'Would love to keep hearing about these delightful laws,' he thought sarcastically, 'but how about you just tell me how to use my Vis?'
"This generation these of to—" Mazzareth started grumbling.
'Quickly! Before you see your host's ass get mutilated!'
The impact was immediate.
Mazzareth went silent for half a second, then replied with rare urgency:
"Remember the feeling you had inside the Gate of Order? Better yet… in the hospital?"
Ezra frowned. 'How do you know abo—'
"No questions. Just listen."
"Picture that sensation again. But this time, don't just feel it. Trace it to its source. Like strings inside you, invisible, tense, vibrating. Or better: think of it as a water flow, and you're the spring. Only instead of looking outward…
Look inward."
Ezra shut his eyes.
He tried to tune out everything around him, the putrid stench, the irritating voices of his captors, even the soft snore of the man sleeping in the corner of the room.
He inhaled deeply, focusing. Thought of the hospital. That strange sensation, when the world had seemed to unveil itself beyond the visible. When he saw more than the real.
Seconds passed.
Then, like a physical memory, he sensed it again. Waves and particles, tiny, vibrating all around him. The world was woven of something else. But Ezra wasn't satisfied yet.
He pushed forward. Steady breath, focused mind, Ezra no longer searched the outside, but the inside. And at last, he found it.
Two points.
The first: the source: There, intertwined with his blood, the Vis was being pumped through his veins, spreading throughout his body. But then it dissipated, slipping out through his pores like steam.
The second: a direct channel to the lobe of his left ear. That was the connection point to Mazzareth. Ezra frowned but chose not to interfere.
'I am the spring. My veins, the river. My thoughts... the dam.'
He focused on the flow of Vis, trying to redirect it. To keep it from dispersing.
His face began to sweat. It was like trying to hold back water with bare hands. The Vis slipped away, unruly.
"Hey, is there something wrong with the kid?" one of the guards called from the back.
"Ah, probably birthing a spirit, nobody shits that hard!" another mocked, laughing loud.
Ezra barely heard them.
"Relax." Mazzareth's voice came, calm and composed. "You don't need to force the current… Let it flow. You only need to block it where it matters. Imagine… a railway."
But Ezra didn't understand the analogy, a relic of the old world. Still, Mazzareth tried again.
"A circuit... yes, an electric circuit. The energy flows, and you redirect it exactly where needed."
Ezra obeyed. Let the current move.
His expression eased. The strain subsided.
"Heh, told you. Just needed to take a piss," the first mocker concluded, drawing laughter from the others.
Ezra ignored them.
He let the Vis rise to his skull, and then, stopped it. Prevented its dissipation.
Controlled the flow. Guided it where he wanted: ears and eyes. Deliberately avoided the nose, fearing an uncontrolled reaction.
Once everything was aligned, the changes began.
First, the sounds. His captors' voices grew clearer, as if whispering right beside him, though still distant.
Then, the vision. Ezra opened his eyes slowly, and nearly recoiled from the shock.
'WOW…' That was the only word that came to mind.
The world felt alive. Colors had layers. Edges pulsed faintly with energy. He didn't just see or hear, he felt the details revealing themselves like never before.
But the awe didn't last.
Because suddenly, it all made sense. Why Mazzareth had said there were fifteen people there…
Ezra understood.
And worse, he heard.
From the other side of the door guarded by two sentinels, footsteps. And the sound of something heavy being dragged.
"Hihihi…" A strange laugh. High-pitched, unhinged.
"Karmen, put that down! The boss said to wait, you'll break him before he can do whatever he wants with the kid!"
"Ah, don't worry, Cyclops. I'm sure he's a strong boy… He'll handle this."
A chill ran down Ezra's spine.
His eyes, which until now had seen nothing but the door, began to pick up something new:
A hazy silhouette, wrapped in a flickering, almost ethereal light. The glow danced, revealing shapes.
And then, slowly, a long staff began to emerge from the image. First, just a trail of energy… Then, the metal. The weight. The intent.
Ezra held his breath. The Vis buzzed in his ears. The door was still closed. But he knew. Something was coming. And it wasn't here to talk, at least not with words.
The sharp scrape of metal dragging against the metal floor filled the air. It scraped with an uneven rhythm, as if the staff were too heavy, or burdened with more than just matter.
Arrrhhhkkk… clank… arrhhhkkk…
It was an unsettling sound. Like nails on a chalkboard, but coming from inside the flesh.
Ezra heard it all.
And though he couldn't see the face behind the door… He could imagine the expression.
A crooked grin. Eyes open far too wide. A dry mouth, trembling with anticipation.
That was what terrified him the most. Not the staff. Not the guards. But the fact that, for some reason, he could feel the mind on the other side. The raw, animalistic hunger.
"Hihihi… I can't wait... I can't wait! I need to taste him…" Karmen's voice was high-pitched, tinged with sick pleasure. Ezra's stomach churned.
Then came the thud. The door shook with the impact.
BAM.
"Shit! He's awake… No one's gonna stop him…" Cyclops whispered, voice trembling. "Fuck. I'm not taking the fall for this!"
Ezra swallowed hard, his mind screaming: 'If not you… then who?'
"If you don't get moving now, you're the one who'll be responsible." Mazzareth's voice rang inside his head, dry as tinder.
"And oh, you so will be." Despite the seriousness, there was a thread of malicious amusement in his tone, as if the whole situation were just another joke to him.
Beyond the door, the footsteps stopped. Everything went silent.
For a moment, it felt like he had walked away. But Ezra knew better. He could see Karmen's Vis still leaking through the cracks.
His eyes moved around, uncertain whether to prepare for a fight, or for a desperate escape.
And within him, one certainty grew, heavy and urgent:
He had to get out. And Now.
Before he lost something far more precious than his own life.