Elias learned to measure time by pain.
There was the sharp, clinical pain of mornings: needles extracting blood, probes inserted into muscle tissue, electrodes attached to his increasingly frail body. This was routine pain—almost comforting in its predictability.
Afternoons brought experimental pain: new compounds injected into his veins that made his blood feel like liquid fire; machines that sent pulses of energy through targeted pathways in his body; immersion tanks filled with viscous fluids that burned his lungs when he was forced to breathe them in.
Nights offered only the dull, throbbing aftermath: muscles spasming involuntarily, fever dreams that blurred reality, and the constant, gnawing hunger that never abated no matter what nutrients they pumped into him.
Six months into his captivity, Elias stopped counting days. Time became meaningless when existence was reduced to intervals between suffering.
"Subject 237 continues to demonstrate remarkable resilience," noted Dr. Vance, the cold-eyed man who oversaw Elias's particular research track. His voice filtered through the haze of pain as Elias lay strapped to the examination table, a familiar position. "Increase mana infusion to forty percent capacity for tomorrow's session."
The assistant technician hesitated. "Sir, forty percent? Subject 229 experienced complete pathway collapse at thirty-five."
"Subject 229 is not Subject 237," Vance replied dismissively. "This one's pathways show unusual elasticity. Note how they reform even after significant trauma. Most fascinating."
They never addressed Elias directly during these discussions, speaking about him as if he were an interesting specimen under glass. In a way, he was. The observation room where he spent most days was walled with transparent panels, allowing researchers to monitor him from all angles.
Elias had pieced together the purpose of the facility through fragments of overheard conversation. The Nexus Corporation—the entity behind these experiments—sought to artificially induce Awakening before the natural age of ten, and to enhance the resulting abilities beyond normal parameters. Their methods were as varied as they were brutal, with success measured in data points rather than human lives.
The realization that he was merely one subject among dozens came during his second month. That was when he first saw the others during a rare supervised exercise period—thin, haunted children with shaved heads and numbered garments like his own. They weren't permitted to speak to each other, but eyes met briefly, communicating shared horror.
He recognized some from the wagon, including the boy who had warned him about the labs. The boy's face was now gaunt, his body trembling constantly from some internal damage. When Elias saw him next, two weeks later, the boy's vacant stare indicated his mind had retreated somewhere unreachable.
By the third month, that boy was gone. No explanation given. But Elias knew.
"Prepare the subject for mana pathway visualization." Dr. Vance's command brought Elias back to his current torment. A technician approached with a syringe containing luminescent blue liquid—the tracer compound that would make his internal energy channels visible to their instruments.
The needle slid into his neck, a familiar violation. Seconds later, fire erupted beneath his skin as the compound spread through his system. Elias bit through his lower lip rather than scream. He'd learned early that screaming only prolonged sessions, as researchers paused to note "pain response thresholds."
On the overhead monitor, a three-dimensional model of his body appeared, inner channels glowing blue where the compound flowed. These were mana pathways—the biological structures that, upon Awakening, would conduct elemental energy. In normal children, these pathways remained dormant until the tenth year, when they naturally activated and determined affinity for fire, water, earth, wind, ice, shadow, or light.
"Remarkable regeneration in the upper thoracic region," observed Dr. Vance, pointing to an area that had been deliberately damaged in the previous day's experiment. "Most subjects show permanent scarring, but his have nearly reformed completely."
"Could this be an indication of light affinity?" suggested a younger researcher. "The healing properties—"
"Too early to determine," Vance cut him off. "Begin the infusion. Standard protocol."
The "standard protocol" was anything but standard medical practice. Two technicians wheeled forward the infusion apparatus—a machine Elias had come to fear more than any other in the facility. Crystal chambers pulsed with raw, unrefined mana energy harvested from dungeon cores, connected to delivery tubes ending in wickedly sharp needles.
These needles would be inserted directly into his primary pathways—at the wrists, ankles, base of the spine, and the center of his forehead. Through them, raw mana would be forced into channels never designed to handle such power before natural Awakening occurred. The theory, as Elias understood it, was that repeated exposure might trigger premature Awakening or expand pathway capacity for later use.
In practice, it was torture in its purest form.
The first needle punctured the sensitive point at his left wrist. Elias's back arched involuntarily against the restraints as his body instinctively tried to escape. The second needle found his right wrist, then his ankles in quick succession. Each entry point burned as if acid-dipped metal had pierced him rather than sterile surgical steel.
"Pathway access established," announced a technician. "Infusion chambers pressurized. Awaiting final authorization."
Dr. Vance nodded, eyes fixed on the monitor. "Begin at twenty percent. Increase by five percent increments until we reach forty."
The first surge of foreign mana entering his system felt like liquid nitrogen being pumped into his veins—an impossible cold that somehow burned. Elias's vision whited out as every nerve ending fired simultaneously. This was the moment when most subjects screamed. Elias had learned to retreat instead, pulling his consciousness inward to a place they couldn't follow.
"Subject showing unusual control," noted Vance with mild surprise. "Normally by this stage we see involuntary vocalization."
"Heart rate and brainwave patterns suggest extreme distress despite the lack of outward response," the technician replied. "Increasing to twenty-five percent."
The next surge shattered Elias's mental defenses. A scream tore from his throat, raw and primal, as the mana spread from his entry points through secondary and tertiary pathways never meant to handle such power. On the monitor, the blue lines representing his channels began pulsing erratically, some flaring brightly while others dimmed.
"Interesting reaction in the cranial pathways," Vance leaned closer to the screen. "Almost as if they're trying to adapt rather than simply conducting. Increase to thirty percent."
Elias's world contracted to a single point of agony. His body convulsed against the restraints, muscles seizing so violently that the reinforced table beneath him creaked. Something warm trickled from his nose and ears—blood, though he couldn't see it. Inside, it felt as if his very cells were being torn apart and reassembled in unnatural configurations.
"Thirty-five percent."
A new sensation emerged beneath the pain—pressure building in his skull as if something were trying to claw its way out from behind his eyes. The room's lights flickered briefly, drawing concerned glances from the technicians.
"Power fluctuation in the observation suite," one reported. "Might be interference from the subject's response."
"Impossible at this stage," Dr. Vance dismissed the concern. "He's years from Awakening. Proceed to forty percent."
The final increase brought a new dimension of suffering, one Elias hadn't experienced in his seven months of captivity. His consciousness fragmented, pieces of himself scattering like shards of broken glass. Through these fragments, he glimpsed other parts of the facility—a corridor where guards patrolled, a room where researchers studied data, cells where other children lay broken and dying.
These weren't physical sights. Somehow, the mana overload was forcing his mind outward, beyond the confines of his body.
"Unusual brainwave patterns," a technician reported, voice tight with concern. "Nothing in our reference database matches this activity."
Dr. Vance's interest sharpened. "Record everything. This could be significant."
Through the haze of pain and disembodied awareness, Elias perceived something else—paths of glowing energy running through the facility's structure itself, like veins in a living organism. Power lines, security systems, data networks—all visible as pulsing streams of information and energy.
Then, as suddenly as it had begun, the expanded awareness collapsed. Elias snapped back into his body with brutal force as the infusion ended. The return was almost as painful as the infusion itself, his consciousness cramming back into the confines of his physical form.
"Remarkable resilience," Vance was saying as Elias's hearing returned. "Most subjects require days to recover from high-percentage infusions. Yet his vitals are already stabilizing."
"Should we schedule another session tomorrow?" asked an assistant.
"No." Vance studied the data scrolling across his tablet. "I want tissue samples first. Core pathways, with particular emphasis on the cranial network. Prepare the extraction suite."
Tissue samples. Elias knew what that meant. More pain, more violation, as they carved pieces from inside him to study under their microscopes. He closed his eyes, retreating again to that mental sanctuary that had become his only escape.
The months blended together after that. Experiments grew more intense as researchers pursued promising data points regardless of the cost to their subjects. Elias watched as, one by one, the children who had arrived with him disappeared from the rare communal periods.
Subject 242, a girl with auburn hair who had occupied the cell across from his, lasted longer than most. Eight months into their captivity, she caught his eye during an exercise period.
"They're killing us," she whispered, her voice barely audible over the guards' footsteps. "To make weapons."
Before Elias could respond, she was pulled away. The next day, alarms blared throughout the facility. Through his cell door's small window, he glimpsed researchers running with emergency equipment. The word "overload" echoed through the corridors.
He never saw Subject 242 again. But that night, as he huddled on his thin mattress, the lights throughout the facility dimmed momentarily. In that brief darkness, he imagined he felt her presence—a fleeting touch of something both familiar and utterly alien—before it dissipated like smoke.
Dr. Vance appeared unusually animated during the next day's session.
"Subject 242's Awakening was premature but informative," he told his team as they prepared Elias for another procedure. "Fire affinity, as predicted by her genetic markers. The uncontrolled release destroyed most of Lab Six, but we gathered sufficient data before containment measures activated."
Containment measures. Elias knew what that meant too. Subject 242 wasn't just gone—she had been terminated after giving them what they wanted. An Awakening, even if it killed her.
"Our focus with Subject 237 should shift," Vance continued. "His resilience suggests potential for multiple affinities rather than specialized channeling. The director has authorized Protocol Chimera."
The term was new, but the increased intensity of subsequent experiments made its meaning clear. Where before they had focused on expanding his pathways, now they sought to force them into unnatural configurations—to create a subject capable of channeling multiple elemental energies simultaneously.
Each session left Elias weaker than the last. His body, once wiry and resilient from street survival, became a collection of bones barely covered by sallow skin. The only meals he could keep down were liquid nutrients administered intravenously. His hair fell out in clumps, and wounds from procedures healed more slowly with each passing month.
Still, he survived when others did not. By what he estimated was the beginning of his third year in captivity, Elias was the last remaining subject from his intake group. New children arrived periodically—frightened faces that soon learned there was no escape, no rescue, no hope beyond endurance.
Elias turned nine in captivity, though the date passed without acknowledgment. The only change was in the data files that occasionally appeared on screens around him, his age updated in clinical notation. More intense procedures were approved as he approached the critical pre-Awakening year.
It was during this period that he began experiencing the dreams.
They started as fragmentary images—unfamiliar landscapes, strange devices, faces he'd never seen. Over time, they cohered into something more structured: memories that didn't belong to him, knowledge he couldn't possibly possess.
A world called Earth. Cities with towers of glass and steel. Devices that connected people across vast distances. Games played with creatures of elemental power, captured and trained to battle. None of it made sense, yet all felt hauntingly familiar.
"Subject shows increased REM activity," noted a night technician, unaware that Elias was conscious enough to hear. "Possible side effect of the latest pathway modifications."
"Or sign of imminent breakthrough," replied another. "Record everything. Dr. Vance will want the data."
Elias kept the dreams to himself, guarding them as the one thing his captors hadn't yet invaded and analyzed. They became his true sanctuary—more real sometimes than the facility itself.
The final phase began three months before his tenth birthday. Protocol Chimera had yielded promising results in simulations but required more direct intervention than previous procedures. Surgical modifications to key pathway junctions, experimental compounds that altered the very structure of his cells, electrical stimulation targeting specific brain regions associated with mana control.
Each intervention left him weaker, closer to the threshold where the human body simply gives up. Subject after subject in parallel tracks reached that threshold and crossed it, their bodies wheeled away to the facility's lower levels where failed experiments were dissected for final data extraction.
"He's not going to make it to natural Awakening," a technician observed one morning, believing Elias to be unconscious during preparation. "The pathway modifications are causing systemic collapse."
"Vance knows," replied her colleague. "That's why they've accelerated the timeline. One final comprehensive infusion scheduled for next week. Either it forces breakthrough or we harvest what we can."
Harvest. The clinical term for the autopsy procedures performed on failed subjects. Elias had overheard enough to know it was conducted on still-living subjects to capture active mana signatures before cellular death.
He was out of time.
The knowledge should have terrified him, but Elias felt only a distant resignation. Death had been his constant companion for three years. Perhaps its arrival would be a mercy compared to continued existence as Subject 237.
The dreams intensified as his body weakened. In them, he was someone else—someone with knowledge and power beyond anything in this world. Someone who understood the energy flowing through his modified pathways as more than elemental magic, but as a fundamental force that could be manipulated, controlled, reshaped according to will alone.
His final day at the facility dawned like any other—lights activating automatically, a nutrient solution delivered through his permanent IV port, technicians arriving to prepare him for transport to the main laboratory. His body was too weak now to walk unaided, necessitating a gurney for movement between chambers.
Dr. Vance met them in the corridor, tablet in hand as always. "Final preparations complete?"
"Yes, sir. All systems ready for maximum infusion."
"Good. This will be our most significant test of Protocol Chimera to date." Vance actually looked at Elias directly, a rare acknowledgment of his existence as more than data points. "Remarkable endurance, Subject 237. Regardless of today's outcome, your contribution to our understanding has been invaluable."
The laboratory had been reconfigured for the procedure. Additional power systems hummed along the walls, and the standard infusion apparatus had been replaced with something larger, more complex. Crystal chambers pulsed with energies in multiple colors—red, blue, green, yellow, white, and black—representing the fundamental elemental affinities.
"Simultaneous multi-affinity infusion has never been successfully accomplished," Vance explained to the assembled team. "Previous attempts resulted in pathway combustion as conflicting energies met within the subject's system. Our modifications to Subject 237's network architecture should, theoretically, allow separate channeling."
Elias was transferred to the central platform, his emaciated limbs secured with familiar restraints. Electrodes and sensors attached to every major chakra point and pathway junction. The primary infusion needles—larger than any used before—were positioned above key entry points.
"Begin sedation," ordered Vance.
A technician approached with the usual mask, but Vance raised a hand to stop her. "No. Conscious response is essential for this procedure. We need him aware."
Fear, long deadened by resignation, flickered briefly in Elias's chest. Without sedation, the pain would be unfiltered, unmitigated. Even with his hard-won tolerance, he wasn't sure he could survive it without losing his mind.
The first needle pierced his chest directly over his heart—a primary insertion point never used in previous procedures due to its risk. The sensation of cold metal sliding between ribs to touch the pericardium itself was unlike any previous violation. Five more needles followed at precise points mapped by earlier scans: throat, forehead, abdomen, and both palms.
"Primary insertion complete," announced the lead technician. "Pathway mapping confirmed. All junctions receiving signal."
"Initialize simultaneous infusion," Vance ordered. "All affinities at thirty percent capacity."
The first surge hit Elias like a physical blow. Where previous infusions had introduced a single mana type, this procedure forced six conflicting elemental energies into his system simultaneously. Fire and ice, earth and air, light and shadow—fundamental forces that naturally repelled each other now coursed through pathways separated by mere millimeters of modified tissue.
Elias's back arched as muscles contracted involuntarily, vision blurring as blood vessels in his eyes ruptured from internal pressure. The scream that tore from his throat didn't sound human—a primal, animal shriek of agony that echoed through the laboratory.
"Pathway integrity holding at eighty percent," reported a technician above the howling machines and Elias's cries. "Better than projected."
"Increase to fifty percent," Vance ordered, eyes fixed on the monitoring screens.
The second surge shattered Elias's conscious mind. His awareness fractured into six distinct streams, each following a different elemental current through his body. He was burning and freezing, suffocating and breathing pure energy, blinded by light and swallowed by darkness—all simultaneously.
Alarms blared as monitoring equipment registered impossible readings. On screens around the laboratory, his vital signs flashed red as multiple organ systems began failing simultaneously.
"Pathway collapse imminent!" shouted the lead technician. "Cardiac rhythm destabilizing!"
"Increase to seventy percent," Vance countered, his voice steady despite the chaos. "We're approaching breakthrough."
"Sir, he's dying!"
"He's transforming," Vance corrected. "Continue the procedure."
The third surge was beyond pain, beyond comprehension. Elias felt his physical form beginning to disintegrate as conflicting energies tore through modified channels never meant to contain such power. Blood vessels ruptured, tissues separated at the cellular level, neural pathways fired in random, desperate patterns.
In that moment of dissolution, as his life ebbed, something impossible happened.
The fractured pieces of his consciousness, scattered by pain and foreign energies, suddenly aligned—not into his original pattern, but something new. The foreign memories from his dreams merged with his own, creating a hybrid awareness that encompassed both his life as Elias and... someone else. Someone who understood power differently.
Above him, through blood-filled eyes, he glimpsed a glowing interface—lines of blue light forming a rectangular panel suspended in air. Words formed across its surface:
[STATUS WINDOW]
The sight triggered a cascade of understanding. Not from Elias the street orphan, nor from Subject 237 the experimental victim, but from the integrated consciousness now occupying his dying body. Knowledge of another world, another system of power, another way of being.
"Massive energy spike!" someone shouted, voice distant and irrelevant. "All monitoring systems failing!"
As darkness closed in from the edges of his vision, Elias reached not with his restrained physical hand but with his fragmenting consciousness—reached for that glowing panel that represented salvation and transformation.
His last coherent thought before consciousness failed completely was not fear or anger or even pain, but a strange sense of recognition.
I remember this. I know what happens next.
Then his heart stopped, his brain activity flatlined, and Subject 237 died on the laboratory table.
But in the space between heartbeats, in the microsecond before total cellular failure, the status window flashed with new text:
[EMERGENCY PROTOCOL INITIATED] [ALL LIMITATIONS REMOVED] [AWAKENING SEQUENCE ACTIVATED]
And Elias began to change.