The abandoned quarter reeked of decay and wet stone.
Caelum moved silently, his footsteps swallowed by the crumbling walls. The girl trailing him—a trembling, fragile thing—had no name, no clear purpose beyond surviving another day. That suited him fine. Names were fragile, too easy to manipulate, too easy to bind.
He had learned quickly: the world only respected power. Not mercy, not cunning, not cleverness. Only power.
A faint hum rippled through the air. He paused.
> Something watches.
The sensation was subtle, like the prickle of a thousand eyes along the back of his neck. Not human, not mortal. He could feel it in the marrow of his bones, in the space between thought and instinct.
He focused. The energy whispered, faint and tremulous—a fragment from the ritual he had consumed. It had survived the night, unstable and raw, coiling inside him like a living thing.
> It is hungry.
So was he.
The city outside the abandoned district had not forgotten him.
Torches flared along the rooftops. Shouts echoed. Footsteps thundered across the stone streets.
Inquisitors. Path enforcers. Hunters of anomalies.
They had no names that mattered, only roles. And he was the failure of every role.
He glanced at the girl. She whimpered.
"Move," he said softly. No plea, no warmth, only command.
They ducked into a narrow alley, shadows swallowing them whole. The faint hum inside him reacted, shifting. He could feel a fragment of the ritual energy bending toward him, responding to his intent.
> Consume. Adapt. Survive.
Caelum flexed his fingers.
For the first time, he intentionally called the power forward.
The energy pulsed, coiling around his arm like a serpent. Pain flared instantly. Not sharp, not fleeting, but deep and intimate, wracking his mind and body in unison. Memories he had never consciously known—faces, feelings, fears—flickered across his mind and then vanished.
He hissed, teeth gritted. The pain was exquisite, a knife slicing through his soul in increments so fine he could barely perceive them.
And then—control.
The energy obeyed. It followed his intention, molding to his will. He reached out, extending a mental tendril into the city itself.
A patrol of three approached the alley's mouth, torches swinging. They did not see him. Not fully. Not yet.
With a thought, he directed the energy. It struck the patrol like a wave of unseen force. Torches clattered, feet stumbled. One guard's vision blurred, another collapsed mid-step, dazed, the third screamed and scrambled backward, clutching his head.
The girl stared. Terror and awe mixed in her gaze.
"Stay close," Caelum said quietly. "I will handle them."
And he did.
By the time the patrol recovered—or understood what had happened—they were alone.
> The city does not understand me yet.
He flexed his fingers. The energy coiled and hissed, as if pleased.
But satisfaction came with a cost.
A memory, fragile and intimate, flickered and vanished. A smile from a long-forgotten teacher, a fragment of warmth in a world that had never cared—gone. He did not mourn.
He could not.
They continued through the ruins, shadows guiding them.
And then, at the edge of an open courtyard, she appeared.
Seraphina Noctveil.
The first thing Caelum noticed was her presence: a quiet, deliberate aura, a subtle disturbance in the Path energy around her. She moved like someone who had already measured every outcome of every step, someone who had seen beyond the surface of things.
Her hair was silver-black, catching the faint moonlight. Her eyes, a muted violet, were sharp—too sharp.
"You're… unusual," she said calmly, voice carrying easily over the distance. Not accusation, not fear. Observation. Neutral. Analytical.
"I've been told I do not exist," Caelum replied.
She raised an eyebrow. "Neither do I."
It was a statement that chilled him more than the city's night air.
She stepped forward, deliberately unarmed, but the aura she exuded made it clear she was no ordinary human. The Path energy around her shimmered faintly, like ripples across a still pond.
"You… you survived the Rite," she said softly, as though testing the words. "No Path, no blessing, no corruption. You—"
He studied her. Calm, precise, unreadable. And yet… he could feel the faint tremor in the energy around her.
She could not see his fate.
> Interesting, he thought.
Most would tremble, grovel, or attack. She did neither. She simply observed.
He stepped into the open courtyard, hands empty. The girl he had rescued ducked behind a ruined wall.
"I am not your enemy," he said.
"You could be," she replied. "Anyone outside the system… is a threat."
He inclined his head. "Then we are agreed. I am the failure of the system. You are… curious."
Her lips curved faintly. "Perhaps. Or cautious. Perhaps both."
There was a long silence.
She studied him, then tilted her head. "You have consumed fragments of the Rite."
He did not flinch. "I have."
"And the cost?"
"Memories, feelings… parts of myself," he admitted. "Not enough to die. Not yet enough to lose control."
Her eyes narrowed slightly, studying him. "Dangerous," she said.
"Yes," he replied. "But effective."
Footsteps again—closer, more insistent. The city had not forgotten them.
"They are coming," she said calmly. "You cannot escape them alone."
He considered it. He did not trust her—not fully. But she was useful, and he could manipulate her later if necessary.
"Fine," he said. "But understand this. I do not save people. I only survive."
She nodded. "Understood."
Together, they melted into the ruins, moving like shadows.
As they ran, Caelum felt the energy within him thrumming in response to her Path.
> Observation. Calculation. Measurement.
Fragments of insight flickered—her strengths, weaknesses, and the flow of her thoughts.
He realized, faintly, that he could learn from her. Not steal, not dominate, not manipulate… not yet. But he could study.
And that study came at a cost.
Another memory vanished, like smoke through his fingers.
He did not notice immediately. He only felt the faint hollow where it had been—a warmth, a name, a day that would never come again.
He would not mourn.
He could not afford to.
They reached an intersection where the ruins opened into a small square. The faint light of torches revealed a new threat: a unit of Path Inquisitors, their faces hidden, their motions synchronized as if part of a single organism.
One of them raised a hand. The energy in the air twisted. The Path system was attempting to engage him directly.
He felt it—like thousands of invisible threads stretching toward his mind, probing.
Most would have screamed, flinched, or collapsed.
Caelum smiled faintly.
> I do not exist.
He reached out mentally. The fragment of ritual energy coiled, obeyed, and lashed. A wave of distorted Path energy hit the inquisitors. Their vision blurred. Their senses fractured. One screamed, clawing at the ground, while another fell to his knees, doubled over.
He had survived.
But he knew, deep down, that this was only the beginning.
Every action left a mark. Every manipulation of energy took more from him. Memories, feelings, fragments of identity.
But if he did not act, he would die.
And death, he had learned, was the only certainty the world could enforce.
After the Inquisitors fled, Seraphina stepped beside him. "You are… not like anyone I've seen," she said quietly.
He glanced at her. "Nor you."
She gave a small, knowing smile. "Then we have a choice. We survive. Together. Or we die separately."
He weighed her words. Trust, even minimal, was dangerous. But he had little choice. The city was vast, and the hunt had only begun.
He nodded once. "Fine."
> But do not mistake this for loyalty, he thought. "I survive for me. Nothing more."
She seemed to understand. Perhaps she had learned the same lesson. Perhaps she was as dangerous as she appeared.
For the first time, Caelum felt a flicker of curiosity—not fear, not hope, but the dangerous, intoxicating spark of strategy.
> The world has no rules for me yet.
And he intended to write them.
That night, under the faint light of a distant moon, Caelum sat in the ruins with the girl asleep behind a wall. Seraphina watched silently from the shadows, calm, observant.
He closed his eyes and called the energy within him forward.
> Show me the rules of this world. Show me the weak points. Show me the fractures.
The energy obeyed. Pain flared. Memories vanished. And through the darkness, he glimpsed the first threads of what he could become.
A survivor. A predator. Something beyond the Paths, beyond fate, beyond gods themselves.
The city slept, unaware of the anomaly in its midst.
And somewhere, far above, the System stirred.
> Anomaly detected. Begin containment.
Caelum did not flinch.
He had just begun.
And no Path, no god, no law—would stop him.