The air is tense.
I sit still, listening, absorbing, feeling the weight of their words like ripples on a still lake—disturbing, widening, sinking into me.
Elias and Edan speak in measured tones, like two scholars at war with a concept neither of them wants to believe in fully.
And yet—
I can hear it in Edan's voice.
The way it is too steady, the way he exhales too sharply between thoughts, the way his mind races ahead of his mouth, his lips barely keeping up with the avalanche of ideas collapsing inside his head.
——
"This isn't just about you being an anomaly."
Edan's words cut through the quiet.
I watch him—his fingers twitch, his gaze sharp, almost too sharp, as if he has found something he wishes he hadn't.
Elias, across from him, does not react immediately.
Only his hand moves—casually tapping against his knee, his calm a little too deliberate.
But I feel it.
The shift.
The way he is waiting.
Because Elias already knows what Edan is about to say.
——
Edan exhales sharply, running a hand through his hair.
"The ruins reacted to you, specifically. That much is obvious." His voice is low, and precise, as if he is pinning down a beast he cannot see. "The presence inside them recognized you."
A pause.
"Not just as an outsider."
His eyes flicker, his mind moving faster now, spiralling through every theory, every fragment of knowledge he has ever encountered.
"But as something that should not exist."
I swallow, my hands clenching in my lap.
There is something terrifying about watching a man as intelligent as Edan realise the truth on his own.
Because he does not stop.
He does not hesitate.
He does not fear the implications.
He embraces them.
——
Elias tilts his head. "So? That's hardly news, is it?"
Edan shakes his head.
"No. It's not just that. It's why."
His voice is sharper now, pressing into the dark, dragging the answer to the surface.
"Something wanted to kill you. Not because you were intruding. Not because you were strong or weak or useful or dangerous. But because you were wrong."
He leans forward, eyes flashing.
"You are something that this world tried to erase."
——
The words hang.
Heavy.
Real.
I feel a chill press against my skin, but I do not move.
I wait.
Because Edan is not finished.
Not yet.
——
Elias exhales, his expression steady, but I see the shift in his shoulders.
He is preparing himself.
Bracing.
And that means—
Edan is about to say something that matters.
Something dangerous.
Something true.
——
"You just said you came from another world."
The words spill from Edan's lips like a dam breaking.
I inhale sharply.
Elias does not blink.
And Edan does not stop.
"If a soul—if a person—if a whole existence is ripped from one world and placed into another, then something must happen. Something must change. Something must be displaced."
I feel it now.
The realization.
The way the pieces in his mind are slamming into place, locking together, forming something coherent.
Something terrifying.
——
"You weren't just dropped here," Edan says, his breath unsteady now, as if saying the words aloud makes them too real. "This world is not just accepting your presence."
His fingers tighten against the fabric of his sleeve.
"It's correcting itself."
A pause.
Then—softer, hoarser, almost unwillingly—
"And I think I finally understand what you took."
——
The wind howls through the ruins.
Somewhere in the distance, an owl screeches.
And then Edan speaks the words that should never be spoken.
"You took the Black Spirit."
——
My breath catches.
Elias closes his eyes.
And Edan, for the first time since we've met him, looks afraid.
——
I do not move.
I do not speak.
I do not breathe.
Because I feel it now too.
The weight of the revelation.
The cold, suffocating horror of it.
Elias had not just arrived here.
He had not just been placed into this world.
He had replaced something.
No—
He had stolen something.
Something fundamental.
Something that should never have been separated from the world it belonged to.
Something that is now—
Gone.
——
Edan stares at him, the flickering torchlight making the shadows under his eyes seem deeper.
Elias opens his eyes again, but he does not deny it.
And I realise—
This was the one thing he had never said aloud.
Not to me.
Not to anyone.
Because to say it aloud—
Would make it true.
——
Edan swallows hard, his voice hoarse, weak.
"If you took it…" He trails off, his mind still grappling with what he is saying.
Then his gaze snaps back to Elias, something almost like horror settling into his features.
"Then where did it go?"
——
Silence.
Heavy.
Endless.
Elias does not answer.
And that—
That terrifies me the most.