The forest pressed in around him—silent, dense, ancient.
Asher leaned against the gnarled bark of a pine, breathing in cold air that smelled like moss and earth. Blood was drying on his hoodie, but it didn't feel real anymore. None of this did.
He closed his eyes—and remembered.
Not the basement. Not the ritual.
Before.
A tiny apartment. Video game posters peeling off the walls. Takeout containers stacked by the sink. A dog he used to walk after school. A sister who'd steal his fries when he wasn't looking.
His life—his first life—had been boring. Safe. Normal.
He wasn't born in blood. He hadn't been raised in a cult.
That version of him had friends. Dreams. Parents who loved him. A future that stretched ahead like a wide, open sky.
He died at seventeen.
He didn't remember how. Only that when he woke again—when he was born again—he'd come into the world with eyes too knowing. With instincts too sharp. With memories that weren't his… and yet somehow were.
This Asher—the one with Parasight—was born to cultists.
He remembered sigils in the crib. Bone charms under his pillow. His mother smiling too wide when he first bled during a moon phase. His father whispering truths in a dead language.
That wasn't his life.
But it was now.
---
Parasight shimmered across his vision again.
> [Integration Level: 4%]
[New Subsystems Unlocked: Status | Inventory | Replay Log]
He opened Status.
> Name: Asher Vail
Kill Points: 95
Entropy: 4%
Spiritual Affinity: Latent – Cultborn
Ritual Aptitude: High
Subsumed Threats: 1
Detected Anomalies: 3 (Masked)
Parasight Sync: Stable
> "Cultborn…" he muttered.
It still felt wrong in his mouth. Like the system was describing someone else. Some other Asher.
But it wasn't.
He knew the meaning of every symbol. Every chant. Every rule of sacrifice and gain. He didn't have to learn—he remembered.
> [New Skill Unlocked: Ritual Echo]
Reconstruct and replicate witnessed or inherited rituals. Cost and result vary based on intent and offering.
So that's what it was. The knowledge he shouldn't have—the rituals in his blood, whether he wanted them or not.
> "This body…"
He looked down at his hands. "It remembers things I don't."
---
He opened the Replay Log.
The ritual from the basement played out again—blurry at the edges, but crystal clear in its horror. His parents weren't summoning a god.
They were trading him to one.
Only something else answered. Something older. Hungrier.
> [Host recognized. Parasight initiated.]
Parasight hadn't come from the cult. It wasn't part of their design.
It had hijacked it.
Whatever they'd done had opened something—and Parasight had slipped through.
> [Root Functions: Locked]
Access Requires: Entropy Threshold Breach
> "And what happens when Entropy gets too high?"
> [Unknown. System integrity will shift. Transformation inevitable.]
He leaned his head back against the tree and let out a breath.
The world had rules.
He used to live by them. Grades. Friends. Games. College.
Now the rules were different.
Now there were Kill Points and Skill Trees.
Now he was a suspect fleeing a massacre—and nobody would ever understand the truth. Because Parasight was invisible to everyone but him.
Even gods wouldn't see it.
And worse?
He was starting to think that might be a good thing.