Bright couldn't sleep.
He'd tried to — more than once. But every time his eyes closed, he saw it again: the way Link fell, the sound of bones breaking under the crawler's strike, the shiver in the air just before that impossible silence.
Even now, lying in the dim light of the infirmary, the memory still clung to him like smoke.
He wasn't bleeding anymore, at least not on the outside. The medics had patched his wounds, flushed his bloodstream of residual poison, stabilized his vitals. But inside, everything still hurt.
The Shroud had changed something in him — something that medicine couldn't touch.
He stared at his reflection in the glass wall across from his bed. His eyes were sunken, his skin pale under the cold light.
He looked alive.
He didn't feel it.
He had relied too much on instinct — firing, dodging, reacting. Every move he made was raw and panicked. His ability, Danger Sense, had saved his life more than once, but it was like gripping lightning without understanding how to channel it.
He clenched his fists.
"I need to do better," he murmured. "If the next thing we face is stronger… if guns start failing, I won't survive."
The thought wasn't far-fetched. The creatures were evolving. The crawlers they fought before were only early-stage mutations; the later tiers were rumored to have exoskeletons that shrugged off plasma rounds and armor that even tanks struggled to dent.
Eventually, bullets wouldn't matter. People would.
Power. Skill. Control.
That was the only currency that would keep them alive.
When Bright stepped out into the courtyard later that morning, the others were already awake.
Duncan was seated near the training grid, his broad frame hunched forward, armor plates stacked beside him. He was sketching on a digital pad — designs for a reinforced exosuit.
Bessia and Silas stood nearby, quietly arguing over allocation reports. Their merit points glowed faintly on their wristbands, unspent.
Adam sat at the far edge, watching a holo-screen flicker with battle footage. His expression was calm, too calm — like someone dissecting his own failures frame by frame.
They were all thinking the same thing.
Bessia noticed Bright first.
"You look like the great ones ass," she said flatly.
He gave a faint shrug. "You don't look too alive yourself."
She huffed and returned her gaze to the console. "Command posted the evaluation results. We all got merit points, but it doesn't feel like a reward."
Duncan grunted. "It's a reminder. We're alive because we got lucky. Next time, luck won't be enough."
He tapped on the screen, the holographic interface projecting his options — armor upgrades, resistance cores, enhancement protocols.
"My body barely held up against the last crawler. If I'm meant to stand in front, I'll need more than skin."
Bessia crossed her arms. "You're trusting the store? Who knows what half those things actually do?"
"I know pain Bessia," Duncan replied evenly. "And I'd rather risk the unknown than die the same way Roegan did. Man was an initiate, died like a damn bug"
The silence that followed was heavy but respectful.
Adam's voice was quiet when it came, but it carried weight.
"The problem isn't strength. It's awareness. We keep reacting , that what's wrong with this army "
His gaze didn't leave the screen showing their last fight.
"The monsters weren't just attacking randomly. They were testing us. Probing our formations, learning our movements. The one that killed Roegan knew where we'd shoot before we did."
He turned off the screen, thinking.
"Buying a cognition enhancement ability core was probably the best option. If I can analyze the flow of battle quicker, we won't always be one step behind."
When the announcement came through their wristbands — the notification to report to the Merit Hall — they moved in silence.
The hall itself was vast, filled with translucent data pillars. Each one pulsed faintly with blue light, a physical manifestation of the system that governed their world.
Here, every act of valor, every kill, every survival — all of it was reduced to merit points.
The system didn't care about emotion, loyalty, or pain. Only performance.
They lined up as their points synced to the hall's registry.
Each number was like a stamp of fate.
They stared at the numbers. They looked high — but felt hollow.
Bright opened his purchase terminal. Rows of glowing icons appeared, showing ability cores, technique manuals, and combat simulations. Each came with a cold, concise description.
He scrolled through them slowly, his reflection flickering against the glass.
"Do I even deserve these yet?" he thought. "I barely survived."
Then, quietly:
"No. Not yet."
He closed the terminal.
That night, the fortress was silent.
Bright found himself walking along the edge of the outer training yard. The air was cool, stars hidden behind the haze of the energy grid.
He replayed every moment from the Shroud in his mind — the panic, the failure, the flashes of instinct that kept him alive.
His ability had saved him, yes — but it had also shown him how weak he truly was.
Danger Sense isn't enough if I can't react to what it shows me.
Instinct isn't enough if I don't have the strength to follow through.
He needed to refine it — not as a reflex, but as a weapon.
He looked at his hands again. The faint pulse of his core glowed beneath his skin — flickering, unstable. The more energy he absorbed, the more volatile it became.
That meant one thing — he was close.
Close to awakening.
Close to becoming an initiate.
He wasn't alone for long.
Silas joined him, quiet as usual, eyes reflecting the grid lights. For a moment, they just stood there, watching the night.
"You didn't buy anything either," Silas said finally. It wasn't a question.
Bright shook his head. "Not yet."
"Smart. Power without control just paints a bigger target."
Bright smiled faintly. "You sound like someone who's already made peace with weakness."
Silas chuckled. "I have. Doesn't mean I plan to stay weak."
They stood in silence for a while longer. When Silas turned to leave, he said one more thing:
"They'll assign us teachers soon. Maybe that'll change something."
Bright didn't answer, but he hoped so.
By dawn, the orders came through.
[Directive: Tier Advancement Training]
Survivors of Shroud Deployment are to report to their designated instructors for personalized development.
Estimated Duration: Indefinite.
Objective: Core stabilization and combat refinement.
— Central Command
Each of them received a name, a location, and a schedule.
Bright's eyes lingered on his instructor's name.
Hailen.
Eastern Training Hall.
He remembered hearing that name whispered once before — a retired Initiate, a man who trained those who fought on the edge of death or so they want us to believe .
He took a deep breath. This was the next step. reforging.
The group assembled one last time before dispersing for training.
Duncan's new armor gleamed faintly under the pale sun — raw, unfinished, but already terrifying in its density.
Adam's eyes glowed faintly with synchronized threads of light — the mark of his cognitive enhancement.
Bessia and Silas looked unchanged, though their restraint was its own statement. They were saving their strength for something greater.
And Bright — he looked the same, but something in his posture had shifted. The heaviness in his eyes was still there, but beneath it was purpose.
"We've come far," Duncan said, adjusting his armor's seals.
"Not far enough,and to be honest I get that this our story, but that was cringe asf, what the fuck is we've come far" Bright replied, imitating Duncan.
No one argued. But some did laugh.
They split paths then — each moving toward their assigned halls, their next lessons, their next fights. Their journey In the Shroud had ended, but its shadow lingered in every step they took.
Bright walked toward the east, where the sun or whatever that weird light was, was beginning to rise.
He didn't know what awaited him under Hailen's instruction. But for the first time in weeks, he welcomed the uncertainty.