It hit Zachary immediately.
The dam he had painstakingly built around his Mind shattered in an instant, overwhelmed by a flood of intrusive thoughts — far stronger and more violent than anything he had fought before.
They whispered in a voice almost identical to his own, so close that it became nearly impossible to tell where he ended and the Soul Devouring Tree began.
"..." Zachary opened his mouth, but no words came out — only a soft, broken whimper escaped his throat.
Holding his head with trembling hands, Zachary collapsed to his knees, ragged breaths escaping his lips. He resisted with everything he had, trying to purge each invading thought as he had done so many times before — but the sheer quantity of them made the task almost impossible.
The girls stood over him, smiling in quiet satisfaction at the sight, before finally turning to leave. Impossible for him to notice, there was a faint twitch at the corner of Nephis's lips.
'What is—'
‹Don'tresistDon'tresistDon'tresistDon'tresistDon'tresistDon'tresist›
Zachary struggled to collect himself, purging each foreign thought as it surfaced. But every genuine thought he formed was immediately followed by dozens of false echoes — each one carrying his own voice. Endless, relentless, like mental spam flooding his mind. He erased one thought, only for ten more to take its place.
He understood instinctively: consuming the fruit had created a channel between him and the tree. Through that link, no matter how much he resisted, the Soul Devouring Tree could keep forcing its influence into him — again and again — until he finally broke and became its obedient thrall.
'I need... to find a way—'
‹SurrenderSurrenderSurrenderSurrenderSurrenderSurrenderSurrender›
Zachary tried to keep his thoughts straight, but each time one appeared, it was immediately drowned beneath the flood of his own voice repeating alien commands. He needed to find a way out — fast.
'I can do it,' Zachary told himself, trying to hold onto a fragment of clarity.
It wasn't a miracle, but perhaps desperation — or instinct — that made him begin to repeat his thoughts in cycles. Each time he formed a coherent idea, he echoed it again and again, forcing it into rhythm. Through that repetition, he stopped himself from being completely swallowed by the deluge.
He had carved a fragile foundation. But the greater problem remained: the Tree's whispers still carried his voice. Thankfully...
'I've done this before,' Zachary thought, forcing his shaking body to sit cross-legged.
Having once come close to losing himself to his Flaw, he had experience in this sort of battle. After all, Mara's Whisper had also spoken in his own voice. Using that hard-earned experience — and the tiny edge he'd honed resisting the Tree's influence — Zachary began his counterattack.
Slowly, painfully, he reclaimed ground within his own Mind.
He bit his lip hard enough for blood to spill, crimson drops running down his chin — but he didn't care. The pain anchored him, a lifeline to the present. Through it, he managed to establish a fragile balance.
Until he heard the voice of the Spell.
[Your Soul becomes better defined.]
Zachary could feel, in horror, the Soul Fragments flowing into his Core — and with them, the voice of the Soul Devouring Tree grew louder, rendering all his precious efforts meaningless. He was back at ground zero.
Now, everything made sense. The Soul Fragments weren't a byproduct of the tree's diet — they were a mechanism of control. Each time a victim absorbed them and their Soul Core strengthened, it triggered a reward response — subtle at first, almost imperceptible: a rush of soul essence, a fleeting clarity of thought, a brief surge of strength. It felt like a blessing.
But it wasn't. It was conditioning.
Each time they consumed the fruit, each time they received a Fragment, their minds unknowingly tied that surge of power to the tree's presence — to obeying it, trusting it, protecting it. The tree trained them through pleasure, a perfect system of reinforcement: obedience meant power, submission meant clarity, loyalty meant purpose.
Over time, that association deepened until resistance became irrational — even painful. The very thought of rebellion stopped feeling courageous and started feeling wrong. Once that line was crossed, they were no longer themselves.
Zachary knew he couldn't fight it now, he couldn't reclaim his Mind from the control already taking root. But that didn't mean he would stop resisting.
If Zachary had a credit for every time he had nearly lost himself since arriving in this world, he would have three credits — not much, but strange enough that it had happened three times in such a short stay.
He thought of the first time. When he had almost lost himself merging with the Original One.
Even in his fragile consciousness, Zachary still managed to think of him — to wonder how different things might have been. He'd said it himself once: two minds work better than one. Maybe, in this moment, that would have been true — two minds working together to resist the Soul Devouring Tree. Unfortunately, that boat had long since sailed. But the thought sparked something.
If his Mind was already being taken from him... then he just had to create another one.
Metaphorically speaking obviously, after all creating a Mind from scratch was nearly impossible according to psychology. What the memory of the Original One had inspired Zachary to attempt instead, was branching his consciousness. This was not multitasking, nor was it like what Sunny had developed at the later stages of his power — the ability to split attention and control different bodies with a single Mind.
What Zachary planned to do was different: copy his consciousness and keep it separated from his original Mind. He would maintain two distinct states — two consciousnesses flowing in parallel, two branches of the same Mind but clearly delimited from one another. This was his only answer to resist the Soul Devouring Tree: surrender one Mind while retreating into a new one, isolating the tree's control to a portion of himself while operating from the other.
'Can I do it?' Zachary wondered, breathing deeply as beads of sweat ran down his temples.
'No... I must.' With that resolve, he began a foolish endeavor once again.
He had a starting point, and once more it was thanks to the Original One. He recalled the First Nightmare — how he had isolated the feeling of his Soul, and through that had entered the Mindscape, the border between two distinct Souls.
This was not the same, but the sensation provided a model. First he pictured the border of his unstable Mind, then he began constructing the second one. How should he proceed? Copy his most personal traits and build a persona piece by piece?
No — that would be agonizingly slow, tedious, and likely impossible. Walt Whitman had put it well: "I am large, I contain multitudes." Trying to replicate that breadth would only overload his already strained Mind.
Instead, Zachary chose a simpler — and paradoxically harder — method: let a part of his Mind collapse under the Soul Devouring Tree, but without surrendering to its command.
Wasn't that the same thing? No. He had noticed, through the channel the tree had opened to him, that its approach toward him had changed. It would not enthrall him wholesale as it did others; rather, it would suppress his rebellious Ego by flooding it with adulterated thoughts, collapsing resistance until only a mindless husk remained to obey.
He was surprised by how the Terror acted — clearly demonstrating intelligence — but more surprising was how much power the Soul Devouring Tree had to spend to subdue him using the girls' altered behavior and this new tactic. It had exhausted reserves it had painstakingly collected to ascend ranks.
'Serves you right, bastard,' he thought, grimly. 'I'll make it tortuous for you, too.'
The next part was the most difficult. He had to maintain a clear boundary around his Mind — so that when he stopped resisting the tree and allowed the foreign thoughts to enter, instead of collapsing beneath them, his Mind would be pushed toward the newly created consciousness. In this way, he could keep most of his awareness under control, migrating safely into the new consciousness while isolating the corrupted portion within the old one.
This was how he would finally outwit the tree — by dividing himself before it could consume him whole.
The cornerstone of this plan was obviously, Balance Control. His Aspect Ability gave him a better control over his Mind. Until now, he had used it to learn fighting techniques better, to mantain a calm mind in perilious situations and now to resist mental corruption. But this time, he had to go further — to truly shape his Mind, molding it to suit his will.
With his plan fully formed, Zachary began constructing the border of his new consciousness.
Time lost meaning. He was completely immersed within himself, cut off from the outside world. This first stage was the hardest: creating something entirely new, giving form to abstraction through instinct alone. He failed many times. While shaping the borders of his new consciousness, he also had to monitor the Soul Devouring Tree's encroachment, maintaining a razor-thin edge of awareness within his primary Mind.
But finally, he had done it.
Now came the most dangerous part: give entry to the Tree's attacks. This was the moment everything would be decided, it was going to be a bet against the tree, and to be honest, the odds were against him. He had done everything to give himself some leverage, but if even one detail failed, it would all collapse.
Unfortunately, there was no other way. So Zachary steeled his wavering Mind, and began limiting it against the tree's voices. Now he had to wait for the right time-
No, that was the wrong viewpoint, what time could be the right one? He wa against the ropes, in his current situation he could not be a chooser. If his heart was wavering it was better to let himself be controlled. In this world he could not doubt, he had to act.
So finally, Zachary stopped resisting.
***
It was night in the Forgotten Shore, and silence flowed across the Ashen Barrow.
The Soul Devouring Tree stood tall above it — imposing in stature, tyrannical in presence. But something was different: its crimson leaves looked slightly withered, and many now lay scattered across the ground — a clear sign that it had been bleeding strength over the past few days.
At its roots, a lone figure sat cross-legged, his tattered mantle the only thing covering his body. After a few slow breaths, the figure's eyelids began to tremble — and then, he opened his eyes.
His crimson irises were clouded. He looked around with a dazed expression, lost and empty, until recognition finally flickered within them.
"I did it," Zachary muttered weakly, though his heart blazed with quiet triumph.
He had done it. Shifting his focus inward, he could feel how the Soul Devouring Tree's enthrallment had been confined within a branched consciousness, leaving his Mind clear of intrusion. The foreign thoughts still pressed against the border between minds, always searching for cracks — but as long as he maintained his focus, they would never cross.
Sighing in weary relief, he looked up toward the dark sky. If his inner clock was right, no more than three days had passed. He still had time.
Zachary ran toward the camp they had built — and there, lying on a bed of leaves, he saw someone unmoving.
His heart seized. He sprinted forward, dropping to his knees beside Cassie. The blind girl was still breathing.
"Cass?" Zachary shook her shoulder gently at first, then harder, trying to wake her. The blonde stirred, eyelids fluttering open with visible effort.
"Zach?" she murmured faintly. A chill ran down his spine.
"Yes, it's me. How are you?" he asked, his voice trembling despite himself.
"I'm… hungry." Cassie's tone was fragile as she sat up slowly. "Do you have a fruit, Zach?"
'Fuck.' The curse echoed through his head. She was at the final stage of enthrallment. His worst fears had come true.
In its attempt to tighten control over him, the Soul Devouring Tree had strengthened its hold on the girls, accelerating their mental decay. They didn't have a month — they might not even have three days.
Swallowing hard, Zachary placed a gentle hand on her shoulder and eased her back down. "Don't worry, Cass. I'll take care of things now," he said quietly, the weight in his voice betraying him.
Then he turned and ran toward the western edge of the island.
Sure enough, Nephis was there — standing near the shore, her melancholy and restless will pushing her beyond exhaustion. The tree's influence had erased any thoughts of leaving, yet her indomitable spirit still drove her forward, fighting in vain.
"Hello, Neph," Zachary said softly. His tone was flat, but underneath it, a storm was brewing.
Nephis turned toward him. Her eyes were dull and clouded, heavy shadows beneath them. Her lips were cracked, half-bitten. "Zach... didn't we... didn't we have to move west?" she asked, her face twisting as she struggled to remember something that refused to come.
The sight struck Zachary's heart like a blade — and with it, the emotions he had been holding back finally tore free, claiming their names.
Guilt.
And beneath it, something deeper — Shame.
He bit his lip hard enough to draw blood, choking on a sob as he sank to his knees beside her.
"I'm so sorry, Neph," he whispered, his voice breaking. "I'm sorry. I'm sorry."
Nephis's frown softened. A faint, wondering expression flickered across her ashen face. "Why are you apologizing for?" she asked softly.
Before she could say more, Zachary rose to his feet and forced a trembling smile. "And yes, we have to move west. But don't worry — I'll make things right. Stay here for a moment, okay?"
Before she could answer, Zachary turned and began striding toward the massive trunk of the tree — then started to climb. He was going to search for something.
He was going to claim something that didn't belong to him.
***
While climbing the tree and keeping tabs on the border of his Mind, Zachary's thoughts grew heavy.
'I've been avoiding thinking about this since arriving at the Ashen Barrow,' he admitted, propelling himself upward and grabbing a rough protrusion of bark.
The truth was, ever since accepting Sunny's absence and being forced to take his place, the thought of what he was about to do had kept crossing his mind — but he had always pushed it down. Refused to entertain it. But now…
"Weaver's forbidden lineage," Zachary muttered, his voice acrid as he finally reached the lower branches of the tree.
A piece stolen by a thief...
At the top of the Soul Devouring Tree, hidden among its gnarled limbs, lay Blood Weave. Yet Zachary had long resisted claiming it. Partly because, in doing so, his last hope of finding Sunny — of letting him reclaim his rightful place in the story — would crumble. And partly because Zachary wasn't sure he could bear the Fate that came with the Lineage.
"A heir of Weaver must never be known, must never be loved, and must never be worshiped by humanity," he whispered, repeating the words he'd once read in the novel. His tone was reverent and bitter — like a prayer no one should hear.
He stopped climbing for a moment, eyes closing in a pained wince before continuing upward.
'In truth, I'd rather leave that thing here, perfectly lost as it should be… but I can't.' Zachary sighed, his heart sinking.
'My goal isn't saving this world. It's not defeating the Forgotten God. It's returning home — and for that, I need every ounce of strength I can gather. I nearly bled out fighting that Demon, and worse battles will come. Not only that — the gap between Awakened who bear a Divine Lineage and those who don't will only widen as one walks the Path of Ascension.'
'That was the same conclusion Broken Sword reached when he claimed Weaver's Legacy… the same conclusion that sentenced him to death,' Zachary thought grimly.
'Sunny's absence is still unsolved, but before I can even begin searching for him, I need to survive. And for that, I need every power I can obtain. If that means condemning my Soul...' Zachary gritted his teeth.
'Then so be it.'
Still, he wasn't ignorant of what he was about to invoke. The curse of the Forbidden Lineage only truly awakened once one reached Supremacy — when people began to worship its bearer and his Domain. Until then, the burden remained dormant.
'Until then... I shouldn't worry too much.'
He paused, a dry laugh catching in his throat.
'Right?'
- You're gonna carry that weight. -
Sighing tiredly, yet with clear resolve, Zachary continued climbing — up, and higher, and higher still. The novel had never described where Sunny had found the nest, only that the branches had thinned, and that the leaves had grown denser and darker.
Weirdly enough, the sharp intuition that had carried him through most of his journey was silent now. Abnormally silent.
Clicking his tongue in annoyance, he pressed on. After reaching the upper parts of the tree, where the branches grew thin and sinewy, Zachary decided to start his search there. He began walking carefully along the massive limbs, moving outward toward the edge. Nothing.
He returned and took another path — west, north, east, and finally south. Still nothing.
Hours passed, and time was bleeding away. The Vile Thieving Bird's nest was hidden too well, buried within the tangled sea of branches and crimson leaves. Only someone with dark vision — and pure chance — could ever hope to find it.
Not only that: whoever found it would need to sense shadows, see in the dark, and, perhaps most of all, possess the stubborn will to climb this cursed tree to its crown.
It had been sheer luck that Sunny discovered it. Or maybe...
"Fate," Zachary murmured. 'Sunny was fated to come across Blood Weave.'
And now he was planning to steal it.
He exhaled softly, raising his head — and froze. Above him, several dozen meters higher, the branches twisted unnaturally, coiling downward like serpents.
"Gotcha."
Zachary turned immediately, sprinting back along the branch to reach the trunk and climb higher. But as he ran, his foot suddenly caught on something — and he tripped, nearly pitching over the edge. If not for Balance Control, he would have fallen.
Catching himself, he frowned, one eyebrow raised. That shouldn't have happened. But there was no time to linger, the girls were waiting.
He resumed his climb, hands gripping rough bark, but a sudden gust of wind slammed into his side, shaking the massive trunk. He gritted his teeth, clinging tightly. The wind howled again — first from above, then below, then from the side — chaotic, almost alive. And yet... each time, it struck him.
A cold suspicion began to form in Zachary's heart.
Branches snapped beneath his fingers. The bark peeled away when he reached for it. His muscles trembled with sudden weakness — his own arms betraying him. Still, with sheer tenacity and stubborn will, Zachary pressed forward.
When he finally reached the upper branches where the nest awaited, one thing was painfully clear: the World itself was moving against him.
As if something higher was rejecting his presence. As if he wasn't supposed to be here.
But Zachary had already steeled his resolve. Even if Fate, the World, or the gods themselves opposed him, he would not back down.
Wasn't this what being a Blasphemer was all about?
After an arduous climb, he finally reached it — the nest. The giant, spherical structure greeted him with eerie silence. With ragged breaths and shallow cuts tracing his face, Zachary stepped inside.
At the center lay an egg. Zachary swallowed hard and approached, summoning Ender's Solace.
To be fair, he didn't share the same spirit of exploration that had defined Sunny. Even so, the history that radiated from the ancient egg filled Zachary with an inexplicable feeling — something like reverence, and dread intertwined.
But he forced those feelings down and got into position.
Ender's Solace had grown stronger — its edge sharper and its bite more dreadful — he was confident it could pierce the shell. But just as he raised the blade, something screamed within him — a primal warning.
Danger Sense flared so violently that his stomach lurched. His hands froze mid-swing, the edge of Ender's Solace hovering mere inches from the egg.
A chill crept down his spine as memory struck.
The egg could steal the life force of anyone who touched it, Sunny had survived only because he was a unique being carrying Shadow Fragments. But Zachary had a normal core.
'Another fateful chance,' he thought bitterly.
Worse still, he could feel that he shared some kind of deeper bond with Ender's Solace. So attacking it with it could spell his doom.
Swallowing hard, he dismissed the sword and summoned Midnight Shard instead. Planting his feet, he steadied his breath and swung. The blade struck true — and barely chipped the surface.
'I'll be damned,' Zachary cursed under his breath. He lacked the shadow reinforcement that Sunny possessed; Ender's Solace was the only weapon he could empower with his Soul.
'But if there's a will, there's a way. After all, eggs are meant to be broken.'
He summoned Antlered Wrath.
Gripping the warhammer with both hands, he grounded his stance on the nest's floor and struck. The impact echoed like thunder, sending a sharp, metallic cry through the chamber. His arms trembled with each blow, but he didn't stop.
Strike after strike — relentless, deafening — until the tenth. The hammer suddenly grew lighter, trembling with contained energy.
Then, with the next swing, it exploded with power.
The impact threw Zachary to the side. He hit the floor hard and looked up — his heart leaping. A spiderweb of cracks now marred the egg's surface.
'I think I know why Cassie fell from the tree,' he muttered, standing and gripping the austere tachi. 'It seems this hammer has an enchantment — after a certain number of strikes, it releases the kinetic energy of all the previous ones.'
No wonder he'd missed it. The only time he'd used Antlered Wrath was against the Centurion, and during that fight, he had summoned and dismissed it repeatedly, resetting the count.
The realization lifted something heavy in his chest — Doubt.
'So my plan failed just because I lacked information... good to know.'
With a steadier heart, Zachary raised Midnight Shard once more — and drove it into the crack.
[You have slain a Great Devil, Vile Thieving Bird's Spawn.]
Zachary's mouth curled into a grin as he waited for the Spell to continue. But there was only silence.
A second passed. Then another. When the third came and went, unease crept into his chest.
'What happened? Don't tell me the Spell is actually—'
Before he could finish the thought, the Spell finally announced:
[You have received a Memory: Drop of Ichor.]
Zachary's heart leapt. He'd gotten it.
Summoning the description, he read of the Vile Thieving Bird, hated by both the gods and the —unknown—.
That made him pause.
He had thought that after learning the runes read 'Daemons', he'd be able to see it written clearly. But no — it seemed the knowledge alone wasn't enough. His soul was still too weak to bear the weight of truly reading those ancient marks.
'Hated by both the divine and the profane, huh?' Zachary smirked faintly. 'Guess we're a little alike, little guy.'
But then the Spell spoke again.
[You have acquired a Drop of Ichor. Do you wish to consume it?]
He remembered how Sunny had described this part — the Spell's voice sounding almost excited.
But this time, the tone was different. Cold. Disgusted. Contemptuous.
Zachary frowned, but shrugged it off. "Yes."
[...]
[Are you sure?]
'Huh?' He blinked. The Spell had asked again. "Yes, I'm sure."
[...]
[Please reconsider.]
"Oh my fucking god." Zachary threw up his hands, exasperated.
He knew this Lineage wasn't meant for him — that much was obvious — but for the Spell itself to plead with him not to take it? That was new.
He already knew the Spell had beef with him, but this? This was ridiculous.
"How is that even my fault, bitch?" he snapped. "If you didn't want me to find it, then Weaver shouldn't have lost it in the first place. Finders keepers, right? So yes, I want to consume it."
A heavy silence followed.
[...]
[As you wish... Usurper.]
The word dripped with barely contained hatred. Then, as Zachary watched, the golden sphere split into two thin streams of liquid. That's when Danger Sense screamed.
Something was wrong. The air itself seemed to change — thickening, twisting. His instincts shrieked that the threat came from everywhere.
But the true source was right before him. The golden ichor pulsed with a malevolent light, its glow shifting — bright gold darkening to something murky and foul.
Zachary recognized it immediately. It was the same color that had bled from the Demon. Malice.
Pure, unfiltered malice. It hated him, the ichor itself hated him.
His heart skipped a beat. He had to stop this. "Wait—"
The words barely left his mouth before the golden ichor shot forward and drilled into his eyes.
And his eyes burst.
Zachary began to hyperventilate, clawing at his hair in desperation, trying to hold himself together — to keep the border of his Mind firm.
Then an agonized scream tore through his throat.
The pain was unimaginable. He couldn't see anything, but Cinder Eyes allowed him to feel everything.
His eyes exploded — regrowing and disintegrating at once. His muscles tore apart. His blood boiled within him, spreading agony through every vein, every nerve, every inch of his flesh. This was no ordinary transformation.
It wasn't chaotic — it was deliberate. Each twist of his body, each tear of his flesh, each rupture of his soul carried intent. The pain wasn't random; it was crafted. Someone — something — wanted him to suffer.
He was being punished for taking what wasn't his.
The fragile border of his consciousness shattered instantly, and the Soul Devouring Tree surged back into his Mind. But this time, the Terror met something far more horrifying than resistance. It met pain. Endless, searing, consuming pain.
I'mmeltingI'mmeltingI'mmeltingI'mmeltingI'mmeltingI'mmeltingI'mmeltingI'mmeltingI'mmeltingI'mmeltingI'mmeltingI'mmeltingI'mmeltingI'mmeltingI'mmeltingI'mmeltingI'mmeltingI'mmeltingI'mmeltingI'mmeltingI'mmeltingI'mmeltingI'mmeltingI'mmeltingI'mmeltingI'mmeltingI'mmeltingI'mmeltingI'mmeltingI'mmelting...
Zachary's body collapsed and regrew in an instant — a paradox of unending death and rebirth. A system in constant decay, trapped in perpetual renewal. And through it all, one truth became clear: he was not fit to bear a lineage. If not for Balance Control — the single thread keeping his Body, Mind, and Soul aligned — he would have already melted into a puddle of blood.
Only one thought survived the storm. A plea, born not of cowardice but of final surrender. Words he had never thought he would pray.
'Let me die.'
An eternity passed — or maybe a heartbeat.
When the agony finally subsided, Zachary lay motionless on the cold floor. Dried blood clung to his face; his vacant eyes stared upward, hollow and glassy. Then, slowly, he stirred.
[You have acquired a new Attribute.]
[You have acquired a new Attribute.]
The Spell's voice dripped with contempt.
Light flickered back into Zachary's eyes — faint, unsteady. His Mind was chaos, his heart cold.
"I need to move," he murmured, voice flat, expression void of life."They're waiting for me."
***
He was halfway down the tree when Zachary's mind began to stabilize.
The first thing he noticed was that, despite the collapse of his mental borders, the Soul Devouring Tree's assault had ceased. The channel formed through the fruit worked both ways — the Terror had suffered the same pain he did.
'Serves it right,' Zachary muttered without humor.
But then he stopped mid-step. His shoulders trembled, and with a shaky breath, a tear slipped down his cheek.
"Focus, Zachary," he whispered. "I can't let that... experience change who I am. I must not lose myself in the hardship of this world."
Swallowing hard, he continued his descent.
'I checked my runes briefly — I actually got two new Attributes: [Blood Weave] and [Spark of Divinity]. Ha, with [Enlightenment] added, I'm just collecting Attributes at this point.' There was a faint trace of humor in his thought, thin but genuine.
He would've liked to study the runes more carefully, but there was no time. Even so, one thing was obvious — his vision had improved dramatically.
Cinder Eyes had already granted him an incredible advantage, but now, the enhancement from Blood Weave was beyond comparison. He would still need time to truly experience what had changed in his vision though.
What he did knew was that he could now see the Weaves — the threads of Memories themselves. But he decided to wait until he was at a better place to truly focus and check the Enchantments of them.
Soon, his feet touched the ground.
He landed not far from the camp and immediately moved toward it. On his way down, he had collected branches and webs from the nest — materials for his escape plan. Placing them aside, he hurried to check on Cassie.
The girl was awake. It seemed the Tree had loosened its control, perhaps recoiling from the echo of his suffering. But even now, delusion lingered in her eyes.
"Zach?" she asked weakly.
"Yes, it's me, Cass," Zachary replied, steadying his breath as he arranged the branches and webs into bundles. He couldn't afford to falter — not in front of them.
He had to get them out.
"Hm? You have new Attributes," Cassie said suddenly, surprise flickering across her pale face.
Zachary froze. His eyes widened slightly before narrowing again in thought.
Right — she couldn't read Attributes, but she could sense their nature. So he forced a calm tone.
"Yes, it happened somehow."
Meanwhile, his mind was already elsewhere.
'I need to find Nephis fast. I'll need her help to build the boat... we must sail after all.'
But before he could move, Cassie spoke again — softly, absently, as though thinking aloud.
"But why would a lineage be forbidden, though?"
Zachary's mind went blank. His shoulders stiffened. A dull ringing filled his ears. She wasn't supposed to be able to read Attribute descriptions.
He turned toward her, color draining from his face.
"What did you just say?"