The shadow hadn't followed him. Or if it had, it had chosen to let him go.
That, more than anything, unsettled him.
Above, the sky remained gray.
He waited for NEX to speak, to analyze, to monitor—but it didn't. No readings. No reports. Just silence.
He rolled onto his side, curling up slightly. His whole body ached. His stomach was an open void gnawing at itself.
And his thoughts, usually tangled in loops of resistance and calculation, began to slow—dull with exhaustion.
Still, sleep wouldn't come.
The moment he closed his eyes, images flashed behind them: not dreams, not memories. Just fragmented things—colors he'd never seen, voices whispering in languages he didn't know, and shapes that broke logic. The worst part? He felt like he had seen them before.
He opened his eyes again. Nothing had changed.
NEX remained silent.
He was completely alone. Not even the AI that had once ruled him wanted to speak.
At some point, he lost consciousness—not sleep, just a slip into darkness. An escape without permission.
And even there, something watched him.
The next morning, or what he thought was morning, he woke up thirsty, hungry, and weak.
He never felt that way before; it was painful and something he wasn't used to. However, on the other hand, he felt happy—he felt things, something he never thought he could, and didn't even want to, because he didn't know it.
Suddenly, he heard a faint sound. He climbed out of the ravine and then he saw a small stream which he headed towards . He went down to drink water, and once satisfied, while washing his wounds, he noticed that the bioluminescence of the nearby trees slowly faded as he passed by.
"NEX, what's happening?"
> Environmental reaction detected.
> Subject interaction: triggering passive adaptation.
> No hostile response.
Axel followed the stream until it turned into a shallow trickle. There, embedded in the side of a moss-covered hill, he found a stone, darker than the surrounding terrain, its surface riddled with unfamiliar runes—each pulsing faintly with that strange, bioluminescent hue.
He reached toward it instinctively, then stopped. Last time, touching the monolith had nearly killed him.
But this wasn't the same. The stone felt less… hostile.
He circled it slowly, eyes tracing the etchings, hands trembling with uncertainty.
> Caution advised.
> Unidentified construct.
> No defensive markers detected.
> Low risk profile.
That was as close to encouragement as NEX would ever give him.
So he knelt. Gently, he placed his palm on the stone's cold, slick surface. Nothing happened at first.
> Warning.> Cultural artifact detected.> Access denied.> Fusion threshold not met.> Required fusion: 0.1%
Then, he felt it: a low vibration in his bones, like a hum too deep to be heard. Not sound—resonance.
He exhaled slowly. His muscles ached less. His mind steadied.
Here, in this clearing, with his hand on that ancient thing, he felt something unexpected:
Stability.
> Neural fluctuation reduced.
> Cognitive rhythm: stabilizing.
> Adaptation marker: progressing.
He didn't speak. For the first time since arriving, there was no pain in his chest. No weight in his limbs. Only the pulse of something older than memory… reaching out in silence.
Axel sat in front of the stone until the gray sky above dimmed into something even less distinguishable. He didn't know if it was dusk, or just the cloud-thick atmosphere shifting again. Time had become emotional, not mechanical. He felt it as weariness, not as hours.
He lay back in the grass beside it, the moss cold beneath his back. His body screamed for rest, but his mind remained alert—caught in loops it couldn't close.
> Fusion threshold not met.
Always the same.
He thought of the status screen, of the increments rising: from 0.0001% to 0.0003%. Meaningless fractions, but they felt like scars. Proof that something inside him was reacting, even if he didn't understand to what.
"NEX," he muttered, eyes half closed, "why show me these things if I can't use them?"
> Data availability dictated by integration.
"Then what's the point of showing me anything at all?"
> Subject feedback loop active.
> Adaptive stress test ongoing.
"So, I'm an experiment again."
No answer.
Of course.
He turned his head and looked at the symbol-covered stone. It wasn't beautiful. It wasn't mystical. It was… designed. That was what made it terrifying.
This place wasn't chaos.
It had rules.
He just didn't know them.
And more than that—it didn't seem like the world wanted him to.
A sharp pain stabbed behind his eyes. He sat up too fast, nearly vomited, and forced himself to breathe. Shallow. Controlled.
His vision swam.
The fatigue was now something deeper.
He closed his eyes again. Not to sleep.
Time slipped again.
When Axel opened his eyes, he didn't know how long it had been.
Then, without prompt, the familiar flicker of system light returned. Not blinding. Not loud. Just present, like a whisper behind his vision.
> Status update available. Display?
"…Yes," he whispered.
The screen appeared—glitching less this time. Clearer. More stable. And for the first time, something was new.
---
Name: Axel
Rank: F
Strength: F
Agility: F+
Mana: F-
Stamina: F-
Intelligence: E
Luck: F-
Skill: –
Physique: –
Oath: –
Grimoire: –
Job: –
Trait: Persistence
Potential Tag: Survivor
Fusion: 0.0009%
Status: Persisting Anomaly
Adaptation: Initiated
System Integrity: Degraded
---
He stared.
Not at the numbers, that had increased again.
But to the new two lines.
"Trait? Tag?" he asked aloud, more to himself than NEX.
To his surprise, the response came immediately.
> Trait: Persistence — acquired through continuous resistance beyond physiological thresholds.
> Potential Tag: Survivor — provisional marker indicating likelihood of enduring hostile systemic environments.
> Confirmation pending.
For a moment, Axel couldn't breathe.
Not because he was scared.
But because for once, the system had recognized something in him—and answered.
Not protocol. Not rejection.
Recognition.
He didn't know what it meant, or what it would unlock.
This was change.
And it was starting with him.