Chapter 37 — Accept
They reached the tree line on momentum and fear.
Becca rode the unicorn into the first break in the brush that could swallow that much horn and muscle. Branches snapped against the saddle bags. Wet leaves slapped Rei's sleeves. Mud tried to keep his boots. He ignored it and followed, breathing hard enough that his throat felt scraped.
Sound from the village blurred behind trunks and distance. The bell still rang. Shouting still cut through the air in ragged bursts. The edge of it all rode the wind and then fell away.
Becca steadied the unicorn with a palm on its neck. "Hold." Her voice stayed clipped. The animal's breath came in hot gusts, then slowed by a fraction as her hand stayed firm.
Rei crouched behind a slick trunk and forced one clean cycle of breath. Ember Circulation gathered panic into something that could move. Vesper's weight settled deeper in his hood, warm and steady. Jinx slid out of sight and returned a heartbeat later, ears forward, tail low.
The SYSTEM NOTICE still hovered at the edge of Rei's vision whenever he blinked.
At the bottom of it, a small prompt sat, unchanged.
[ACCEPT]
Becca leaned close enough that Rei could hear her over the unicorn's breath. "We press it."
Rei kept his eyes on the brush line and the field beyond. "Here?"
"Now," Becca said. "We're done bleeding minutes into mud while people break behind us."
He understood the instinct. A pocket realm sounded like walls. Walls sounded like control. The woods they hid in sounded like the next place someone could stumble out and turn sharp in the span of a breath.
He swallowed once. The taste of iron lingered from the lane. "Give me ten seconds."
Becca's stare cut sideways. "For what."
"Footing," Rei said. "Space. For her."
Becca's jaw worked. Then she nodded once, sharp, and pulled the unicorn deeper under the canopy where the ground leveled. "Fine. Ten."
Rei shifted with her. He found a patch of earth that felt solid. He kept his shoulder angled so the foxes stayed tucked close, and he kept his hands ready in case the brush moved with the wrong rhythm.
Jinx returned from her loop and pressed into his calf, eyes bright. Vesper stayed heavy, calm, as if she could lend him spine through cloth.
Rei drew one more slow breath, then lifted his gaze to the prompt.
"Okay," he said.
Becca's fingers flexed on the reins. "Do it."
Rei pressed Accept.
The teleport hit like a fist through the senses.
Pressure folded through his head and jaw, sharp enough to make his teeth feel too tight in his skull. His stomach rose, then dropped. The world vanished and returned inside a blink.
Stone met his boots.
Noise met everything else.
Hundreds of voices layered over one another. Heat pressed into bodies. Motion stacked on motion. Magic brushed magic without apology, a crowd full of people carrying edges and intent. The air tasted like sweat, iron, incense, and fresh-cut ozone.
Becca exhaled one sharp laugh, already half a curse. "Holy—"
Rei didn't stop moving. He pulled them three steps off the teleport anchor to clear the crush and avoid the next arrival landing on their heels. The unicorn sidestepped with a nervous stamp. Becca kept a firm hand on its neck and an even firmer hold on the reins.
Jinx wove between Rei's feet like she owned the stone. Vesper stayed in his hood, eyes hidden, weight steady.
Rei lifted his gaze.
Ahead, the access point dominated the space without taking a solid shape. The air there bent straight lines—banner edges, armor rims, stone tile seams. Light warped and refused to settle. It looked like torn space held open by force.
It was quiet in its own way.
People formed rings around it, distances measured by caution and greed.
Attention touched Rei in glances and slid away. He wasn't famous. He wasn't invisible either, not with a unicorn and two foxes and the way he moved off the anchor like he expected trouble.
A voice behind them carried too clearly to be private.
"…Duskridge…"
Another answered, rough. "…slaughter…"
A third, tight and quick: "…heard it was a whole street—"
Becca tilted her head a fraction, listening without turning. Rei kept his face neutral and let his eyes do the work.
Clusters had formed already.
On the left, a merc-heavy block held loose spacing and hard posture. Blades stayed sheathed, hands stayed close. People there watched the teleport anchor more than they watched the tear, as if they expected prey to arrive in pieces.
Closer to center, a knot of players stood like they were pretending they hadn't joined anything. Their laughter came too sharp, their voices too loud, bodies too ready.
On the right, a quiet group worked without theatrics. Someone knelt and drew a simple map in dust with a spear tip. Others watched the tear and the crowd with patience that looked practiced.
Becca leaned in, voice low. "This is a feeding ground."
"Yeah," Rei said.
Becca's mouth twisted. "We keep her close."
Rei's eyes stayed on the rings around the tear. "We keep ourselves close. She makes us visible."
Becca shot him a look. "You want me to put her away."
"I want us alive," Rei said.
Becca's grip tightened, then eased. "Fair."
A formation tightened near the far side—clean spacing, measured movement. A calm voice cut through a small flare of shouting nearby, precise enough that three people shifted without argument. Rei didn't need a banner to recognize discipline.
He caught a familiar presence at the edge of that formation: cold posture, stillness like a held blade, eyes that missed nothing.
Nyx.
She stood a half-step removed from the cluster, as if she preferred the edge where she could see the anchor, the tear, and every path between. Her gaze tracked arrivals first, then slid to the distortion, then cut through the crowd in quick, exact lines.
When her eyes landed on Rei, they held for a fraction.
Assessment, clean and sharp.
Her gaze flicked to Becca and the unicorn, then to Jinx, then to the hood where Vesper hid, then back to Rei's face as if she read his breathing.
Nyx moved.
She didn't shove through people. She walked a line that opened in small, reluctant shifts. Bodies angled out of her way without anyone making a show of it.
Becca noticed her first and stiffened. "Oh, good."
Rei's mouth twitched once, then settled. "Stay calm."
"I'm calm," Becca said, voice already sharp. "I'm calm with my whole chest."
Nyx stopped a pace away, close enough that Rei could hear her without leaning. Her eyes stayed on him. Her voice came out level and dry.
"You look like you ran through a village full of people trying to stay polite."
Rei kept his breathing steady. "We left fast."
Nyx's gaze flicked to mud on Rei's boot, then to Becca's knuckles on the reins. "Good."
Becca lifted her chin. "You gonna tell us this place is friendly?"
Nyx's mouth moved like it considered a smile and discarded it. "Friendly costs resources. People conserve."
Rei kept his eyes on the tear. "You entering right away."
Nyx glanced toward the distortion. "Soon."
Becca's fingers flexed again. "We press in with a crowd or alone?"
Nyx's eyes slid over Becca like a scale weighing metal. "With awareness. Alone if you can hold distance. With a group if you can trust them."
Becca gave a short sound. "Trust."
Nyx's gaze returned to Rei. "Your foxes are alert."
"They're fine," Rei said.
Nyx watched the hood a moment longer than comfort allowed, then looked away. "Good."
A ripple moved through the crowd ahead. Not panic. A shift in tone, like a room hearing the first note of a song it recognizes.
Someone pointed toward the tear.
A pulse ran through the air there, subtle enough that most eyes would miss it, clear enough that Rei felt it in his teeth. The bend in the space sharpened, the edge of the distortion thinning for an instant and then tightening again.
The crowd's sound thinned with it.
Becca whispered, "It's changing."
Nyx's posture tightened by a fraction. "It's reacting."
Rei watched the tear and felt his chest go quiet. The road behind them had shown what happened when people broke in place. This space promised danger with structure and reward attached, and that promise pulled players like gravity.
Rei kept his voice low. "We don't go first."
Becca's eyes stayed on the tear. "We also don't wait until someone decides we look like loot."
Nyx's gaze cut toward the teleport anchor, then back. "Pick your timing."
Rei nodded once. His hands stayed loose, ready. Jinx pressed close to his shin, tail still. Vesper's weight stayed steady in his hood.
The air at the access point pulsed again, a thin flare that made the tear's edge look sharper and made scattered breaths catch in the crowd.
Rei shifted his stance a half-step, putting Becca and the unicorn at his side instead of behind him.
"On my move," he said.
The staging ground tightened around the tear as if every person there had reached the same conclusion at once.