I leaned back against the cold stone wall, letting my head rest for a moment as I studied him, now far more stable and cleaner than when he had collapsed into the cell. I had seen him in his previous panther hybrid body and now seeing him as a man was a little weird but we had expected something like this before coming here.
"So what happened after you got here?" I asked, turning my head slightly toward him. "I mean... the beginning. How did all this even start for you?"
Knight let out a slow breath, shifting his posture as he settled more comfortably against the wall, his gaze drifting somewhere distant as he began to recall it.
"When I woke up," he said, "I was already half-dead. The body I took over had a massive wound across the torso, deep enough that I could feel the damage before I even understood where I was. They had thrown me into what I think was their version of a morgue... just left there to die."
He paused briefly, rubbing the back of his neck as if the memory itself was uncomfortable.
"I wasn’t alone at first. There were other prisoners, a few of them still conscious, and one of them filled me in on my situation. Told me who I was supposed to be, what I had done. As I told you, apparently, the original owner of this body had killed the mayor’s entire family. They were believers, but they were starting to turn, thinking of becoming defiers, so he took them out before they could."
He glanced at me briefly before continuing.
"Right after that, the system arrived and everyone was pulled into the tutorial. I didn’t even have time to ask more questions. So suddenly I was alone. Completely alone in the prison."
His expression shifted slightly, something between disbelief and quiet amusement.
"And then the door opened on its own."
I raised an eyebrow but didn’t interrupt.
"I don’t know if it was a malfunction or something else, but the lock just... disengaged. So I got up, barely holding myself together, and walked out. The entire place felt abandoned. I made my way out of the prison, then out of the city, because I knew I wouldn’t survive long if I stayed weak like that."
He leaned forward slightly, resting his forearms on his knees.
"So I went into the forest. Started hunting. Slowly at first, because I could barely move, but I pushed through it. Killed whatever I could, gained levels, healed up, then went back to the city when I needed to recover or understand where I was."
"You went back?" I asked.
He nodded.
"Yeah. The mayor’s house was empty. Most of the administrative buildings were too. I figured if I was stuck here, I might as well learn something useful. So I started going through whatever I could find—documents, records, anything that talked about the region, the structure, how things worked in this world. It gave me a rough idea of the world, at least from their perspective."
He paused again, his expression hardening slightly.
"Then they came."
"Believers?" I asked.
"Yeah. But not what I was expecting. These were... different. And obviously not human." He exhaled slowly. "The moment they realized I was a defier, they attacked. No hesitation. No questions. Just straight to killing."
"So you ran."
"I had to," he replied. "I wasn’t strong enough to take them head-on back then. But I didn’t just run. I picked off the weaker ones when I could. Captured a few. Questioned them."
There was a brief pause before he added, more casually than the content deserved, "Tortured them too. They didn’t talk otherwise."
I didn’t react, just let him continue.
"That’s how I found out about all this," he said, gesturing vaguely around us. "They’re not from here. Different races. Different worlds. Goldius or whatever they call their god has made deals with them. They’re here to support the believers, guide them, help them take control once the tutorial ends."
"And they tracked you anyway," I said.
He nodded.
"Yeah. I don’t know how, but they found me in the forest. Surrounded me, forced me into a fight I couldn’t win at the time. That’s when they captured me the first time and brought me here."
I frowned slightly. "First time?"
A faint smirk appeared on his face.
"I didn’t stay long," he said. "I escaped. Managed to break out, got away from the city, and this time I didn’t make the same mistake. I set up a safe zone, got the communication system, started preparing properly."
"And then?"
"They found me again," he said simply. "This time faster. I didn’t get as much time as I wanted."
I studied him for a moment before asking the obvious question.
"How did you escape the first time?"
His smirk widened slightly.
"That," he said, "comes down to my talent."
I leaned forward just a little.
"Go on."
"It’s called Phasing," he said. "At first, I didn’t fully understand it. Thought it was just some kind of defensive skill. But it’s more than that. When I activate it, my body doesn’t behave normally anymore. It stops interacting with physical matter the way it should."
He lifted his hand slightly, as if demonstrating.
"Think of it like this... instead of hitting a wall, I pass through it. Just... ignoring it. My body shifts into a state where solid objects don’t register as obstacles."
I narrowed my eyes slightly, already seeing the implications.
"So you can just walk through anything?"
"Not exactly," he replied. "There are limits. It drains energy, and I can’t stay in that state forever. Timing matters. Control matters. If I mess it up, I get stuck or snap back at the wrong moment, and that can get ugly real fast. I believe I got this talent because of my previous space related talent and it just got modified after my soul arrived here."
He let out a quiet breath.
"But for escaping a prison?" he added, glancing around the cell. "Yeah. It works perfectly."
I looked at the bars in front of us, then back at him.
"...That’s good for our condition."
He chuckled.
"Yeah," he said. "That’s what I thought too."