Alex awoke.
When he opened his eyes, he saw nothing.
Only darkness — and a pale mist that wrapped around him like a cold blanket.
The silence was absolute, so deep it made his ears ring.
Every breath left a trace of vapor that mingled with the air.
He slowly pushed himself up, searching for some point of reference — but there was none.
The ground beneath him was soft, insubstantial, as though he were floating on an invisible sea.
Then memory returned.
The pain.
Iver's voice.
The sphere of light.
The darkness.
He understood where he was.
During lessons on Aether, he had heard of this place: the Aether Tree.
An inner realm, a zone of immense energetic concentration, accessible only through the process of Convergence or with advanced catalysts.
It was said to be the purest form of oneself — the place where the Condition took shape.
According to the teachings, before him should have appeared his own tree — a luminous essence, rooted in the soul.
But there was nothing.
Only mist.
A dense, living mist that moved as though it were breathing.
Time flowed uncertainly — minutes, hours, days — impossible to tell.
Until, at last, a figure slowly emerged from the milky veil.
It was wrapped in a cloak of mist, and only its outline hinted that it was a girl.
She was as tall as he was, with long, smooth hair cascading over her shoulders like liquid smoke.
Alex felt a flicker of fear — but quickly smothered it.
He remembered where he was: inside himself.
Here, nothing could harm him… or so he believed.
The figure reached out a hand.
The fingers, slender and translucent, brushed against his skin.
A shiver ran up his arm — cold, yet strangely familiar.
Without a word, the figure guided him deeper into the fog.
Alex wasn't walking; he was floating.
Each step was a thought, each movement a breath.
The world around them warped — a shifting sequence of shadows and light.
Then, suddenly, the mist cleared.
Before him opened a void — black, bounded by a ring of silvery vapor.
At its center stood an altar — made of mist as well, solid and trembling at once.
Alex looked at it and sighed.
"Well, that's new."
He turned to speak to the figure beside him, but when he looked —
She was gone.
Vanished.
As if she had dissolved back into the element she came from.
A wave of sadness brushed against him — inexplicable, sudden.
Then he stepped closer to the altar.
On its surface, letters began to form slowly, as if carved by the breath of the mist itself:
"You are the Son of the Unknown."
Alex stood motionless.
That was his Condition.
Every Convergent possessed one — a phrase defining their essence, the boundary and possibility of their power.
But his… was cryptic.
Incomprehensible.
Unlike any he had ever studied at school.
He had no time to think further.
The mist began to move — rising like a living wave, swallowing the altar, the walls, and finally him.
The last thing he saw was his own body dissolving into the fog.
Then, once again — darkness.