The air was tense as the dread and pressure seemed to materialize over Jace.
He adjusted his eyes in the faint light filtering from the blinking console. The masked figure before him was tall, clad in that long, dark Reaper coat that hid his body but amplified the threat of the crimson eyes behind the mask. He moved like a predatory phantom.
"Are you just going to stare? I don't fancy old guys," Jace scoffed.
The man ignored the question. He pointed the Translator Relic at Jace and spoke in a cold, precise language Jace had never heard. Jace saw the word 'Austro' displayed on the relic.
"Your continued attempts at humor will not delay your execution," the masked figure said, his voice now filtering the Austro into Jace's native tongue.
Jace blinked, confused. "What... I can't understand shit you're saying, Mr. Shakespeare."
The masked figure adjusted the settings, and the voice that filtered through was amplified, cold, and flat. "You have a choice. Death now, or risk death later, under my terms. I suggest you listen very carefully, relic."
Jace flinched at the word 'relic.' Anger rose up from his deep fear of being treated like an object."Just so you know, I have a name. It's Jace, fucker" he interjected, a snarky whisper laced with profound fear.
The man's hand moved fast. He drew his blade, the cold steel cutting a quick line through the air until the tip hovered just above Jace's neck. A chill ran down Jace's spine for a brief moment.
"Watch your words, kiddo," the masked figure warned, his tone slicing through the silence. He pulled the blade away immediately, but the threat lingered.
"What you are defies every physical law we use to govern this place," he continued, pointing the Aether Compass at Jace again. The needle instantly locked on the impossible ZERO reading.
"The Citadel quantifies all life by its Aether Core—its Phase. You are Zero phase. To them, you do not exist. Since no cores will mutate right away upon exposure to Aether, a zero-core life form is an impossibility. You are a flaw."
Jace felt the new information hit him all at once. Aether Core? Phase? It was a frightening look at the rules of this new world. "What the hell is a Zero Phase?" Jace snapped. "Is Aether just another word for dumbass?"
The masked figure didn't react to the insult. "It means you do not exist, and therefore, you cannot exist. If my team had brought you back, you would not see a living daylight. For sure, you will be dissected like a frog the moment you enter the Alexandria Guild. You would be stripped of your body, your memories, your self, for the sake of their goal."
Jace flinched hard. The masked figure's cold threat, 'dissected like a frog,' triggered a sudden, horrific memory: a screaming subject strapped to a table, dark energy surging on the console, and the betrayal by his own father. He realized the tapes he had watched were not just history—they were a warning.
Jace tried to regain his composure. "Wait, can we back up a bit?" he asked, desperately grabbing at the fragments of knowledge. "Citadel, Aether Core, Austro—can you tell me in simple terms?"
The man gave him a short, vague summary of how the world worked. The Citadel is the government. Austro is the language. Aether is the power source, like mana, for Aether Cores. Phase means how many cores are in your body.
The masked figure continued on. "I risked my life and my entire operation to keep your existence a secret. I tell you this because the certainty of death by their research is far greater than the risk of betrayal by me."
"Why?" Jace demanded, his gaze locked on the cold mask. "Why bother? Why not just kill me now?"
The masked figure paused. He had to trust his instincts, since his radar skill did not work on Jace. The anomaly was the flaw.
"Your existence is proof that the system is broken," the masked figure stated, his voice dropping in pitch. "You are the fundamental flaw in the world. This flaw must be utilized. It must break the system."
The words carried a heavy sense of purpose. Jace realized the man was not a hero, but a revolutionary. Jace was just a tool to him, but he had no choice.
"Fine. I'll go with you," Jace said, his voice flat. "But I have terms."
The masked figure remained utterly still. "You have no terms."
"Yes, I do," Jace countered, pushing back the fear. His years of survival screamed for knowledge.
"You will tell me whatever those shits you mentioned—every single thing. And you will keep that thing," he pointed at the Translator Relic, "always on, and you answer every question I ask during the journey. If I sense your bullshitting me, or if you refuse to talk, I stop. I run. And you lose your grand plan." Jace looked as though he had gained the upper hand in the negotiation.
The masked figure tilted his head, weighing the risk. The boy was dangerous, but his hunger for knowledge could be used. A sarcastic smile, hidden by the mask, tugged at his mouth.
"Nice negotiation skills, kid. I'll give you that," he finally conceded. "But the journey is too complex to start immediately. You will stay here. You will stay hidden for six months while I tidy up things on my end."
"Six months?" Jace scoffed. "Six months is a piece of cake. What's two years?" The remark was laced with sarcastic confidence.
"I will leave you rations, and I will leave you this." The masked figure placed the Translator Relic in Jace's hand and set it to the local Austro language. "This tool can also display visual translation to help you with the basics. Treat it as your friend."
Jace almost laughed at the idea of a friend, having never had one in his life.
He turned the device over in his hands and glanced at the battered steel door. The silence dragged on, broken only by the faint hum of old ventilation. "So," he muttered to himself, "I guess that's it. I'm just... waiting?"
The masked man paused at the threshold. "You are not just waiting. You're learning. Preparing. The world outside isn't what you think."
Jace hesitated. "I know what's out there," he said, voice uncertain. "Radiation. Death. That's why this bunker exists. The outside would kill us."
The masked figure cocked his head as if genuinely puzzled. "Radiation?" His voice filtered through the translator, the word foreign on his tongue. "We have detectors for Aether surges, but nothing called radiation."
Jace stared at him. "It's... like invisible poison. Fallout from the old wars. You can't see it, but it kills."
The masked man regarded him in silence, some impassive calculation flickering behind the lenses. "You won't find this 'radiation' outside. Not as you imagine. The world is dangerous, yes, but for different reasons. The Citadel's reach. The Guilds. The storms. Not invisible poison."
Jace held his breath. The thought that his father's warnings could be wrong, or even a lie, sent a chill through him. "You're serious? The air's not toxic? People... live out there?"
The masked man, Theo, hesitated and narrowed his eyes in thought. "If you had an Aether Core, the outside would feel the same as here. But you are Zero Phase. In theory, Aether in the air should be poison to you. But you have survived this long inside, without a Core and without mutation. That should be impossible. And yet, you are not dying."
Jace frowned, absorbing this new, frightening logic. "So the air's not poison, but the Aether is?"
"Aether is life to most," Theo said quietly, his tone more contemplative than before. "But for you, it should be fatal—at least, that's what every law and every researcher in the Citadel believes.
Yet, here you are. You exist outside their rules. That makes you valuable and dangerous. The Citadel would destroy you to hide that flaw."
Jace pressed his palm against the cool metal grate, the truth swirling in his head. Everything his father warned him about—the poisonous air, the invisible death—was a story to keep him inside. "So all this time, I was... hiding from ghosts. Not poison. Not radiation. Just fear."
Theo let the silence settle, then his voice returned, more purposeful. "Fear is a powerful tool. It kept you safe, but it also kept you caged. Now you have a choice: learn, listen, adapt. I will return for you in six months. If you run, you won't survive. But if you prepare, you'll see the world for what it truly is."
Jace looked away from the terrifying mask and those crimson eyes, down to the high-end Relic. He was trading his sanctuary for a chance to fight back. "Yeah, yeah, old man, I got it. I'll prepare for your return."
The masked figure walked past Jace, then paused, placing a hand on Jace's shoulder.
"Nice meeting you, kid," the man murmured, his voice now unfiltered, closer to a whisper. "I'll see you around."
Before Jace could react, the man moved faster than he could see. Jace blinked and looked back, but the man was gone. There were no footsteps, no sign of movement. The figure had vanished, almost like he dissolved into the air. Jace realized he had just met the most dangerous person he had ever known.