The tower pierced the heavens like a needle of black glass.
It stood alone in the eastern mountains, surrounded by clouds of perpetual storm. Lightning danced across its surface, illuminating ancient runes carved into its obsidian walls.
No army had ever breached its gates.
No king had ever commanded its master.
For the Tower of the Eye answered to only one being.
Inside the highest chamber, silence reigned.
The room was circular, its walls lined with mirrors that reflected not light—but visions. Fragments of the world flickered across their surfaces: armies marching, children playing, beasts hunting, stars dying.
Everything that happened on Sambala... she could see.
In the center of the chamber sat a throne carved from a single crystal—pale blue and humming with power. And upon that throne...
She waited.
Her eyes were closed.
She appeared young—perhaps twenty summers—but her silver hair cascaded to the floor like liquid moonlight, ancient beyond measure. Her skin was pale as fresh snow, marked with faint luminescent patterns that pulsed like a second heartbeat.
She wore robes of midnight blue, and her fingers rested on the throne's armrests with the stillness of someone who had not moved in days.
Perhaps weeks.
Perhaps years.
Time meant little to her.
Before the throne, a knight knelt in absolute stillness.
His armor was unlike anything forged by mortal hands—black metal interlaced with veins of glowing crimson, shaped to resemble the scales of some primordial beast. A massive sword rested across his back, its blade wrapped in chains.
He did not breathe.
He did not move.
He simply waited.
For hours, he had waited.
And he would wait for hours more if required.
Then—
Her eyes opened.
They were not human eyes.
They were orbs of pure white, without iris or pupil, blazing with an inner light that seemed to see through flesh, through stone, through the very fabric of reality.
"Kapa."
Her voice was soft. Musical. And utterly terrifying.
The knight's head lowered further. "My Lady."
"Something has arrived."
The mirrors around the room flickered. One of them shifted, its surface rippling like water, until an image formed:
A streak of fire across the violet sky.
A ship of unknown metal crashing into crystalline forest.
A figure—small, fragile, alien—crawling from the wreckage.
"The northern reaches," she continued, her white eyes fixed on the mirror. "The border of the Wizard Realm. An otherworldly creature has fallen from beyond the stars."
Kapa raised his head slightly. "Your orders, my Lady?"
She was silent for a long moment.
Then her lips curved into something that might have been a smile.
"Find him. Bring him to me. Alive."
"And if others have found him first?"
Her smile widened.
"Then remind them who rules the East."
Kapa rose to his feet, his armor groaning with the movement.
"It shall be done, my Lady."
He turned and walked toward the chamber's edge—where no door existed. Only a window overlooking the endless storm.
Without hesitation, he stepped off.
Lightning swallowed him whole.
The woman closed her eyes once more.
But this time, her smile remained.
"An otherworldly creature," she murmured to herself. "How... interesting."
The mirrors continued their endless dance of visions.
And somewhere in the north, a boy in a cage had no idea that the most dangerous being on Sambala had already set her gaze upon him.
Bump.
Bump.
Bump.
The wooden wheels groaned over uneven ground.
Ethan's consciousness returned slowly—fragments of sensation piecing themselves together. The smell of sweat and filth. The sound of chains clinking. The rough texture of wooden bars against his back.
A cage.
I'm in a cage.
His instincts screamed at him to open his eyes, to fight, to escape. But something deeper—something cold and calculating that hadn't existed before the nanobots—whispered:
Wait. Listen. Learn.
Ethan kept his eyes closed.
Voices drifted around him.
Strange voices.
The language was unlike anything he had ever heard—flowing syllables punctuated by harsh consonants, rising and falling in patterns that seemed almost musical.
He understood nothing.
NEXUS, Ethan commanded in his mind. Can you translate?
[NEGATIVE. LANGUAGE DATABASE DOES NOT CONTAIN MATCHING PATTERNS. INITIATING LINGUISTIC ANALYSIS PROTOCOL.]
How long?
[ESTIMATED TIME FOR FULL LINGUISTIC COMPREHENSION: 2 HOURS, 14 MINUTES. RECOMMEND CONTINUED PASSIVE OBSERVATION.]
Two hours.
Ethan could work with that.
He focused on his other senses.
The cage was moving—a cart of some kind, pulled by... something. The footsteps were too heavy for horses. Too rhythmic.
Multiple other people shared his cage. He could hear their breathing—some shallow with fear, others deep with resignation. At least seven, maybe eight individuals.
Guards walked alongside the cart. Three, possibly four, based on the footstep patterns.
And beyond that...
Wind through crystalline leaves.
Alien birdsong.
The distant rumble of something massive moving through the forest.
This world is alive, Ethan thought. Very alive.
Time passed.
The cart continued its journey.
Ethan remained perfectly still, absorbing every sound, every scent, every vibration. The nanobots processed the language around him, breaking down sentence structures, identifying patterns, building a translation matrix.
[LINGUISTIC ANALYSIS: 67% COMPLETE.]
The voices became clearer. Words began to separate from noise.
"...three more... village..."
"...good price... young ones..."
"...Ura... market..."
[LINGUISTIC ANALYSIS: 89% COMPLETE.]
"...strange clothes... no mark..."
"...foreigner... fetch more..."
"...wizard territory... careful..."
[LINGUISTIC ANALYSIS: 100% COMPLETE. TRANSLATION MATRIX INTEGRATED INTO HOST NEURAL PATHWAYS. LANGUAGE DESIGNATION: SAMBALAN COMMON TONGUE.]
Understanding flooded Ethan's mind.
It wasn't like learning a language—it was like remembering one. The words that had been meaningless noise suddenly carried weight, meaning, context.
He could understand them.
He could speak their language.
Incredible.
Ethan slowly opened his eyes.
The cage was exactly as he had imagined.
Wooden bars lashed together with crude rope. Rusty chains connecting the prisoners' ankles. A floor covered in dirty straw.
Around him sat seven others—men and women of varying ages, their clothes torn, their faces hollow with despair. Some bore bruises. Others had the empty eyes of those who had long since stopped hoping.
Beyond the cage, the cart was pulled by massive beasts—six-legged creatures that resembled oxen but stood twice as tall, their hides covered in bony plates.
Guards in leather armor walked alongside, swords at their hips.
And the forest...
Gods.
Trees of pure crystal rose a hundred meters into the violet sky, their branches refracting the light of the twin suns into rainbows that danced across the ground. Flowers that glowed with inner light dotted the undergrowth. Strange creatures flitted between the trees—some with wings, some with too many eyes, some that seemed to phase in and out of visibility.
This is Sambala.
I actually made it.
"Rise and shine!"
Ethan's gaze snapped forward.
A man sat across from him in the cage—perhaps fifty years old, with a weathered face, shrewd eyes, and a smile that didn't quite reach them. His clothes had once been fine but were now reduced to tatters.
"Roman," the man said, tapping his chest. "And you've been sleeping for three days. We were starting to think you were dead."
Ethan's throat was dry. When he spoke, the words came out in perfect Sambalan.
"Where am I?"
Roman raised an eyebrow, impressed. "Well, at least you speak properly. I was worried you were some feral from the Unmarked Lands."
"You were caught by slave traders."
The voice came from an old man huddled in the corner—thin, frail, with a long white beard and rheumy eyes. His wrists bore marks of chains far older than the current ones.
"Name's Dimitri," he said. "Found you in the Shattered Grove, they did. Unconscious near that strange burning metal."
The ship.
"You don't have any mark on your body," Dimitri continued, eyeing Ethan curiously. "No kingdom seal. No house brand. No slave tattoo. Nothing."
Roman chuckled. "Which means you're either a very clever escapee... or you truly came from nowhere."
He leaned forward.
"Either way, they're taking you to Ura. The great city. The slave capital of the Northern Kingdoms."
"Ura?" Ethan repeated.
"The jewel of the realm," Roman said with mock grandeur. "Where nobles parade in silk while the rest of us rot in chains. Where kings decide whether you live as a servant... or die in the fighting pits."
"Kings?" Ethan's mind raced. "This world has kings?"
Roman laughed. "This world has everything, boy. Kings, queens, emperors, lords, merchants, soldiers, slaves..."
His smile faded.
"And all of them answer to power. If you're lucky, a noble house will buy you. Give you food, shelter, purpose. If you're unlucky..."
He drew a finger across his throat.
Dimitri scoffed.
"They don't control everything."
Roman turned, his expression amused. "Oh? Enlighten us, old man."
"The kings rule their little territories," Dimitri said, his voice quiet but firm. "They command armies. Collect taxes. Make laws."
He looked up, and something flickered in his rheumy eyes—something sharp and defiant.
"But this world is not ruled by kings. This world... is ruled by wizards."
Silence fell over the cage.
Then Roman burst out laughing.
"Oh, here we go again!" He slapped his knee. "Tell me, Dimitri, if wizards are so powerful, where are they? Why aren't they saving us?"
Others in the cage began to chuckle.
"Please, O Great Wizard!" Roman raised his hands in mock supplication. "Use your magnificent powers to free us from this cage! Strike down our captors with lightning! Turn these chains to dust!"
The laughter grew louder.
Dimitri's face reddened with anger, but he said nothing. He simply turned away, hunching into himself.
Roman wiped a tear from his eye. "That's what I thought."
But Ethan wasn't laughing.
He was staring at Dimitri.
The way the old man's fingers trembled—not with weakness, but with restraint.
The faint shimmer in the air around his hands.
The way his eyes, for just a moment, had glowed with pale blue light.
He's not lying, Ethan realized. He's actually—
[ALERT.]
Ethan's thoughts shattered.
[ALERT. ALERT. ALERT.]
NEXUS's voice exploded in his mind—no longer calm and mechanical, but urgent. Almost frantic.
[ANOMALY DETECTED IN HOST NEURAL ARCHITECTURE. SCANNING... SCANNING...]
What? What anomaly?
[MUTATION DETECTED IN HOST CEREBRAL CORTEX. UNKNOWN CELLULAR RESTRUCTURING IN PROGRESS. CAUSE: EXPOSURE TO WORMHOLE RADIATION.]
Ethan's blood ran cold.
Mutation? What kind of mutation?
[UNKNOWN. CHANGES ARE OCCURRING AT THE QUANTUM LEVEL. UNABLE TO DIAGNOSE. UNABLE TO PREDICT OUTCOME.]
Is it dangerous?
A long pause.
[PROBABILITY OF LIFE-THREATENING COMPLICATIONS: 73.2%. PROBABILITY OF NEUROLOGICAL DEGRADATION: 58.7%. PROBABILITY OF... COMPLETE COGNITIVE RESTRUCTURING: 41.4%.]
Complete cognitive restructuring? What does that mean?
[UNKNOWN. THE MUTATION IS BEYOND CURRENT ANALYTICAL CAPABILITIES. IT MAY ENHANCE HOST FUNCTIONS. IT MAY DESTROY THEM. INSUFFICIENT DATA.]
Ethan's face went pale.
Roman noticed immediately.
"Oy. You alright there, boy? Look like you've seen a ghost."
Ethan didn't respond.
His mind was spinning.
He was trapped on an alien planet. No ship. No way home. Surrounded by strangers, headed toward slavery.
And now something was growing inside his brain—something even the most advanced nanotechnology couldn't understand.
73% chance of death.
And that's just the beginning.
He looked down at his hands.
They were trembling.
But then—
Something else stirred inside him.
Not fear. Not despair.
Determination.
He had crossed a wormhole that should have killed him. He had survived a crash that should have destroyed him. He had woken up in a world that shouldn't exist.
And he had promised Maya he would come back.
I'm not dying here.
I'm not dying until I see her again.
He clenched his fists.
NEXUS.
[YES, HOST?]
Monitor the mutation. Record every change. Find a way to stop it—or control it.
[UNDERSTOOD. INITIATING CONTINUOUS NEUROLOGICAL SURVEILLANCE. WARNING: IF MUTATION ACCELERATES, EMERGENCY INTERVENTION MAY BE REQUIRED.]
Then we'll deal with it when it happens.
Ethan raised his head.
Roman was still watching him. "Seriously, boy. You look like death."
Ethan met his gaze.
"I'm fine," he said quietly. "Just... adjusting."
Roman studied him for a long moment.
"You're a strange one," he finally said. "Strange clothes. Strange manner. And those eyes..."
He shook his head.
"Whatever you're running from... I hope it was worth it."
Ethan looked out through the bars of the cage.
The crystal forest stretched endlessly. The twin suns blazed in the violet sky. And somewhere in the distance, a city of slaves and kings waited.
Worth it?
I'll find out soon enough.
The cart rolled on.
And far to the east, in a tower of black glass, a woman with white eyes smiled in her eternal meditation.
The hunt had begun.