The monster did not chase.
Nor did the fake brother.
They watched. Still as statues carved from rot and ritual.
Regulus ran.
Ten minutes. Maybe more. Each step a heartbeat. Each breath a blade. The girl—barely conscious—hung in his arms, weightless only because adrenaline made him a god of desperation.
Finally, a building emerged from the fog. A half-burned husk of brick and wood, long abandoned. No people. No light. But a roof.
Sanctuary.
He stumbled inside and dropped to his knees. Not from pain. From questions.
His lungs screamed, but he couldn't rest.
He couldn't sleep.
Because sleep would mean silence. And in silence, the thoughts always came.
Who was that man?
What did he want?
How did he know? About my transmigration? About me?
His hands trembled as he set the girl down gently on a pile of rags in the corner. She didn't speak—just breathed, slow and shallow. Her skin was pale, bruised, half-dead.
But she was alive.
He looked at his own hands. The cuts from battle were already closing. The bruises had faded. His heart was still racing—but his body felt... wrong. Too strong. Too durable.
"Can I survive if I die again?" he whispered to himself.
A shiver crawled up his spine.
Was this body cursed?
Or something else?
He stood suddenly. His fists clenched.
Then he screamed.
A wordless roar of rage and helplessness.
He slammed his fist into the ground. Stone cracked. Dust exploded. The girl gasped in fear, recoiling.
Regulus turned toward her, breathing heavy. His eyes were wide, bloodshot.
"Who are you?" he demanded, voice low, sharp. "Who the hell are you?! And who is that sick freak hunting us? That—thing—who chants from books and plays god with corpses?!"
The girl flinched. She tried to sit up, but her body failed her.
Regulus stepped closer. He grabbed the wall beside her.
"You hear me?! Speak!"
Her lips trembled. Her eyes glistened.
But still—she said nothing.
He growled. A deep, raw sound.
"You bitch! I saved your life! I broke myself to get you out of there, and this is how you repay me? With silence?!"
She winced.
Then, finally, she spoke.
"My name... is Beatrice."
Her voice was hoarse. Barely above a whisper.
"I'm... with an organization. We deal with... things like this. Paranormal threats."
Regulus blinked. "Paranormal? What the hell does that mean?"
She shook her head slowly.
"I don't know much about him. But I've seen his kind before. He's probably tied to an old group we've been tracking for years. The Atlas Organization."
Regulus narrowed his eyes.
"Atlas?"
She nodded.
"They're... monsters. No one knows what they really want. But they've left a trail of rituals. Sacrifices. Towns erased overnight. Every act—every massacre—it always ends the same way: with whispers of a 'revival.'"
Regulus swallowed.
"A revival... of what?"
She looked away.
"We don't know. Just... that it's evil. An entity. Something that shouldn't exist."
Regulus sat back, eyes fixed on the ground.
Entity. Organization. Rituals.
And him.
Am I the only one?
He turned to her again.
"So... you're special? Him and you? Both of you have powers?"
Beatrice hesitated.
Then nodded.
"I'm a Thinker. Grade 7."
Regulus blinked.
"What does that even mean?"
She looked at him, as if seeing a child asking about fire.
"Thinker is a Path. A Revelation Path. It enhances cognitive functions—strategy, analysis, memory, reflex. Each grade unlocks more. More thought. More precision. More... control."
Regulus frowned.
"And the grades?"
She exhaled.
"We rank downward. The lower the number, the more powerful. To go down a grade, you have to obtain a fragment of the Endless Book."
He raised an eyebrow.
"Endless Book?"
She nodded again.
"It's not a literal book. Just... pieces of it. Scattered lines, chapters, pages—buried in the world. Each one unlocks a Path. A way to change yourself."
Regulus looked down at his hands.
Could that be it?
Had he consumed a page of this "Endless Book" without realizing?
His ability to come back after death—
Was it part of a Path?
Was it something more?
Beatrice looked at him carefully.
"You're not normal, are you?"
He smiled bitterly.
"I woke up in a dead man's body. Watched a girl get her head split open. Fought a stitched god of limbs. And I'm still breathing. Normal doesn't fit anymore."
He leaned forward.
"So maybe... just maybe... I inherited a Path too. Maybe this whole nightmare is tied to that book. Maybe the way back home is buried in one of those fragments."
He stared at the wall.
Then turned to her.
"I want to see your organization."
Beatrice blinked.
"What?"
"Your people. The ones fighting this war. I need to understand this world. These Paths. Everything."
She hesitated.
Then, slowly, nodded.
"That's... the least I can do. For saving me."
There was a long silence. But it wasn't peaceful.
Regulus stared at the cracked floor. The silence wasn't quiet—it was heavy. Like a sound waiting to be born.
Beatrice lay down, her breathing steadying. Regulus didn't sleep. He sat beside the broken window, watching the ruins outside.
So there are twelve paths... maybe more, he thought. And each is unlocked through fragments. A shattered book scattered across a dying world.
He touched the back of his neck where the first pain of transmigration had sparked.
Did that pain... mark the moment I awakened to a path? Or was it something else—something deeper?
Questions clawed at his skull. About the brother. About the ritual. About Beatrice's wounds. About the strange echo in his heartbeat, like something ticking underneath his ribs.
What did they do to him?
What was he now?
Far in the distance, a low howl echoed through the fog.
Not a beast.
Something older.
Regulus turned to Beatrice.
"And what grade is your leader?"
She didn't open her eyes. But she answered.
"he keep it secret but he is very strong."
He stared at her, and for the first time, he felt small.
"Is it possible to become a god through these paths?"
A long silence.
Then:
"Some think so. But gods tend to die faster than men in this world."
Regulus turned back toward the dark horizon.
Ash. Echoes. And now—faith.
He didn't know where he was going. But he knew he had to walk.
Even if the road was carved from pages of the damned.
His head began to ache. Not from pain, but from the weight of too many unknowns.
Beatrice had fallen asleep, her breaths shallow but calm. He envied her. Not the peace, but the ability to surrender to it.
He leaned against the cold stone wall, still alert. Still watching. Still thinking.
Maybe tomorrow I'll understand more, he thought.
But thinking only led to more questions.
And exhaustion.
Eventually, without realizing, Regulus's eyes began to close.
Darkness crept in—not the kind behind his eyelids, but the kind that comes when a mind can bear no more.
His breathing slowed.
And for the first time since his awakening in this cursed world—
Regulus fell asleep.