Kanin stumbled forward, hand pressed against the jagged stone wall, his breath ragged in the cold, musty air. The dungeon beneath the ruin stretched on like the throat of some slumbering beast, every corridor branching into darkness, winding deeper into the bowels of the Unknown. The faint light of his comprehension spell flickered ahead—an interface only he could see, illuminating paths unseen by any torchlight.
"I can see the layout of this dungeon... it goes deeper. Way deeper."
He paused, staring down the corridor that spiraled lower still into the darkness. There was no logic to this place—walls curved unnaturally, floor tiles etched with symbols of long-dead languages. It felt like the dungeon had once been alive, and now merely dreamed in its decay.
But his mind, still reeling from the trauma of rejection, could not rest.
"What is this? Comprehension? I've never heard of anyone with something like this."
He pressed his back to the wall and slid down, letting himself collapse into a crouch.
"Why didn't I awaken to an element? I followed every rule. Prayed every night. Studied harder than anyone. Did everything they asked of me."
The fire of disappointment burned hotter than hunger ever had.
"All the hope I had... to finally have my own life... gone in a single minute."
He clenched his fists until his knuckles turned white.
"Is that all my life ever amounted to? Do people ever really change their fate?"
He glanced around the dim corridor. His comprehension highlighted passages and sigils, calculating paths and energy flows, but none of it brought him comfort.
"Maybe I can use this to map the dungeon. Great. What good is a walking map? I can't cast a single spell. What's comprehension good for without magic?"
The despair swirled, but a cold instinct—sharpened by years of surviving on scraps and instincts—cut through the fog of self-pity.
Survive.
That was the first rule of the Unknown.
He rose slowly, gripping a loose stone from the ground as a makeshift weapon.
"I must find my way out of the Unknown. But I can't return to Erinthidr. Not now. I'd be hunted, imprisoned... or worse."
His thoughts turned to the stories he'd heard in the orphanage—smuggled tales whispered under blankets of straw and shadows.
"Pattrain."
A kingdom far across the southern sea, famous for its Aura Knights—warriors who harnessed inner willpower instead of elemental magic—and its defiance of Erinthidr's magical hegemony.
"They hate magic supremacists. Maybe there, I could be safe. Have a real life."
His heartbeat quickened—not with hope, but with doubt.
"But… would I even be able to leave the Unknown? Forget that—can I even get out of this cursed dungeon alive?"
The silence around him deepened. The walls seemed to breathe.
Then—
<<...>>
<
A red light blinked to life in the far corner of the wall.
It wasn't part of the torch sconces. It glowed within the stone itself.
Kanin squinted. The light pulsed slowly like a heartbeat.
As he approached, a chill swept over him, and comprehension flooded his senses. Warnings, alerts, unfamiliar runes hovering in his vision.
The moment his fingers brushed the stone—the world shifted.
The floor disappeared beneath his feet.
He didn't scream—there was no time.
Darkness swallowed him.
Falling—!
SPLOOSH.
Freezing water enveloped him. He gasped, choking as he kicked to the surface.
"Safe…" he whispered aloud. His voice echoed against wet stone.
But the red light still glowed—beneath the water.
With lungs burning, he dove.
At the pool's bottom, his hand brushed against something small—smooth and round.
A pebble?
He surfaced with it clenched in his palm.
Coughing and shivering, he pulled himself onto a moss-covered slab and opened his hand.
It wasn't a pebble.
It was a ring.
Delicate. Ancient. A thin band of gold etched with flames, the metal unnaturally warm to the touch.
<
<> <> <> <
[The code converts the designated area into flames and allows the caster to control the flames at will. The flames will return to the original medium as per the caster's will.]
Kanin's eyes widened.
"What… is this?"
He slipped the ring onto his index finger.
A sudden warmth bloomed in his chest, flowing down his arm into the ring.
Nothing exploded.
No fire burst forth.
But he felt something he hadn't felt since the Baptism.
Connection.
The air shimmered faintly before him.
He hesitated, then slowly lifted his hand to his head, brushing aside the long crimson strands of hair from his forehead—a subconscious gesture.
And then, it happened.
Flame erupted—not from the ring, but from his hair.
Brilliant, searing threads of red fire spiraled into the air as though awakened by his touch. The strands of his crimson hair seemed to become conduits, channeling the heat and magic into being.
A wisp of flame danced to life before him, flickering red and gold. It hovered above his palm, shifting with his thoughts.
His breath caught in his throat.
He could control it.
Direct it.
And as instinct and comprehension aligned, a single word echoed in his mind—one of the many foreign codes he'd deciphered:
"Jothiathiran."
He spoke it—softly, barely above a whisper, but even unvoiced, the code resonated in his head.
The flame reacted instantly, expanding in response, as though the very utterance activated its essence.
"Is this… magic?"
It wasn't elemental magic. Not the kind priests and mages revered. But it was magic.
Through the ring.
Through comprehension.
Through himself.
A loophole in the laws of Erinthidr.
"Can I finally… return?"
He thought of the High Priest's words:
"A man devoid of magic is a man abandoned by god."
They were wrong.
He wasn't devoid of magic. He was born to understand it in ways no one else could.
He closed his hand around the flame. It vanished with a flicker, returning to the ring.
"I don't need their Baptism."
He stood, soaked and shivering, but with new light in his eyes.
"I'll find my way out of the Unknown."
He looked at the ring again, brushing his hair once more as a test.
The flame responded instantly, coiling into existence.
He closed his eyes and recited the code in his mind:
Jothiathiran.
The fire surged.
"And I'll burn my own path."
As he navigated through the next chamber, more relics littered the stone floors—blades of blackened steel, gems cracked with forgotten energy, shattered scrolls etched in dust.
Each one whispered secrets to him.
"This one channels wind essence—but it's incomplete. That gem… it amplifies mana flow, but it's fractured. This scroll... a teleportation spell with unstable coordinates."
It was overwhelming—but exhilarating.
Knowledge didn't just come to him. He absorbed it, like a sponge in a storm.
And then, ahead—he heard it.
Breathing.
A creature.
He flattened himself against the wall, peeking into the next chamber.
A hulking beast—twice his height—stood guard before a glowing stone gate. Its skin was plated with scales like obsidian glass, and its eyes glowed with deep crimson light.
<
His comprehension flickered with tactical suggestions.
"Use the ring. Distract it. Target the underbelly."
Kanin swallowed hard.
His heart thundered.
But he raised his hand.
And once more, he brushed his crimson hair back.
He closed his eyes.
Jothiathiran.
Flame ignited. It swirled, flickered—then launched like a comet toward the beast's flank.
It roared, staggering.
Kanin sprinted, flame blooming from his hair to his fingers, trailing like a whip of molten thread. Every movement carved heat into the air, burning with willpower.
He was no warrior.
But he was alive.
And he would fight.
The beast lunged.
He rolled under it, planting a flame underneath.
It exploded.
The creature howled and crumpled.
Smoke filled the chamber.
Kanin emerged coughing, heart racing.
But alive.
He looked down at his hands.
Calloused. Burned.
But his.
"I don't need to be chosen. I'll choose myself."
The stone gate before him cracked open with a groan, revealing a new path.
To safety.
To Pattrain.
To destiny.