Everything hurt.
That was the first coherent thought to surface through the grey fog. Not specific pain, just... everything. Like his entire body had decided to go on strike.
Sounds came next, muffled and distant, as if his ears were stuffed with cotton. His own breathing, echoing strangely.
He tried opening his eyes, immediately regretted it, and settled for cataloging what he could without moving. Cold stone pressed against his back. The air felt... old. Stale. His mouth tasted like he'd been licking a copper pot.
Who... was he?
The thought drifted lazily through his mind. He should probably know that. Important detail, really. Name. He had one of those.
Adom. Right. He was Adom.
Good start. Progress.
What else?
Mage. That felt right. Something about... research? Books? His head throbbed when he pushed too hard at the memories.
The copper taste in his mouth was getting worse. He tried swallowing, which led to coughing, which led to his body remembering it could move, which led to every muscle screaming in protest.
"Ow," he managed, his voice raspy and strange in his ears. "Ow, ow, ow."
He forced his eyes open again, blinking at the dim... ceiling? Stone. Definitely stone. Carved with some kind of pattern he couldn't quite focus on.
Pattern. Stone...s... snake?
The memory hit him like a bucket of ice water. The treasure chamber. The gold. The giant stone snake that had-
Adom bolted upright with a strangled gasp, heart hammering. "It ate me!" he wheezed. "The door ate me!"
His vision swam from the sudden movement, and he braced himself against the floor, trying not to be sick as the memory of stone jaws and white light played behind his eyes.
Memory entanglement. A common consequence of bad dimensional travel. Another reason to hate portals. Because that snake was definitely one.
"Right. Right." Adom pressed his palms against his eyes, forcing himself to breathe slowly. "Assessment. I'm alive. That's... that's definitely step one covered. Good job, me."
He lowered his hands, taking proper stock of his surroundings. The chamber was roughly circular, maybe thirty feet across. Natural cave formation, but with signs of deliberate shaping - the floor had been smoothed, and there were what looked like drainage channels cut into the stone.
Phosphorescent moss provided a soft blue-green light, clustering around several crystalline formations that jutted from the walls. The air was cool but not cold, with a slight mineral taste.
"No immediate threats," he muttered, continuing his inventory. "Two passages leading out. One with a sort of spiral rune, one with none. Some kind of ventilation system - there's airflow. Plant growth, so there's enough moisture and..." He squinted at a patch of what looked like miniature silver ferns. "...nutrients? Those shouldn't be able to grow underground unless..."
Adom's eyes tracked across the chamber. Moss, crystals, unusual flora, small pile of broken machinery, grumpy leprechaun, two other paths, more crystals-
Wait.
Grumpy what?
His head snapped back so fast his neck cracked.
On his right, sitting cross-legged on a crystal outcropping, a leprechaun was watching Adom with mild interest.
His clothes might have once been the traditional greens and golds, but years of apparent wear had reduced them to a uniform grey.
His hair and beard were a wild mass that would have made any self-respecting bird reject it as too chaotic for nesting material. There was what looked like a small gear being used as a hair tie, a worn out hat and a small bag at his waist. From the looks of it, a very old dimensional bag, since it had a rune on the exterior.
"How're you doing, lad?" The Leprechaun said.
"..."
Adom's brain briefly considered shutting down again, or at least reassess. Illusions were not a symptom of bad dimensional travel.
The leprechaun's bushy eyebrows furrowed. "Well, that's just rude, that is. If you're going to be one of me hallucinations, least you could do is answer when spoken to. Basic courtesy, even for a figment."
"I'm not-" Adom started, then paused. "Wait. Your hallucination? You're clearly my hallucination. I'm the one who just got eaten by a stone snake."
"Oh, this one's got some spirit!" The leprechaun brightened, adjusting the gear in his hair. Two more gears dropped from that somehow. "Been ages since me mind conjured up something with actual personality. Usually just get the quiet ones who stand there looking confused. Boring, the lot of them."
"I'm not a hallucination," Adom said firmly. "I'm a real person who just had a very bad day involving magical security systems and questionable life choices."
"That's exactly what a hallucination would say," the leprechaun countered, wagging a finger. "Besides, no real person could get past the snake. I've been here..." He squinted at nothing in particular. "...a fair while."
"The snake ate me. I did not come here willingly."
"Likely story. Next you'll be telling me you're not just a manifestation of me loneliness and deteriorating sanity."
"I am absolutely not a-" Adom stopped. "Hang on. How long have you been down here?"
"Time's a bit fuzzy," the leprechaun admitted, scratching his beard. Several small cogs fell out. "Lost count after the first few centuries. Or was it decades? The moss has grown seventeen times, or maybe seventy. Hard to tell when you're going mad."
"You're not real," Adom declared. It was likely just another effect of the dimensional travel messing with his head. "You're just my brain trying to process trauma through increasingly bizarre imagery. I mean, look at your hair."
"Me hair?" The leprechaun looked offended. "Says the one dressed like..." He gestured vaguely at Adom's robes, clearly struggling to find the right words. "...whatever you're supposed to be."
"These are standard Academy robes."
"Well, they look ridiculous. Like something a confused rainbow would wear."
"This is ridiculous. I'm arguing with a hallucination about fashion."
"No, I'm arguing with a hallucination about fashion."
They glared at each other across the chamber.
"Right," the leprechaun announced, hopping down from his crystal. "Only one way to settle this."
Before Adom could react, the ancient fae darted forward with surprising speed and pinched his arm. Hard.
"Ow!" Adom yelped, jumping back. "That hurt!"
They stared at each other in mutual surprise.
"Huh," the leprechaun said finally. "You're real."
"Of course I'm real. I've been saying that for- wait." Adom reached out and poked the leprechaun's shoulder. His finger met solid resistance. "You're real too."
"Well," the leprechaun said after a long moment. "This is awkward."
"...So," Adom said slowly, rubbing his pinched arm. "You've been trapped here since... whenever. And I just got swallowed by a stone snake. Any chance you know the way out?"
This was probably a stupid question. Since the Fae was still there. But it just came out of his mouth, for reasons unknown. Probably panic.
Where modern arrays used efficient three-point formations, this one maintained the traditional seven points, complete with the redundant stabilization curves that hadn't been necessary since the Third Age's breakthroughs in runic optimization.
He pressed his palm flat against the stone, sending a careful pulse of mana into the first point.
The rune flickered.
Another pulse, slightly stronger. The second point lit up.
Third pulse. Fourth. Fifth. Each point illuminating in sequence, the curved lines between them beginning to glow with a pale blue light.
Sixth pulse - the pattern was almost complete.
Seventh -
The entire array blazed to life, lines of power spreading outward across the stone like frost across a window.
"How in the nine hells did you do that?" Bob demanded, his beard-gears spinning rapidly. "I've been staring at these walls for centuries and never saw any runes!"
"Because I'm smart," Adom said flatly, still studying the spreading patterns of light.
"Are you implying I'm not smart?"
"I never said that."
"But you thought about it."
Adom turned to him with the faintest smile, but before he could respond, the wall before them shifted. Stone ground against stone as a new surface emerged, covered in flowing script.
"What's that then?" Bob squinted at the text. "More of your clever runes?"
"No, this is..." Adom leaned closer, adjusting his glasses. "Ancient Imperial. Fairly late period, actually. The grammatical structure is almost modern." He traced the characters with his finger. The script was elegant but practical - none of the flourishes that marked the early Imperial period's obsession with calligraphic beauty.
"Well? What's it say?" Bob hopped from foot to foot, gears jingling with each movement.
"Test of Courage," Adom read, his finger moving across the characters. "The first trial of Orynth's Labyrinth demands that you face what lies within your own heart. Enter the void, confront your deepest fears, and emerge victorious." He paused, frowning at the next section. "Interesting..."
"What's interesting?" Bob peered at the incomprehensible script.
"It says the test can be taken alone or with companions. If multiple people enter together, they share the trial - and if one succeeds, all succeed." Adom glanced at the leprechaun. "That's unusually generous for an ancient trial."
"Oh?" Bob leaned closer to read.
"'Participants begin with 200 life force. Should it be depleted, you may retry the trial or surrender. Surrendering means starting from the very beginning of the Labyrinth.'" Adom's fingers traced the warning runes. "No mention of permanent death, at least."
"Generous indeed," Bob snorted. "You didn't see what's in there. Though..." He tugged at his beard thoughtfully, several gears spinning slower. "Might explain why it didn't work when I tried. Was alone then, wasn't I?"
"The text doesn't say it has to be done together," Adom clarified, still reading. "Just that it's an option. Though considering what you've told me about your experience..."
"You're not seriously suggesting we go in there together?"
"You said it yourself - the riddle path is a trap. This is the real way forward."
"Yes, but..." Bob's gears clinked anxiously. "There's facing your fears, and then there's whatever that void does to your mind."
"It's either that or—" Adom stopped mid-sentence as another gear clinked to the floor. "Actually, I've been meaning to ask. What's with all the gears? And why do they seem endless?"
"Oh, these?" Bob picked up the fallen gear, which immediately split into two in his hand. "Found them right here in this chamber, actually. Quite the neat trick - touch one, and it makes another."
Adom's eyes widened. "That's not just a neat trick. That's a Multiplicity Artifact. There are only three known to exist in the entire..." He shook his head. "And you've just been using them as clothing decorations?"
"Well, what else was I supposed to do with them? Count them? Already tried that - got to several million before I lost track." Bob attached both gears to his sleeve. "Besides, they make a lovely sound, don't you think? Almost like gold."
Adom turned back to the void, ignoring Bob's impromptu gear orchestra. "So. The rune was just for instructions. We either go in together, or we stay here."
"Technically, you could go alone."
"And leave you here for another few centuries?"
"I've grown rather attached to the place," Bob said, though his gears clinked a distinctly nervous rhythm. How was that even possible?
"Right."
They both stared into the absolute darkness.
"Together then?" Bob asked quietly.
"Together."
"We're going to regret this, aren't we?"
"Probably."
They stepped into the void.
[Time of Entry: 19:23:07]
*****
Adom wove a [Flame] spell, the familiar warmth spreading from his palm. The darkness remained absolute, but at least he could see his own hand now. And Bob, standing uncomfortably close.
The void felt... wrong. Not empty, but somehow negative - as if the space itself was actively hostile to their presence. Their footsteps made no sound, and the air had no temperature. It was a unique sensation.
"Maybe we should..." Bob coughed, gears turning awkwardly. "Hold hands?"
"No."
"I'm being practical! You're the one making it weird."
"Still no."
"Fine, but when you get lost in this nightmare void, don't come crying to—"
The sentence cut off mid-word.
Adom turned. Bob had been right beside him, close enough to touch. Now there was only darkness. He reached out, finding nothing but that same hostile emptiness.
"Bob?"
The void swallowed his voice.
You could be reading stolen content. Head to the original site for the genuine story.
"Right. Of course." Adom adjusted his glasses, more out of habit than necessity. The gesture felt absurdly normal in this abnormal space. He continued forward, his flame spell creating a small bubble of visibility that somehow made the surrounding darkness feel even darker.
The silence was absolute. No echoes, no ambient noise, not even the sound of his own breathing. Just the steady rhythm of his footsteps that he felt but couldn't hear.
He kept walking.
More walking.
And more.
Adom stopped, turning in a slow circle. He hadn't been afraid of the dark since he was five, when he'd finally understood that darkness was simply the absence of photons. He'd spent hours in the library reading about light particles and wave theory, finding comfort in the rational explanation that had chased away childish fears.
But this... this wasn't natural darkness. Obviously.
This void defied scientific explanation. The magical architecture required to create such a space was staggering. Modern mages had centuries of magical theory and advancement at their disposal, their spells far more sophisticated than anything from the past. And yet... this construction shouldn't be possible for its time period. The complexity of the void's structure went against everything he knew about magical development. It was like finding advanced crystalline matrices in primitive ritual circles - it simply didn't align with any known progression of magical knowledge.
How had mages from that era managed something this complex?
He felt a pull – not physical, but an inexplicable certainty in his mind. Forward. He knew which way was forward, though he couldn't have explained how. The knowledge simply existed, as fundamental as gravity.
Turning back in that direction, Adom gasped. A door had materialized at the edge of his flame's light – simple, brown, wooden. Utterly ordinary, which made its presence here all the more unsettling. It stood unsupported in the void, as if someone had simply forgotten to build the wall around it.
His steps faltered for just a moment.
This door...
"What the hell is this?" said Adom. That damned door...
That scratched corner where he'd kicked it in frustration. The brass handle, slightly tarnished on the right side where thousands of nervous hands had gripped it. Even that peculiar whorl in the wood grain that his young eyes had traced over and over while waiting.
Room 347. Doctor Kane's office.
"So this is where we're going, huh? Memory?" Adom muttered. His voice still made no sound, but he felt the words in his throat.
He stood before the door, studying it with the same detached curiosity he now used for analyzing magical phenomena. Funny how such an unremarkable piece of wood could mark the boundary between before and after. Between health and decay. Between childhood and... whatever came after.
Forward.
His hand reached for the handle.
Light flooded his vision, and suddenly the world had weight again.
*****
"—dom? Adom? Can you hear me, young man?"
His mother's arms were around him, warm and real. The scent of her sweet apple and cinnamon perfume mixed with the sharp antiseptic hospital smell. He'd forgotten that detail - how the two scents had clashed yet somehow merged in his memory.
Her tears were soaking into his shirt. His father stood by the window, shoulders rigid, staring at nothing. The afternoon sun cast long shadows across the sterile white floor.
This felt more substantial than memory. The scratch of his cotton shirt against his skin. The slight tremor in his mother's embrace. The weight of the air itself.
It all felt real. Undeniably real.
Where was he again? Ah, yes. Room 347. Doctor Kane had just finished explaining Lifedrain Syndrome. Three to five years, he'd said. Maybe less.
He'd lived sixty-seven more, just to spite the diagnosis.
"Orynth, you bastard," Adom muttered.
Making him relive this moment, the exact second his life began to crumble. Of all the trials the ancient mage could have designed...
His mother's arms tightened around him, misinterpreting his words as confusion or denial. So he could interact with them here, huh?
If only she knew.
"I missed you both," Adom said softly, looking between them. "So much."
His mother pulled back, brow furrowing. "What are you talking about, my little one?"
"Doctor," his father's voice was tight, controlled. "Are there cognitive symptoms we should know about?"
"Arthur." His mother whirled on him. "Our son just got the worst news of his life and you're suggesting he's losing his mind?"
"I'm trying to understand all the—"
"Understand? Understand what? That you're already giving up on him?"
The doctor raised his hands. "Please, Sir and Lady Syll—"
Adom watched them argue, a familiar heaviness settling in his chest that had nothing to do with his illness.
These fights. They'd had so many after his diagnosis - voices rising, blame flying, love turning bitter with fear and helplessness. He'd forgotten how early they'd started. How bad they'd ended.
Then it came.
That familiar tickle in his throat. Adom almost laughed - he knew this script by heart. First the tickle, then the burning sensation spreading through his chest like hot wire. The tightness that made each breath shorter than the last. The metallic taste at the back of his throat.
He coughed.
His mother stopped mid-sentence. His father took a half-step forward.
Another cough. Harder this time. Then another. And another. A rhythm he'd lived with for sixty-seven years, now playing out in its opening performance.
He raised his hand to his mouth, going through motions that felt like muscle memory even though this body hadn't learned them yet. When he pulled it away, black blood coated his palm, thick and glistening in the afternoon light.
"Heh." The chuckle came out wet and dark.
"Adom!" His mother's scream.
"Son!" His father's shout.
The world tilted sideways, the floor rushing up to meet him. Right on schedule.
As consciousness faded, he wondered what Orynth had in store for him next.
1st attempt successful.
Would you like to continue? [Y/N]
Forward. Always. It was the only way out.
"...Yes. Yes you asshole."
*****
Adom opened his eyes and squinted immediately due to the light.
A warm breeze ruffled his fur. Not his - a dog. The Service Companion sat beside his chair, tongue lolling in a perpetual smile. An old Moonspire Shepherd, with its characteristic white coat that seemed to catch and hold sunlight.
"...Fido?" Adom's voice caught. His first dog. His last dog. The one his father got him for his eighteenth birthday. He'd forgotten. How had he forgotten?
The dog's tail thumped against the cobblestones, ears perking at his name. That same goofy expression Adom remembered from that time.
He reached down, fingers sinking into thick fur. Fido smelled like pear and summer storms - the enchanted shampoo his mother used to buy from the markets. The memory hit harder than any spell.
The café terrace buzzed with afternoon life. Children chased each other between tables while their parents sipped spiced tea. A street performer juggled balls of light, each one singing a different note as it arced through the air. Two old men argued over a game of stones, their laughter carrying across the square.
Adom's tea had gone cold, forgotten beside a half-eaten plate of honey cakes. The sun hung lazy and golden in the cloudless sky, casting long shadows across the festival banners.
Festival banners.
His eyes caught on the flowing script: "1457th Festival of Kati."
His cup clattered against the saucer. "No."
This wasn't just any festival day in Kati. By then, his hometown had transformed into one of the Sundar Empire's most formidable fortress cities. Its walls, reinforced with defensive enchantments, stood as a beacon of hope for refugees fleeing the endless border wars. The city where he'd grown up had become a sanctuary for millions of souls.
Millions.
"No," he repeated, softer this time.
Fido whined, pressing against his leg. The old dog always knew when something was wrong.
"Papa, what's that?"
A child's voice, from the next table. Small finger pointing up.
Adom's hands began to shake. Sweat beaded on his forehead despite the pleasant temperature. He knew what he'd see before he looked, but he looked anyway.
Could he do anything about it? Probably not.
The sky was darkening. Not with clouds - with absence. A void spreading across the blue, like ink in water. People were noticing now, conversations falling quiet, faces turning upward.
The juggler's light-balls winked out.
"Just weather magic," someone said, uncertain. "For the festival?"
But Adom remembered this day. Remembered what came next.
A low hum began, felt more than heard. The stones beneath his feet trembled. Cups rattled on tables. The old men's game pieces scattered.
Fido growled, hackles rising.
"Oh gods," a woman whispered. "Look."
Through the spreading darkness, a point of light. Growing larger. Brighter. A falling star in reverse colors, wrong in ways that hurt to look at.
It had many names.
Life's bane. God's wrath. World-ender. The Final Word. A hundred names in a dozen languages, each attempting to describe the indescribable. But in that moment, as it fell toward Kati, only one name mattered.
Dragon's Breath.
Not fire, not destruction, but erasure. Complete. Absolute. The kind of death that didn't just kill - it rewrote existence itself, leaving nothing behind. Not even ashes. Not even memories. Humanity's crowning achievement in the art of warfare. The weapon that made elves pause their eternal dances, that hushed the singing forests, that gave even the deathless ones reason to fear. The ultimate expression of human ingenuity turned toward a single purpose: unmaking.
And he was watching it descend on his home. Again.
Adom lunged for Fido's collar. "We need to move!"
The dog planted his paws, one hundred and forty pounds of muscle refusing to budge. It wasn't Fido's fault. He was trained like that. To not let Adom do simple things like running. In his condition at that time, he would have had a heart attack for that.
"Fido, please," he begged the dog. "Please move!"
People still sat at their tables, pointing up at the darkening sky. A child started crying.
"RUN!" It was pointless. "Everyone needs to run! NOW!"
A few heads turned. A mother grabbed her children, hurrying them away. Others just stared at him, the crazy young man screaming in the square.
The sky shifted from steel-gray to a darker one. The air felt wrong - too thick, too heavy.
Then he saw it.
A star falling in daylight, but wrong. No star should move that fast. No star should pulse with that twisted light. The horizon where it fell began to glow, a false dawn in the wrong direction.
Someone whispered, "Saints preserve us."
The ground shook. Tea cups danced off tables. A woman screamed.
Fido finally moved, but in the wrong direction - trying to herd Adom toward shelter. The dog's training fighting Adom's desperate pulls.
"I order you to-"
The horizon ignited, far beyond the city walls where the Empire's Third Legion made camp. Ten miles distant, but it didn't matter.
A pinprick of light bloomed into an impossible sun - white-hot, reality-bending brilliance that turned day into negative space. The festival crowd fell silent, necks craned upward. Some still stood transfixed, shielding their eyes, murmuring about new festival magic. They didn't understand. Couldn't understand.
The ground shook first. Not the gentle tremor of earlier, but a deep, primal vibration that rattled teeth and toppled glasses. In the distance, a sound no human throat could make - part thunder, part scream, part the universe tearing. The very air seemed to hold its breath.
Then it rose. A pillar of destruction climbing into the sky, burning white at its heart, crowned by a blooming mushroom of blacks and grays that devoured the clouds. Even at this distance, the world lost its colors, reduced to stark shadows and searing light. Those still watching saw their own bones through closed eyelids. Time stretched like taffy, each second an eternity of waiting.
The shockwave came visible across the plains - a wall of pure force that flattened the grasslands, rolled through the army camp like it was paper. Even from here, they could see the massive siege engines tossed like children's toys. It raced toward the city, a ripple in reality that turned stone to dust and flesh to vapor. The roar of its approach drowned out even the screams.
People ran. Really ran now, a stampede of bodies crushing together in the narrow streets. Adom lost his grip on Fido's collar in the surge. The dog vanished in the panicked crowd.
"FIDO!"
A mountain of a man slammed into him, sending them both sprawling. "Sorry lad, sorry!" The stranger hauled Adom to his feet with one meaty hand.
The second wave hit.
This one wasn't light or sound - it was force. Pure, unstoppable force that picked up carts and people like toys. The air itself seemed to catch fire.
Adom saw the building coming. A small house, lifted whole from its foundations, tumbling end over end through the burning air.
His last thought before impact was of Fido's goofy smile.
Then world exploded into sound and fire.
*****
His ears rang with a high-pitched whine that drowned out everything else. The world spun lazily, even with his eyes closed. Consciousness came back in fragments - the taste of copper in his mouth, dust coating his tongue, the weight of... something pressing down.
Where...?
The ringing slowly faded, replaced by muffled sounds of destruction. Reality pieced itself together through the fog in his mind. The festival. Fido. The light in the sky.
Ah. Yes.
Orynth's test.
Pain screamed through every nerve as tons of concrete pinned him down. His legs - he couldn't feel his right leg anymore, but his left was a symphony of agony, bone fragments grinding against each other with each breath.
Hot wetness pooled beneath him, and he wasn't sure if it was blood or the broken heating pipes. His chest felt like it was being crushed in a vice, each shallow breath sending jolts of electricity through his ribs. Dust filled his lungs, making him cough, each spasm multiplying the pain exponentially.
Even knowing this was Orynth's test didn't dull the sensations. The body remembers, and Adom's remembered this moment with perfect clarity - the precise way his pelvis had shattered, the burning as debris scraped against exposed bone, the peculiar numbness creeping up from his toes that would never quite go away.
This was the sequence burned into his nightmares. Dragon's Breath to shatter their defenses, to erase their strongest warriors and mightiest walls. Then, while the survivors still reeled from the horror, the Aslan Empire would descend like wolves upon the helpless. A perfect strategy, tested and proven across a dozen conquered nations.
The concussive force of spells shattering shields vibrated through the rubble crushing his legs, each tremor sending fresh waves of torment through his broken body.
Through a gap in the concrete, Adom watched the sky turn colors that shouldn't exist as battle mages tore reality apart above.
A knight crashed through a wall, his armor molten, screaming.
A child stumbled past, cradling something gray and wet in blood-stained hands, calling "Mama, mama, your head fell off..." Adom would never forget that face - hollow-eyed, tear-streaked, yet focused with terrible determination as small fingers tried to push pulpy matter back into a shattered skull. "Stay still, Mama. I'll make it better. I promise I'll make it better."
"Hey..." Adom's voice cracked.
The child looked up. Couldn't have been more than six. A face that should have been worrying about lost toys or scraped knees, not... this. "Mister, can you help me? My mama's not answering. I'm trying to put her thoughts back, but they keep slipping."
Adom's throat closed. He reached out, tried to form words to pull the child away from the corpse, to run, to live-
The light spell cracked across the street like lightning. A single shot, precise, professional. The child's body jerked, a puppet with cut strings. Those empty eyes locked onto Adom's face in the final moment, filled not with fear or pain, but simple confusion.
Adom's scream died in his throat. How? How could anyone...? What threat could a child possibly...?
But this was war. This was the moment when the world stopped making sense, when humanity shed its skin and revealed the monster beneath.
The air tasted like copper and ozone. Someone was singing - a lullaby mixed with sobs, coming from beneath a collapsed building. The singing stopped abruptly as another explosion sent bodies flying.
His father's voice cut through the chaos: "Hold the line! Protect the civilians!"
Through the smoke and debris, Adom saw him. Commander Arthur Sylla. Two star knight. Leading the defense, his sword glowing with fluid as he cut through enemy soldiers. Each swing precise, each step calculated. A warrior doing his duty.
It was about to happen.
In exactly four minutes, his father would spot him in the rubble. In four minutes and thirty seconds, he would turn his back on an enemy to reach his son. In four minutes and forty-five seconds...
A mage's corpse landed nearby, still crackling with residual energy. Her eyes were open, staring at nothing, mouth frozen in a half-cast spell.
The singing had started again, from somewhere else now. A different voice, a different lullaby. The same abrupt end.
The rubble pressed against his chest.
Four minutes.
He could already see his father scanning the battlefield, that moment of recognition about to dawn on his face. The enemy mage was positioning himself, spell already forming in the air.
The same choreography of death he'd carried for decades.
A child screamed somewhere - not in pain, but in that hollow way that meant they'd seen something their mind couldn't process.
A battlemage's shield shattered, raining crystalline shards that cut through three soldiers below. The singing had started again, from beneath another pile of rubble.
Adom's hands found purchase on broken concrete. First try - muscles screamed, bones ground against metal rebar piercing his abdomen. The pain whited out his vision. He collapsed.
[Life force: 38/200]
His father turned.
Second try - he pushed harder. Blood bubbled up his throat, spilling black over his chin. The rebar twisted inside him, tearing new paths through flesh. The edges of his vision darkened. By all rights, he should have passed out. He refused.
[Life force: 23/200]
His father took another step.
Third try - Adom roared. His flesh tore around the metal, blood streaming hot down his side. Concrete shifted, crushing his left leg further. Every nerve ending blazed with agony. His body begged him to stop.
[Life force: 19/200]
He told his body to shut up.
"Fuck that."
The words came out as a growl. The rubble shifted as Adom pushed his torso up on trembling arms, metal sliding wet and raw through his abdomen. His crushed legs remained pinned, useless, but his upper body rose like a wounded beast.
[Life force: 09/200]
"Illusion or not—" Energy crackled around his hands, blue-white and savage. Each movement sent fresh waves of agony through his shredded flesh. He didn't care.
[Life force: 03/200]
"I. Am. Not. Reliving. This."
His father's eyes widened in recognition. The enemy mage raised his hands, death-spell forming—
"NOT THIS TIME!"
The energy beam erupted from Adom's palms with decades of rage behind it. Clean. Precise. A perfect circle through the mage's chest where his heart should have been. The spell dissipated as its caster fell, surprise frozen on his face.
The battlefield seemed to stutter, like reality hiccuping. His father stood frozen mid-step, sword half-raised, expression caught between shock and confusion.
Around them, the war raged on. A knight's enhancement gear backfired, turning him inside out. A young mage apprentice tried to hold his intestines in while still weaving shields. The singing had stopped again.
"Son?" his father's voice wavered. "How did you—"
Time stopped.
206th attempt successful.
Would you like to continue? [Y/N]
[Warning: Progress can only be made forward. Retreat will reset the trial]
Right. Two hundred and six times he'd felt the rebar tear through his organs. Two hundred and six times he'd tasted his own blood, felt his bones splinter. Two hundred and six times he'd watched that child try to piece their mother's brains back together. Then die for no reason.
But this time - this one time - his father was still standing.
The battlefield continued its apocalyptic dance around them, but for just a moment, Adom allowed himself to look at his father's time stopped face. Alive. Confused, but alive.
Blood bubbled up his throat again, darker than before. His vision swam.
[Life Force: 01/200]
[Warning: Terminal threshold approaching]
He needed to choose. Quickly. Forward into whatever fresh hell Orynth had prepared, or reset and lose this victory he'd paid for two hundred and six times over.
The choice was obvious.
*****
The world shifted. Memory flooded in - another moment, burned into his soul. The camp of New Harbor, Year 853.
The cough tore through his chest like barbed wire, each spasm threatening to split him in two. Adom gripped the metal rails of his wheelchair, knuckles white, waiting for his lungs to remember how to work. Blood flooded his mouth.
The fluorescent lights of the refugee camp's medical wing buzzed overhead, casting harsh shadows across equipment that looked ancient even by pre-war standards. His reflection in the cracked mirror told its own story of decay: hair white as fresh snow, skin like old parchment stretched too thin across hollow cheeks.
He was twenty-two at that time. Twenty-two going on eighty.
He dabbed at his mouth with a handkerchief. Red, of course. Always red these days.
The Life Drain Syndrome had carved lines into his face that belonged on men thrice his age. Each wrinkle mapped a different spell, a different experiment, a different desperate attempt to protect what remained of humanity. The mage suit hung loose on his frame now - he'd lost weight again. The crystalline nodes embedded in the fabric pulsed with a weak blue light, monitoring his failing vital signs.
"PLEASE! NO, IT STILL WORKS! I CAN FEEL MY TOES!"
The screams from the next chamber cut through the thin walls. Adom knew that voice - Gregory, one of the scouts. Yesterday's patrol had gone wrong.
"Hold him down!" The healer's voice, sharp with urgency. "The rot's reaching his knee. It's this or death."
"I'LL DIE WITH MY LEG! PLEASE! I CAN STILL-" The words dissolved into unintelligible sobbing.
The wet sound of saw meeting flesh. Gregory's screams pitched higher, became something animal, primal. The rhythmic scraping continued, inexorable.
The door burst open. "My Lord Mage!" A soldier stood there, blood-splattered and breathing hard. Her armor bore fresh dents. "We've got incoming. Orc warband, at least two hundred strong. They've got dwarven siege engines with them."
A particularly agonized shriek from next door. The saw hit bone.
"GODS, PLEASE, JUST KILL ME!"
The soldier flinched at Gregory's plea but kept her eyes on Adom. "Sir, we need to move. Now."
"Where is my mother?"
The soldier hesitated, just for a moment. "Lady Sylla was last seen at the outer perimeter, my lord. Healing survivors from the first wave."
No.
"Get her back." His voice cracked. "Get her back inside NOW."
But he knew. He already knew. The memory was already playing out - his gentle mother, who'd sing healing hymns while tending gardens, who'd cradle injured birds and weep over withered flowers. Who never turned away anyone in need.
"Sir, we need to evacuate. The orcs are-"
He remembered how it played out: The sounds came first. The splintering of bones. The wet, meaty sounds. Then someone screaming "Lady Sylla!" And finally, finally, the sight of her through the medical tent's window - her small form caught between massive, armored bodies. Crushed like a flower under boots.
His heart stuttered, skipped, seized. Not from the Life Drain this time, but from seeing something so pure, so kind, reduced to... to...
They'd had to peel her off the ground. His mother, who'd spent her life putting broken things back together, couldn't even be buried whole.
Adom slumped in his wheelchair, chest constricting. The seventh heart attack in his life wasn't from pushing too hard. It was from remembering this moment, remembering how they'd brought him her remnants, remembering how someone who'd dedicated her life to healing had died with such violence.
"My lord!" The soldier's voice seemed distant now. "We need to move!"
But Adom could only see his mother's last smile that morning, could only hear her last words: "Remember to eat something, dear. You're working too hard again."
The war horns bellowed closer, but they couldn't drown out the truth - this was the day his mother died, and something in him died with her. Not just his health, not just his heart, but his belief that anything good could survive this world.
This needed correction.
Adom wheeled himself forward, each turn of the wheels sending sparks of pain through his arms.
[Life Force: 189/200]
This was attempt ninety-eight. He'd memorized every death, every failure, every moment he wasn't fast enough, strong enough, clever enough to save her. Not this time.
"My lord, you can't possibly-" The soldier's protest died as Adom raised his hand.
"Watch me."
The first wave hit the outer barriers. Adom's fingers traced complex patterns, weaving spells that made his blood burn. He was already a circle mage by then. A sick, wounded one, but a circle mage nonetheless.
A dwarven siege engine exploded, showering the advancing horde with burning debris. His heart stumbled, protesting the strain.
[Life Force: 156/200]
"FORM RANKS!" His voice carried across the battlefield, stronger than his body had any right to be. Soldiers rallied, finding formation around his wheelchair. "ARCHERS, TARGET THE SHAMANS!"
Another spell. Lightning chained between orc warriors, their armor conducting death. The effort sent him into a coughing fit, spattering his lap with blood.
[Life Force: 134/200]
He could see her now - his mother, kneeling beside wounded refugees, her healing magic a soft green glow. So focused on saving others, she didn't see the berserkers breaking through.
[Life Force: 112/200]
"LEFT FLANK, BRACE!" The command tore from his throat as he channeled power through his failing body. A wall of force materialized, crushing the first berserker wave. His vision blurred. Too much. Too fast.
But he was closer now. Ninety-seven failures had taught him every move, every spell, every sacrifice needed. His wheelchair creaked as he pushed forward, soldiers forming a protective wedge around him.
[Life Force: 87/200]
A dwarven bolt thrower targeted his position. Adom's counter-spell caught the projectile, reversed its course. The machine exploded, taking its crew with it. Blood trickled from his nose.
[Life Force: 65/200]
"Mother!" His voice barely carried over the chaos. She looked up, eyes widening. The massive orc behind her raised its axe-
Time slowed. Not from magic, but from desperation. Adom saw every detail: the axe's arc, his mother's turning head, the distance between them. Numbers and calculations flooded his mind - trajectory, force, spell matrices.
[Life Force: 43/200]
The spell left his hands before he could consider the cost. Reality bent. Space folded. His mother vanished from the axe's path, reappearing beside his wheelchair. The effort sent him into cardiac arrest.
[Life Force: 21/200]
"Adom!" Her hands glowed green, pouring healing magic into his seizing heart. "My boy, what have you-"
"Not... done... yet." Each word was agony. But he had one more spell. One final gambit.
[Life Force: 9/200]
Power gathered around him, drawing from his very soul. The remaining orcs charged. The last siege engine aimed.
[Life Force: 4/200]
"I love you, mother. And I missed you." The words came clearly despite his failing body. "Now run. Please."
The spell released. A dome of pure force expanded outward, disintegrating everything in its path. Orc, dwarf, machine - all reduced to ash.
[Life Force: 2/200]
As darkness took him, Adom smiled. Ninety-eight tries, but he'd finally done it. His mother was saved. He knew this was not real. This was an illusion. But God, it felt right.
And this time, when his heart stopped, it was worth it.