Each step was slower now, not from hesitation, but from exhaustion. His body had reached its limit, but his eyes never left the sword. There was no doubt in his gaze, no fear, no uncertainty.
He stepped onto the summit.
The air here felt different. It was still, untouched by the violent clashes that had shaken the mountain below. Even the wind seemed to avoid this place, as though unwilling to disturb what stood at its center.
Theras stopped a short distance from the blade and drew in a deep breath.
Up close, the sword appeared almost ordinary.
Its hilt bore engravings unlike any he had seen before. Fine lines curved and spiraled across its surface, forming patterns that resembled stars, clusters, and vast empty stretches between them. It was not decoration. It was a map.
A map of something far greater than this mountain.
The blade itself was entirely black, darker than shadow. A single silver line ran through its center from hilt to tip, straight and unbroken. The sword was buried halfway into the stone, yet the mountain did not crack around it.
There was no aura surrounding the weapon. It did not radiate power.
Theras stepped forward. He reached out. His hand closed around the hilt.
The moment his skin made contact, his body stiffened.
His red eyes widened slightly. A window appeared before him.
It did not emerge from the sword. It appeared in front of him.
Floating.
[Initialising....]
Theras stared at it.
His grip on the sword tightened unconsciously, but he did not pull.
I felt it too.
I could see it.
Not as a distant observer struggling to interpret fragments of memory, but clearly, perfectly, as though the vision itself allowed me to witness what he saw without distortion.
This was not part of his world. This was the System. The same structure that governed my existence.
The window shifted.
[Initialisation complete.]
New lines formed beneath it.
[New coordinates detected.]
[New host detected.]
[Talent detected.]
Theras’s expression changed.
Confusion.
He blinked slowly, his eyes scanning the floating text as though trying to understand what stood before him. He did not pull his hand away. He did not release the sword.
The window remained.
[Permission to Begin?]
Theras frowned slightly.
"What is this?" he muttered under his breath.
His voice carried no recognition. He had never seen this before. He did not understand it. He did not know what the System was.
His lips parted, as though he was about to speak again, as though he was about to respond to the question placed before him.
But the vision shattered. The mountain vanished. The sword disappeared. The world collapsed into darkness.
And I was pulled back.
My eyes opened slowly.
The ruined mountain, the summit, and the black sword vanished, and in their place returned the silent interior of the abandoned house. The cracked stone walls stood exactly as they had before, empty and lifeless. The Essence barrier I had placed around myself remained intact, its faint violet surface shimmering quietly, isolating me from the dead city outside. The unconscious Naga remained frozen where I had left him, suspended in place, his breathing shallow and unaware of everything that had just unfolded.
For a few seconds, I did not move.
The vision lingered.
Not as a fading memory, but as something precise and intact, every moment preserved with unnatural clarity. I could still see the summit. I could still see the sword. I could still see Theras standing before it, his hand wrapped around the hilt, his expression shifting for the first time into something that had not been confidence or indifference.
Confusion.
I lowered my gaze slowly to the book resting in my hands.
The second page remained open.
The image of the sword embedded in the mountain peak stared back at me, unchanged and silent, its black blade and single silver line drawn with perfect accuracy. Above it, the title remained the same.
Brother.
My eyes lingered on that word. It did not make sense.
Nothing in the vision had explained it. The sword had not spoken. It had not acknowledged him. It had only presented the System window. There had been no voice, no declaration, no recognition of kinship or relationship. And yet the title was not random. The book had never shown anything without reason.
Brother.
I replayed the vision in my mind again, every detail unfolding in sequence. The climb. The shadows. The final opponent. The summit. The sword. And then—
The window. That was the part that mattered.
I had seen it clearly. The System.
It had appeared before him exactly as it appeared before me.
My grip on the book tightened slightly. Theras had not understood it.
That much was obvious.
His reaction had not been recognition. He had not responded with familiarity or acceptance. He had stared at it as though it were something entirely foreign to him, something he had never encountered before.
Which meant only one of two things was possible. Either the System had not existed in his world until that moment or he had never been chosen by it before.
I leaned back slightly, my thoughts turning inward. Until now, I had operated under a different assumption.
I had believed Theras Prime was the Chained Fallen.
The entity the System itself had labeled as such. The being whose existence had been buried beneath layers of restriction and silence.
If that assumption was correct, then he should have known what the System was. He should not have been surprised. He should not have hesitated.
Unless—
Unless that moment had been the beginning. Unless that sword had been the first contact. Unless the System had entered his world through that blade.
The thought settled heavily in my mind. It would explain his reaction. It would explain the title.
The Beginning. Not the beginning of his climb. Not the beginning of his rise.
The beginning of the System’s presence. Which meant the sword had not simply chosen him. It had introduced something into his existence that had not been there before.
I lowered my gaze again to the image on the page.
Brother.
If the sword had brought the System to him... Then the sword was not just a weapon.
It was the origin point.
Or worse—
It was something the System recognized as equal.
A cold realization settled in my mind. The System had not presented itself as his master.
It had asked permission.
[Permission to Begin?]
The System had asked him.
Asked.
Which meant Theras had not been beneath it.
He had been something else. Something compatible. Something worthy of consent.
My thoughts shifted to the chained realm. To the presence I had felt there. To the suppressed authority that even the System had not erased completely.
If that being was truly Theras...Then everything I understood about the System was incomplete. I looked around the abandoned house again. The ruined city remained silent outside.
No Essence.
No System presence.
Nothing. And yet this place had triggered the book. This place had allowed the page to open.
Which meant this city was connected to him. Connected to the sword. Connected to the origin of something the System itself had acknowledged.
But there were no answers here.
Only questions.
And the deeper I looked, the more unsettling they became.