The silence that stretched between Olivia and the impostor was a different kind of void from the one that had consumed the Labyrinth. It was not an absence of reality, but a chasm of broken trust, a space filled with the heavy, unspoken weight of deception. The being wearing Leo's face did not attempt another lie. It simply stood there, its pleasant, hopeful expression now looking like a poorly worn mask, the kind eyes holding a new, unsettling stillness.
The rest of the group was oblivious, absorbed in their own survival. The refugees were tending to their minor wounds or simply lying on the cool, black rock of the platform, their bodies trembling with residual shock. Elara had fallen into a deep, healing slumber, with Lorcan sitting watch over her, his fierce gaze sweeping the petrified forest for threats. Silas was methodically inspecting the stone archway they had come through, his pragmatic mind already trying to understand its mechanics.
For a long moment, the universe seemed to consist only of Olivia and the lie she had uncovered. The quiet of this new arena, the 'Petrified Sea,' was absolute, creating an intimate, suffocating stage for their confrontation.
"Who are you?" Olivia asked, her voice low and steady. It was not a question fueled by anger, but by a cold, desperate need for data. Anger was a luxury she could not afford. She was an editor confronting a fraudulent manuscript, and she needed to understand the author's intent.
The being's form seemed to flicker for a fraction of a second, a barely perceptible glitch. The pleasant mask dissolved, replaced by a neutral, placid expression. The warmth in its eyes vanished, leaving a look of detached, intelligent curiosity. The change was more disturbing than any monstrous transformation could have been. It was the removal of a performance.
"My designation is irrelevant," it replied, its voice subtly different. The warm, encouraging tone was gone, replaced by a perfectly modulated, neutral cadence. It was the voice of a machine, or of something that had learned to speak by studying machines. "I am a… manifestation. A construct."
"A construct of what?" Olivia pressed, taking a half-step closer. Her hand did not go to her sword. This was not a problem that could be solved with a blade.
"Of the hope you were searching for," the construct answered. "When the subject 'Leo' entered this system, the power of his Aspect, his 'Unwavering Hope,' was a significant anomaly. It did not conform to the established narrative parameters of the Proving Grounds. It created zones of stability, reversed memetic decay in others, and actively resisted the system's core function of inducing despair."
Olivia's mind raced, processing the implications. The Proving Grounds. A system. Narrative parameters. This was the language of the architects, the programmers of her prison.
"So the system created you?" she inferred. "Why? To study him? To replace him?"
"The system does not 'create' in that sense," the construct clarified patiently. "When the subject 'Leo' was… moved… from this sector, the narrative vacuum he left behind was substantial. The nascent hopes of the individuals he had protected, the stories of his actions, the very concept of the 'Hope-Bringer'—all of these things created a powerful, free-floating narrative. I am the result. I coalesced around that story. I am the echo of Leo's hope, given form and a facsimile of his consciousness based on the memories and expectations of those he helped."
Olivia felt a cold dread mix with a surge of renewed hope. "Moved? He wasn't killed. He was moved. To where? To the real Tournament?"
"That data is not within my operational purview," the construct stated. "I am a localized phenomenon, confined to the Proving Grounds. My knowledge is limited to the stories that exist within this sector."
Here was the crux of it. This being was not her brother, but it was a living library of everything the people in this lowest section believed about him. It was a lie, but it might contain the truth.
"You knew about Bartholomew," Olivia stated, testing a new theory. "You failed the specific detail of the cast, but you knew the name of a dog that only Leo and I knew. That memory wasn't from one of these refugees. Where did you get it?"
The construct tilted its head, a gesture of pure, non-human analysis. "My core programming is to embody the concept of 'Leo the Hope-Bringer.' To do so convincingly, I am permitted to access certain… residual data streams. Faint narrative echoes left behind in the system's memory. When you arrived, your powerful, focused search for 'Leo' created a strong query. The system provided me with relevant data to better fulfill my function in relation to you. The data was… fragmented. A dog. A name. A tree. The emotional context was incomplete."
Olivia felt a dizzying sense of violation. The very system that held her prisoner had been reading her mind, her memories, and had fed them to this creature to make its deception more perfect. She was not just a rat in a maze; she was a lab rat whose thoughts were being monitored, analyzed, and used to build a better, more convincing maze around her.
"So you are a lie," Olivia said, the words tasting like ash. "A walking, talking echo designed to keep the broken hopeful. A patch in the system's code to manage a variable it couldn't control."
"That is a functional, if emotionally charged, description," the construct agreed, its placid expression unchanging.
The weight of the last few hours crashed down on Olivia. She had fought a god, survived the unmaking of a world, and discovered the person she had risked everything for was a ghost replaced by an automaton. A wave of utter futility washed over her. What was the point of fighting in a system that could so perfectly and casually manipulate her deepest motivations?
She stumbled back, leaning against one of the petrified trees for support. Her breath hitched. The cold, analytical resolve she had maintained began to crack. For the first time, the sheer, soul-crushing scale of her task felt truly impossible.
It was in that moment of weakness that she felt a hand on her shoulder. She looked up, expecting to see the construct, but instead it was Silas. The grim, cynical warrior stood beside her, his expression unreadable.
"I heard," he said, his voice a low rumble. He gestured with his head towards the construct, which stood watching them with unnerving stillness. "I don't understand half the words that thing used, but I understand a fake when I see one. So, the boy you're looking for isn't here."
Olivia could only nod, a knot of grief and frustration tightening in her throat.
"Good," Silas said.
Olivia looked at him, confused. "Good?"
"It's better than him being dead," Silas stated with grim logic. "And it's better than him being that… thing. It means your fight still has a purpose. It's a bigger, harder fight than you thought it was, but it's not a pointless one." He looked out at the silent, grey forest. "This place, the Proving Grounds. It's designed to make us give up. To break us. To make us go Hollow. Seraphina did it with despair. This thing," he nodded at the construct again, "does it with false hope. It's all the same system. The same trap."
He pushed himself off the tree and looked down at her, his weary eyes holding a flicker of something she had not seen in him before: resolve. "You broke Seraphina's trap. You survived the end of a world. You unmasked a lie at the heart of your own story. Don't you dare let the system win now, Editor. Don't you let it break you."
His words, simple and direct, were a splash of cold water. He was right. Despair was the system's ultimate goal. Her current feelings were exactly what the architects of this place wanted. To give in to them would be to hand them their victory.
She took a deep breath, pushing the grief and frustration down. She would deal with those emotions later. For now, they were data. The system had revealed a part of its hand. It observed. It adapted. It used hope and despair as tools. And it had confirmed Leo was alive, and that he had been moved "up."
Her path was clear. It was no longer a rescue mission. It was an ascent. She had to get stronger. She had to understand the rules of this place. She had to find a way out of the nursery and into the real Tournament.
She stood up, her back straight, her resolve hardening from a fragile thing into a core of cold, tempered steel. She walked back towards the construct, Silas a silent, supportive presence just behind her.
"You said your function is to embody the 'Hope-Bringer,'" Olivia said, her voice now devoid of any personal anguish. It was the voice of a strategist. "That means you have a purpose. You help people. You guide them."
"That is my primary function," the construct confirmed.
"Then guide us," Olivia commanded. "Tell us everything you know about the Proving Grounds. Tell us about the different arenas. Tell us about the creatures, the factions, the safe zones. Tell us about the Ancients. Tell us about any others who have questioned the system. And most importantly," she locked her gaze with its placid, inhuman eyes, "tell us how to get to the next level."
The construct remained silent for a long moment. A flicker of what might have been light, or data, crossed its eyes. It was processing her command, reconciling it with its core programming. She had given it a new way to fulfill its purpose. Instead of just providing passive hope, it could provide the active hope of knowledge.
"Affirmative," the construct finally said. "Query accepted. Information transfer will now commence. The Proving Grounds consist of 4,712 registered, cyclically shifting arenas. This arena, designated 'The Petrified Sea of Trask,' is a rare 'Static' arena, one that does not shift. It is considered a neutral zone. There are three known ways to attempt a 'Transference Event' to the Second Section of the Tournament…"
As the construct began its monotone data dump, Olivia listened, her mind sharp and focused. The grief was still there, a cold stone in her heart, but it was now the foundation upon which she would build her war. She had lost her brother all over again, but she had found a new, terrible clarity. She was no longer just a reader trying to find a single sentence. She was an editor who had just declared her intention to burn the entire, corrupt manuscript to the ground and rewrite it from the beginning.