After Elias left, I sat alone, not sleeping. The room was dim and cold. The stone walls held a chill, and the only light filtered through a narrow slit of a window high above—fractured and dusty. My skin shimmered faintly, that strange glow pulsing beneath the surface—soft, rhythmic, like a second heartbeat.
I raised my hand to the light. The glow didn't brighten or dim in reaction. It simply was.
What was I supposed to do with this? I pressed my fingers to my chest, trying to feel the source.
I closed my eyes. Stillness.
Then I reached inward, without knowing how or why—only that I could. The glow responded. It intensified at first, a wave of gentle heat brushing against my skin.
And then, as I willed it, it vanished.
Not gone. I still felt it, but hidden—like a flame submerged beneath still water.
Suddenly, my body sagged, as if all the effort pulled something from within me. I was exhausted? Moments passed—or hours—and eventually, I thought of sleeping, and so I did.
...
After around two hours or so, there came a knock.
I blinked awake.
Another knock, sharper.
When I opened the door, Karasa stood in the hall. She came alone this time.
Her eyes narrowed slightly. "What did you do?"
I blinked at her. "I didn't do anything. What do you mean?"
She didn't answer right away. Her jaw worked, like she was chewing over her next words, then she just turned and started walking.
"Let's talk on the way."
...
We stepped into the Ashram's winding corridor. I hadn't seen it in this light before.
Acolytes moved in quiet rhythms, sweeping colored prayer sand into circular patterns across the tiled floor. Each swirl caught the morning light through stained glass, casting muted reds and greens onto their robes. In the distant courtyard, Enforcers sparred—silent, brutal choreography of fists and steel. Their movements looked rough but well-trained.
In a side alcove, a figure tended to a large, embedded crystal—its light pulsing like something asleep and dreaming. Runes shimmered on its surface. When touched, the crystal hummed in answer.
Karasa finally spoke. "You hid it. Your glow."
I said nothing.
"That's not something a rat from the slums can do. Not even all nobles," she said flatly.
"You're not trained," she muttered. "But you hid it. That makes you suspicious. And the other people nervous... It makes *her* nervous."
Before I could ask who—
Turas appeared. Or rather, emerged—from the shadows of an arched hallway, arms crossed, leaning against the stone.
As if he was waiting for us.
His smile was thin, his eyes sharp. "Ah, there he is."
He stopped. After making a weird expression, he said, "What did you do? Where did your glow go, little ember?"
His gaze shifted to Karasa, then back to me. "People spend years learning how to suppress Essentia like that. And you just... did it?"
"Who are you exactly, ember?"
He straightened, stepping closer, voice quieter. "You know the Overseer's going to ask questions. She doesn't like talent without training. Makes her think of spies. Or... worse."
Karasa rolled her eyes. "You're not helping."
"I wasn't trying to."
The three of us walked the rest of the way in silence. After a minute, we arrived at a set of wide stone doors, guarded by two Sentinels in white armor traced with runes. Their faces were blank behind their helms. They didn't speak.
They opened the door without a word.
...
The chamber was a perfect circle.
Stone walls etched with geometric runes rose to a domed ceiling. The air vibrated faintly, as if held in place by invisible threads. There was a desk and chair in the middle, some bookshelves to the right, and nearby stood a figure—tall and still. She was looking outside the window, but she had a blindfold wrapped across her eyes.
And she turned as we entered—as if she saw more than eyes could.
She did not sit.
The Overseer.
Composed. Dressed in layered robes of dark grey and deep violet. A black silk blindfold covered her eyes, yet her gaze seemed to pierce through the veil—through me.
Her voice—her voice was stone shaped by centuries. Smooth, cold, and calm.
"Karasa. Report."
Karasa stepped forward. "The leaking Essentia was gone when I reached him this morning. But the energy was still there. Hidden. Perfectly suppressed."
The Overseer turned her head slightly in my direction.
"Who taught you to suppress your Essentia?"
I hesitated for a moment.
"No one," I said. "I just... did it."
Silence.
"Where are you from?" she asked, tone sharp.
I looked at the ground.
"I don't know. I woke up in a ruined shrine. I don't remember anything before that."
A pressure crept into the room.
She said nothing. But I felt something. Not physical—but a presence. Something within me tugged. She was probing—not my words, but something beneath them. Emotion? Memory? The invisible rhythm of thought?
I didn't fight it. I didn't need to.
Nothing reacted. No fluctuation. No deceit.
She stepped back, thoughtful.
"Very well," she said.
She lifted a hand. Then her voice sharpened, just slightly.
"Let us test something else."
She raised her hand.
Then suddenly, the world fractured. It twisted...
...and I stood in a wasteland of fire and dust.
The air reeked of blood and ash. Screams tore through the sky like arrows. Great beasts roared in the distance—metal-clad monsters, wings burning. Bodies littered the ground. Men, women... children.
A child ran toward me, eyes wide. They latched onto my sleeve, shaking, tugging, voice lost in the chaos.
"Help me!"
I didn't move.
A blast of energy—sharp, violet light—struck the ground behind us. The shockwave knocked me backward.
The child was gone. Blown apart like mist.
I stared at the spot where he had been.
That child was Elias.
Something churned inside me.
Not pain. Not sorrow. Something else. It rose like heat. My breath grew short. My chest tightened.
More children ran. Fell. Screamed. Died.
I felt it. Everything.
It was too much. I didn't know what emotions they were. They were flooding every corner of my mind. It clawed at me. Tried to drag me into it. To make me feel it.
But none of it was mine.
I looked at my hands. Still me. Still calm.
"No," I whispered. "Not mine."
I closed my eyes and breathed.
This is not real.
The emotions I felt were not real. They weren't mine. She was forcing those emotions on me.
The fire faded.
Silence returned.
But this silence was worse than those screams...
I don't like it.
I stood still for a moment, wondering—what were those emotions?
I opened my eyes, and the battlefield was gone. The chamber appeared again.
The Overseer stood still, unreadable—but I noticed it now: a pause. A breath too long.
Her voice didn't change. But something had shifted—something subtle in her posture. Surprise, maybe. If she hadn't been carved from silence, I might have seen it more clearly.
"Uncommon," she said. "But not unheard of."
She paced towards her desk.
"You are... unmeasured. Untaught. And yet, capable. That is a risk—and a resource."
Then she turned to Turas.
"Leave us."
He blinked, hesitated. He gave me one last look—half caution, half wonder—then gave a mock bow to the Overseer. "With pleasure." Before vanishing into the hallway.
The Overseer then looked to Karasa.
"Take him through the slums. Show him the structures, the flow, the rot."
To me, she said:
"You have two choices. Live with the slum-dwellers. Gather raw ethercrystal like the rest. Or remain in the Ashram and be shaped by its will."
She tilted her head.
"You have until the week's end to decide."
Then she turned away.
...
The slums stank.
We passed through rusted gates and broken stone into a world of smoke and dust.
The city beyond the Ashram was... broken. Slums clung to ruins like moss on a dying tree. Cracked bricks, tents patched with whatever could be scavenged. Children chased flickering crystal motes through cracked alleys. Merchants shouted in rough dialects. Gang markings stained the walls—spirals of red, clawed symbols, like someone had grabbed those walls so hard their fingers bled.
A fight broke out near a collapsed shrine. Three Enforcers dragged a man away, kicking and bloodied. No one intervened. Not even Karasa.
She said, "The Ashram purifies. The slums… they deal in raw power. Dirty, unstable. But necessary. The gangs control it."
She paused.
"There are Enforcers who don't ask questions. If they think you're dangerous... they'll make you vanish."
"There are two more like me," she said. "Enforcer leaders. Varex and Rinhal."
She looked at me sharply.
"But they're also not like me. They are cruel. They break. Burn. Disappear."
No judgment in her voice. Just fact.
We walked deeper. The streets narrowed, the alleys curled like broken ribs. The slums had veins.
At one point, we passed a narrow space where a few children sat crouched beside a barrel-fire. One of them looked up at me.
For a moment, I froze.
He couldn't have been more than six. Thin. Hollow-cheeked. His hair fell across his eyes in uneven strands. His hands were wrapped around a frayed satchel, like it was the only thing he had left.
Our eyes met.
He didn't flinch. He just watched—steady, silent. Like Elias had.
Not his face. Not his voice. But the stillness.
That same quiet defiance, nestled in exhaustion.
Something moved in me. A flicker.
Memory—not thought. Not language. Just the feel of Elias's grip on my arm in the dream, in the fire. The way he'd clung to life. To me.
The glow beneath my skin stirred. Briefly. Like it remembered too.
Then the boy blinked and looked away.
The feeling passed, but it didn't leave.
...
We continued walking until evening, the slums crawling with half-light...
And we returned just before nightfall.
As we reached the gate, I looked back once.
The slums had already swallowed the day.
Karasa stopped at the dormitory door. Her tone was quieter now.
"Training gives you structure," she said. "A shield, if you're lucky. But out there…"
She didn't finish.
She didn't have to.
*Out there, no one cared if you survived or not.*
I nodded. She left me alone.
...
An orb pulsed on the desk, echoing with quiet resonance.
In her chamber, the Overseer sat across from it, legs on her table. She was leaning backward.
A shadow flickered near the edge of the room.
"He broke the illusion," she said softly. "No training. No background. Not even fear. And he didn't even seem to be lying."
The voice in the dark asked, "Is he a threat?"
She turned her blindfolded gaze toward the orb.
"He is not measured," she said. "But perhaps... that is the very problem."
The orb pulsed once more.
"You'll have to watch him closely. He might be useful to us... or dangerous."
Then it fell quiet.
And so did she.