The voices were faint at first, muffled as if he were hearing them from underwater or through a thick wall.
"Hey, kid..."
"Hey, can you hear me!"
The words became clearer, sharper, cutting through the fog in his mind. A loud, sharp crack echoed in the space, followed by a stinging sensation on his cheek. He was being slapped. Not gently. The world began to swim back into focus, not the dark void, but a scene of chaos.
He just lay there for a second, trying to piece together what had happened. Some person shows up out of nowhere, demanding the value of a single life. Of all the people to ask, why him? It made no sense. Lucid thought again, his mind struggling to work. Whatever they wanted, it had to be for leverage. They needed to threaten him to gain something.
Then, a bucket of cold water hit him full in the face and chest. It was a shocking, brutal awakening. He gasped, jerking violently as the icy water soaked his clothes and hair, running into his eyes and mouth.
"Geez, I guess that just doesn't come off, no matter what," a familiar, stern voice grumbled from somewhere above him.
He blinked the water from his eyes. Two figures stood over him, silhouetted against the broken windows and the daylight beyond. Bjorn and Gabriel, the city guards. He groaned and pushed himself up onto his elbows. The floor around him was a treacherous carpet of glittering glass shards. He winced as a piece dug into his palm. Placing one hand on the solid wood of the front bar for support, he hauled himself unsteadily to his feet.
Looking around, it was a complete mess. The tavern, which had been so cozy and orderly just an hour before, now looked like it had been hit by a storm. Every window was shattered, leaving jagged teeth of glass in the frames. Tables and chairs were overturned, some with legs snapped. Bottles behind the bar were smashed, their contents leaving sticky, sweet-smelling puddles on the floor. It looked less like a fight and more like a frenzied, deliberate act of vandalism.
'Goodness gracious,' he thought, the scale of the destruction sinking in.
Bjorn and Gabriel were looking at him carefully, their eyes scanning him for serious injury and then surveying the wreckage.
"Sir Lucid, is it?" Gabriel said, his tone formal but not unkind. He took out a small, leather-bound notebook and a stub of pencil, already scribbling something down while his eyes darted around the room. "We would like your input on what happened here."
Bjorn, meanwhile, was already moving, his small frame dragged his large hands righting a heavy oak table with a grunt. "Start from the beginning, son. Take your time."
"Well," Lucid began, his voice hoarse. He cleared his throat, which sent a sharp twinge of pain from the freshly healed wound on his neck. "I was going about my day. Rebecca, the innkeeper, had an errand to run. She asked me to take over for a bit. Some time after she left, a man came in. Dressed impeccably well. He ordered a shot of rum, didn't touch it for a while, asked me a... a weird philosophical question, and then made a signal. It was like there was a group waiting outside for his command." He explained adding more details as well.
Gabriel's pencil scratched against the paper. "This man. Sharp eyes? Black hair? Fine black clothes? A human?"
"Sounded like it, yes."
"Weird. No individual I've heard of around here fits that description," Bjorn called out from where he was stacking chairs.
"Then what did he want?" Gabriel mused, more to himself than to Lucid. "Robbery seems pointless. They didn't take the strongbox, I checked."
"Well, if he wanted to kill me, he could have done that and left," Lucid said, thinking aloud. The memory of the hands around his throat was vivid. "He had the chance. That means something deeper was going on. It was a message."
'Why the sudden interest in me?' he wondered, a cold knot of anxiety tightening in his stomach. He was nobody. A drifter. A face obscured by mist.
"And the innkeeper, Rebecca? What of her?" Gabriel asked, looking up from his notes.
Lucid went quiet for a moment. He thought about the man's chillingly specific question: 'How much worth, then, is Rebecca's life?' Just thinking about it now made a hot anger bubble up in his chest. The idea that someone would use her kindness, her safety, as a tool to manipulate him was infuriating. He could leave. Right now. Walk out of this town and never look back. Nothing truly bound him here.
'Are you not fond of that demi-human, Lucid?' The voice in his head, Alice's voice, cut in. It was a voice he had not heard in days, not since the void. This time, her intrusion into his thoughts didn't put him off. Instead, it made him give a quiet, internal chuckle. There was a new familiarity to it, less like an invasion and more like a nudge from a partner.
'I will leave Rebecca out of the picture for now,' he thought firmly. He didn't want to draw any unnecessary attention to her or give the guards a reason to suspect she was involved. But the thought was futile. A small crowd had gathered outside the broken windows, peering in at the destruction. Murmurs of shock and concern drifted through the shattered panes.
"Oh no, a vandalism on the Golden Shine? The most frequented place in all of Tyriana!"
"Who could have done such a thing? They make the best porridge and beer..."
"I hope Rebecca is alright. Why would anyone attack such a gentle soul?"
The townsfolk were talking amongst themselves, some leaving in distress, others lingering to gawk. Bjorn, seeing the gathering, moved to the front of the tavern, his small but menacingly frame blocking the doorway as he began to calmly but firmly ask people to move along and give them space to work.
"Well, if that's the extent of it for now," Gabriel said, closing his notebook with a snap, "we will speak to Rebecca when we see her. In the meantime, I will file this report. The town governor should cover the costs of repairs and any damages. Do not worry on that account. He is a kind and fair man, especially to businesses that bring good repute to our town."
He paused, his expression softening slightly. "And regarding that other hearing... about our noble here. I fear we will have to postpone it. Tell me when you feel better and ready to proceed."
"Mhm, yeah, of course I will," Lucid confirmed, though the mention of the hearing sent a fresh wave of anxiety through him. His temporary sanctuary felt more precarious than ever.
With that, Bjorn gave him a final, appraising nod, and the two guards left. They hadn't done much, just taken his statement and righted a few pieces of furniture. The real work remained. Debris still littered the floor. Sticky puddles of ale and spirits needed to be mopped. The windows were gaping, open wounds in the tavern's walls.
He worked in silence for hours, the rhythmic sounds of sweeping and cleaning a focus for his churning thoughts. Sunset painted the sky in hues of orange and purple by the time he had made the main room mostly functional again, barring the windows. Rebecca was still nowhere to be seen. This confirmed a quiet, gnawing suspicion in Lucid's gut. Of course. Things always had to take a turn for the worse. Nothing ever went as planned.
Exhausted, he stepped outside, avoiding the glass still on the porch, and sat down on the top step. He watched the last sliver of the sun disappear behind the distant rooftops, the sky deepening into twilight. The air was cool and quiet.
"Alice," he called out gently, not with his voice, but with his mind. "You there?"
A moment's pause, then the response came, clear and present in his thoughts. "Yes. I am here."
"Good," he muttered, allowing himself a faint sigh of relief. Her presence felt different now. Stronger. More real. "Can you show me your status? Your enlightenment screen. I am curious about something."
"Anything for you," her voice replied, gentle as ever.
In front of him, the air shimmered. White, swaying forms of essence coalesced, like light given shape to a shadow. They formed a familiar rectangular screen, hovering in the dusk air. The layout was as he remembered, but something new immediately caught his eye.
***
Enlightened Title: The Divine Maiden
Name: Alice
Rank: Primordial
Fate Essence: ∞
Trait: [The Chain of Heart] ███▒▒▒▒▒▒▒▒▒▒▒▒▒▒▒▒▒▒
Description: Lost in time and space... Error... Error... This message cannot be revealed further.
***
As he looked at it, he felt a confirmation of something he had sensed in the void. A connection, a knot growing tighter inside him, bonding him to this voice, to Alice. Before, she had felt like a distant voice, a separate entity. Now, he could *feel* her. Not just hear her. It was a subtle sensation, like the faintest breath on the back of his neck, or the warmth of someone standing just behind you. Emotions that were entirely different from his own now echoed in his mind with a new, surprising clarity. He had grown closer to her. How? He pushed the question aside for now, focusing on the screen. His eyes were locked on the Trait line.
"Hmm... 'The Chain of Heart.' That is something new."
He reached a hand out, almost playfully, to swat at the glowing words. It was a weird, intriguing display. His hand passed through the light like it was cutting through smoke, but the letters swirled and reformed instantly, undisturbed.
"Huh. Interesting."
"Lucid," Alice's voice prompted him. "Try to push your finger into the trait listing. Normally, something should change."
"How do you know about this?" he asked, skeptical.
"I do not," she admitted. "But at the same time, I do. It is a knowing that comes with the sight, not from memory."
"I mean, it says your name, so it has to be at least something related to you," he dismissed, mumbling under his breath.
Hesitantly, he raised his index finger. He pointed it at the blocky, shimmering letters that spelled "Trait." He took a breath and lightly tapped the space.
The effect was immediate and strange. It was as if his finger was a small pebble dropped into a still, black pond. Where he tapped, the solid black letters rippled and parted, not disappearing, but giving way to new text that swam up from beneath them. The progress bar of shaded boxes vanished, replaced by a dense block of information.
"What the..." Lucid leaned forward, his eyes wide.
***
Trait: [The Chain of Heart]
Description: The sin of envy shackled her heart, despite her inherent will to show kindness, her subjects chackled it with the chains of envy.
Trait Rank: F
Attribute: The wielder of this trait possesses the heart of an ██▒▒. Grants: Weak Regeneration, Weak Perception, Weak Fate Essence Regeneration.
Passive: [The Divine Unchained Heart]
Once the user's soul ceases to exist, the chains wrapped around the heart are freed. The being may continue to exist in its original state for a limited period, until they exhaust their reserve of Fate Essence.
***
He stared at the words for a long moment, reading them over twice. Weak regeneration. Weak perception. A vague, censored reference to some kind of heart. And a passive ability that only worked when you were already dead.
A wave of sheer disappointment washed over him. After everything the mystery, the strange connection, the triumph of that Sentrum rift.... this was it? This was the grand trait of a "Primordial" being?
He let out a long, slow sigh, the tension draining from his shoulders to be replaced by weary exasperation.
"That's so fucking useless," he said aloud to the empty street.