There was absolute silence in the outpost.
Outside, the acid rain eased into a steady hiss, rinsing away the gray sludge that had once been the Mindshroud.
Inside, the air reeked of sweat and rust.
Bran lay on the metal floor near the support pillar. He was unconscious, curled tight like a child.
His heartbeat was steady, but his face was pale, almost bloodless. Daniel stood by the doorway, wiping rain and slime from his hands with a rag he had found.
Daniel's heart began to beat hard, not from fear of the monster, but from the tension filling the room.
He checked his Databand. The notifications of his kill and the stats started glowing softly, a secret victory only he could see.
He felt stronger. The assimilation of the Mindshroud had poured power into his veins, sharpening his mind and knitting his muscles.
But when he looked up, he didn't see relief on his teammates' faces. Ragnar stood by the window, looking out into the dark.
His massive arms were crossed over his chest. The stone-grey color of his skin had faded back to its normal tan, but his muscles were still tense.
He wasn't celebrating the victory. He was brooding. Sophie was kneeling beside Bran, checking his pulse.
She stood up slowly, dusting off her knees.
Her face was calm and unreadable, like she was already weighing her next move. She didn't look at Daniel with gratitude. She looked at him like he was a puzzle she couldn't solve, and she hated puzzles she couldn't solve.
"He's stable," Sophie said, her voice cutting through the silence. "The connection is gone." "Good," Daniel said, letting out a breath.
"That's good." "Is it?" Ragnar turned around.
His voice was low, a deep rumble that vibrated in the small room.
"Because from where I'm standing, nothing about this feels good, Daniel." Daniel stiffened.
"We're alive, Ragnar. Bran is alive. The monster is dead. That counts as a win in my book."
"Don't play dumb," Ragnar snapped. He took a step forward, his heavy boots clanging against the metal floor.
" You know exactly what I'm talking about." The big man pointed a finger at Bran's unconscious body.
"Back there," Ragnar continued, his voice rising. "When the kid went crazy. You didn't touch him. You didn't hit him. You looked him in the eye, you screamed, and he dropped like a sack of potatoes."
Daniel swallowed. He had known this was coming. He just hoped he would have had more time to come up with a better lie.
"I told you," Daniel said, keeping his voice steady. "I pushed my intent at him. I tried to break the connection."
"With what?" Ragnar demanded. "Attribute Enhancement? That's your talent, right? A D-Grade physical boost. It makes you hit harder. It makes you run faster. It doesn't let you shoot mind bullets, Daniel!" Ragnar was shouting now.
It all spilled out at once. The frustration, the fear, the confusion.
"I carried that kid," Ragnar said, his voice cracking slightly. "I watched him bleed. I watched him go crazy. And the whole time, you were sitting on... whatever this is."
Daniel looked at Sophie, hoping for some logic, some support. But she just stared back, her eyes narrow and sharp.
"He's right, Daniel," Sophie said. Her tone was clinical, stripping away any emotion. "I've run the numbers. Your 'sensory talent' explained how you found the traps. It explained how you tracked the crawler. But it doesn't explain this."
She walked closer, her gaze locking onto his. "A psychic attack strong enough to sever the control of a Level 3 Mindshroud? That requires a massive surge of Spirit. It requires a specific type of mental manipulation skill. An Attribute Enhancement talent, even an evolved one works through biology and physical force, not the mind.
She stopped and let the words linger.
"You're lying to us, Daniel. You've been lying since we stepped through the portal."
Daniel leaned back against the cold metal wall. His mind raced. He could try to spin another lie. He could say he found a skill book. He could say it was a one-time consumable item he found on a corpse.
But seeing Ragnar's pained look and Sophie's cold distrust, he knew it wouldn't work.
They weren't stupid. They were survivors, just like him. And in the Aurora Vale, trust wasn't just a nice feeling, it was the only thing keeping a knife out of your back while you slept.
He had two choices. Tell them the truth about his SSS-Grade talent, about Soul Assimilation, about how he feasted on the dead to steal their power. Or... he could leave. If he told them, what would happen? Would they look at him with awe? Or would they look at him with fear?
He remembered the look on Instructor Baldwin's face when she talked about power. 'Power isn't given, it is taken.' If they knew he could steal their stats, their skills, their very souls... they wouldn't see a teammate. They would see a predator. They would wonder if he was waiting for them to die so he could loot their bodies.
He couldn't take that risk. His mission was too important. He had to save his mother. He had to find Chloe. He couldn't let himself be shackled by their fear or their judgment.
Daniel straightened up. He stopped trying to look harmless. He let the new strength he had gained flow through his posture. He looked Ragnar in the eye, then Sophie.
"You want the truth?" Daniel asked, his voice calm and cold. "The truth is that I saved your lives. Twice." Ragnar flinched, but he didn't back down.
"That's not an answer." "It's the only one that matters!" Daniel shouted, his own anger flaring up.
"Who found the water? Me. Who killed the snakes? Me. Who realized Bran was being possessed? Me. And who just put his life on the line to act as bait for a psychic monster while you hid on the roof?"
He stepped away from the wall, walking into the center of the room. "I have secrets," Daniel admitted. "Yeah, I do. We all have things we aren't saying. But my secrets haven't hurt this team. They've kept you alive."
"Trust is the foundation of a team," Sophie stated, crossing her arms. "We are putting our lives in your hands. If we don't know what you can do, we can't plan. We can't fight effectively. And we can't trust that you won't turn on us."
"Turn on you?" Daniel let out a bitter laugh. "I just took a psychic hammer to the skull for you, Sophie. If I wanted to turn on you, I would have left you to the spiders in that cave."
"Then tell us!" Ragnar pleaded. "Just tell us what you are, Daniel. Stop the games. If you're a mage, say it. If you have a B-Grade talent, say it. We don't care about the rank. We care that you're treating us like pawns."
Daniel looked at the big man. He saw the genuine pain in his eyes. Ragnar wanted to trust him. He wanted to believe that their friendship was real.
And it was real. That was the tragedy of it.
Daniel liked them. He liked Ragnar's bad jokes and Sophie's sharp mind. He even felt protective of Bran. But he couldn't give them what they wanted.
"I can't," Daniel said softly. The silence that followed was deafening.
Ragnar's face hardened. The hurt faded, replaced by a cold look. He nodded slowly, accepting it.
"Then we're done," Ragnar said. "We can't walk with someone we don't know." Sophie didn't say anything.
She just moved to stand next to Ragnar, creating a clear line in the room. Us and Him.
Daniel felt a sharp wave of sadness, deep and sudden.
It reminded him of the day the sun went out, the day he lost everything. Now, he was losing the first thing he had built since then.
"Fine," Daniel said. He turned away from them and walked to the corner where his pack lay. He moved with mechanical precision.
He checked his water flask. He checked the D-Grade Vibro-Knife at his belt. He adjusted the straps of his Deflector Vest.
He didn't take anything that wasn't his. He left the remaining snake meat. He left the extra medical supplies. He threw the pack over his shoulder and turned back to them one last time.
Bran was still unconscious, mumbling something in his sleep. "Keep an eye on him," Daniel said, pointing at the boy.
"The connection is severed, but his mind is fragile. He's going to need time."
"We know how to take care of our own," Sophie said coldly. Daniel nodded. "I know you do."
Daniel turned and walked toward the broken gate. Stepping out into the rain felt like crossing a threshold.
The acid rain had stopped, leaving the air heavy and humid. The strange, violet clouds swirled above, hiding the moons.
As he walked away from the outpost, the heavy weight of the lie lifted off his shoulders. It was replaced by a cold, lonely emptiness, but also a sense of freedom.
He didn't have to pretend to be weak anymore. He didn't have to hold back his strikes. He didn't have to walk past the corpses of enemies and leave their power on the table.
He could be what he needed to be!
He stopped at the edge of the plateau and looked back at the dark silhouette of the outpost.
He felt a crushing wave of guilt wash over him. He was abandoning them. Without his senses, without his [Omnivision], they were vulnerable.
"I'm sorry," he whispered to the wind. But he didn't turn back.