The sky over Shardbrook split like old cloth.
One moment, the late sun burned orange over the wheat fields. The next, a seam of black opened from horizon to horizon, thin as a knife cut and growing wider. Wind rushed toward it. Birds folded mid-flight and fell. Farmers swore and pretended not to be afraid.
Zeke Blade stood with his practice sword over his shoulder and watched the world come apart.
Shardbrook was the kind of far-off town the capital forgot between taxes. The Blade family had been its pride for five generations—farmers with calluses and swordsmen with steady wrists. They trained on hard dirt, ate whatever grew, and buried their dead without a fuss.
Zeke was the youngest Blade. Eighteen. Lean. A good listener, a bad liar, and a passable swordsman who wanted more.
"Inside," his mother said, setting down her basket of lavender like it weighed a mountain. "If gods are fighting again, the weak get stepped on."
He didn't move. "I won't be weak."
"Then don't be stupid."
He smiled, because that was easier than agreeing, and because the seam in the sky had started bleeding light.
The first demon fell through it—long limbs, a ribcage like a thorn cage, skin the color of ash. It screamed, and the scream made the wheat bow. The boundary was supposed to keep such things out. Tonight, the boundary was a joke.
The demon planted a clawed hand in the road and pulled itself up. A second followed. Then a third.
Everyone ran.
Zeke didn't. The sword in his hand was iron and honest. He'd stolen glances at legendary blades in the capital during his one trip there—runes and star-forged metal—but he knew how his own blade bit and bent, and he trusted that knowledge more than any story.
"Zeke!" his brother Reyn shouted from the well, dragging a child behind him. "You're not a hero, you idiot—move!"
Zeke's heart banged against his ribs. He was scared enough to taste it. But the fear burned clean, and clarity came with it.
The first demon leaped.
Zeke stepped left. Its claws sliced air. He slashed its tendon as it landed, iron biting gristle. The demon shrieked. Then it moved like a flood. Its forearm smashed his ribs. He flew, hit dirt, rolled, stood because he had trained to stand.
It came again.
He raised his sword and—
—something pinged behind his eyes.
A panel flashed across his vision, translucent and clean. Too clean to belong in this world.
[SYSTEM BOOTING…]
[World: Infiniti]
[User: Zeke Blade (Verified)]
[Status: Alive (For Now)]
[Boundary Integrity: 7% — Good luck.]
The demon pounced.
Zeke shoved his sword into its mouth. Iron screeched against teeth. He pushed until his shoulders shook, until his palms tore, until his breath burned like dry straw. The blade punched through the back of its throat. The demon stilled in furious surprise and fell.
[Kill Confirmed: Rift-Scaled Imp (Lesser)]
[+10 Points]
[First Blood Bonus: +10 Points]
[Welcome Gift Unlocked: Inventory, Shop, Quests, Appraisal]
The words hung in his mind. No one else reacted. Reyn was still shouting. Villagers were still fleeing. The corpse still steamed at Zeke's feet. The system was his alone.
The second demon galloped toward him on all fours.
Another panel flicked open.
[Tutorial Quest: Eat or Be Eaten]
Goal: Stay alive for 60 seconds.
Reward: +20 Points, Basic Pouch (3 Slots).
Countdown: 60…59…
"Fine," Zeke muttered, and sprinted.
The fight dragged him through the square. Reyn's barrel trap caught one demon like a snared boar, and Zeke's blade finished it. A shrine door burst open and a girl in white-and-blue robes tumbled out—dark hair tied with a ribbon, clutching a staff too heavy for her arms.
She blinked at him, then the demon, then back. "Oh. This is… not ideal."
"Iris, move!" Zeke yanked her aside just before claws raked the spot where she'd been.
"I was praying," she gasped. "To anyone. Not to… that."
"Pray later."
"That's blasphemy!"
"Then pray quietly."
She made a scandalized noise that would've been funny if the demon wasn't galloping after them like a nightmare hound.
The quest timer ticked down. Zeke bought himself seconds with desperate strikes, rolls, and a thrown halberd. At the final second, his blade split the demon's heart.
[Kill Confirmed: Rift-Scaled Imp (Lesser)]
[+10 Points]
[Tutorial Complete.]
[+20 Points]
[Reward: Basic Pouch (3 Slots) — sent to Inventory.]
He gasped for air. The panel flickered faintly, waiting. No one else saw it.
By dusk, the seam had almost sealed. Survivors stumbled out from hiding.
And then she came.
Raven Nightwind, envoy of the capital. She stepped from the wall of the shrine to the square, silver hair catching the dying light, rain-colored eyes sharp enough to cut. White armor gleamed on her frame, and her presence pressed against the square like a storm held back by a thin leash.
She looked at Zeke as though measuring a tool.
"You're alive," she said.
"Working on it," he replied, trying not to sound like a boy.
Her eyes narrowed. She studied his posture, his breath, the way he held his blade. She lingered a second longer than comfort allowed—but found nothing out of place. The panel pulsing in his vision stayed invisible.
"…You fight like someone with something to prove," Raven finally said. "Keep proving it. Or you'll be fertilizer by next week."
She leapt away, silver and light, vanishing over rooftops like a blade cutting horizons.
Zeke let out the breath he didn't know he'd been holding.
The world had always been cruel. But now, it had given him a weapon no one else could see.
He smiled in secret.