Chapter 4: Province 269
The rocks of Province 837 faded behind Bullet, their jagged edges dissolving into a sky bruised with auroras. Violet and green ribbons bled across the darkness, crackling with energy that vibrated in his bones. The air tasted sharp—ozone mixed with iron, metallic on his tongue.
He walked on bare feet, each step across the stone sending jolts of pain through his body. The cuts on his soles seeped crimson steadily, old blisters splitting open under the rock's rough bite. Blood pooled in the dust with each footfall, the coppery scent mixing with the dry earth.
The pull in his chest burned with relentless intensity, guiding him toward an unknown horizon. It drowned out everything else—the pain, the exhaustion, the questions. A flame that refused to let him falter or rest.
His shoulder ached constantly now, blood crusted around the wound from the Dreadwraith's whip-like strike. The gash continued to ooze beneath Patch's patched cloak, the leather rough against his frayed pants, straining across cracked ribs that made every breath an exercise in controlled agony.
His calf stung from the creature spines back in Province 472's water block, thin bloody lines still visible, their venom leaving a persistent ache deep in his muscles. And always, always, the scar over his heart blazed like a live coal—a second pulse that refused to fade, demanding his attention even through layers of other pain.
The pipe hung heavy in his hand, its metal surface etched and scarred from shattering circuits and bones. It was slick with residual ooze from the Dreadwraith, a constant reminder of the sentinel's wreckage, of the cragbeasts buried under tons of stone.
The etched shard in his pocket pressed against his thigh, pulsing faintly. That circle bisected by a jagged line. It seemed to mirror something ahead—a glow on the horizon that grew brighter with each step. A riddle without answer, gnawing at the void where his memories should be.
Spark's shard nestled beside it, unetched and cool. A weight he carried, a debt he'd never chosen but couldn't set down. Its quiet presence felt like an accusation—all those trusts left behind, all those people abandoned.
No name beyond what strangers had given him. No past he could access. Just the pull and the scar, driving him through this merciless world. Province 837's blood-soaked tunnels faded into memory, their soil and scars adding to the weight he carried.
Province 269 lay ahead, its bioluminescent glow a beacon in the dark. A new crucible forged by the world's cruel pulse.
The rocky plain ended abruptly, giving way to something Bullet had never imagined.
A jungle rose like a living wall before him, but not like any jungle that should exist. Every surface glowed with bioluminescence—blues, greens, purples creating a riot of color that pulsed with alien life. Veins of light ran through everything like circuits in some cosmic ruin, their collective hum a hypnotic whine that vibrated in his chest.
Towering fungal trees loomed overhead, their massive caps pulsing like beating hearts. They cast eerie blue light across his skin, making him look like a ghost. The trunks were slick with sap that reeked of ozone and decay, the smell sharp enough to make his nostrils burn.
Above, a canopy of vines hummed with energy. Their iridescent threads wove together like neurons in some massive brain, creating what felt like a hive-mind. Whispers seemed to drift from them—myths of something called the Weaver, born from the jungle's core. A sentience watching with unblinking eyes.
The ground beneath his feet was spongy, carpeted with luminescent moss that rippled with what looked like sentience. Each step made it flare brighter—green light spreading out from where his bleeding feet touched down, casting warped patterns on his cloak like a mockery of safety.
Glowing mist curled through the air like spirits, thick and humid. It painted everything in a dreamlike haze, its ozone tang choking his throat, making his vision blur at the edges.
Beetle-like creatures skittered through the undergrowth, their exoskeletons glowing, legs clicking like blades on stone. Their collective hum created a chorus that reminded him uncomfortably of the sentinel's whine. A sound of hunger, of mechanical purpose.
The pull tugged harder, a fire in his ribs. It urged him into the jungle's heart despite every instinct screaming at him to turn back.
His scar blazed like a brand.
A fungal branch creaked overhead. Spores dusted down in a shimmering haze, stinging his eyes. His shoulder continued oozing crimson. His ribs screamed with each step. His muscles were cramping from exhaustion and dehydration, the cloak straining against his cracked bones.
Bullet paused at the jungle's edge, pipe a cold weight in his hand. It was slick with sweat and blood. His scar throbbed in time with the jungle's pulse.
Guilt rose like bile in his throat. Shard's resolve. Spark's shard. Patch's cloak. Ember's warnings. Ridge's tunnels. Stitch's trust. All abandoned for this pull's fire, for a compulsion he couldn't name or resist.
The jungle wasn't safe. He could feel that in his bones. Its hive-mind was watching, vines linked like a neural web, whispering of traps designed to hold visitors in an eternal now. A stasis where no one aged, no one gave birth, just endless light and shadow.
But the pull didn't care about safety. It only cared about forward.
He stepped into the jungle, and the moss flared green underfoot. Its pulse vibrated through his soles like an electric current. Tendrils twitched like living threads, their purple tips glowing brighter, mist coiling closer like a living shroud pressing against his skin.
Thorn-vines lashed out without warning, their red-tipped barbs slicing through the haze. They grazed his cloak, tearing leather with a sharp rip. Sap splashed onto his forearm, burning on contact, leaving fiery welts that made him hiss in pain. His ribs screamed as he twisted to dodge another strike.
He swung the pipe instinctively, its jagged edge slashing through a tendril. Violet sap sprayed out, searing his hand where it landed. The air filled with its acrid stench. His scar flared like someone had pressed a hot coal to his chest.
A shadow darted through the mist—panther-like, moving with predatory grace. Its claws were bioluminescent, slicing through vines with surgical precision. Its eyes locked onto Bullet for a heartbeat, glowing like embers, then it vanished back into the jungle's depths.
His scar burned hotter. The pull urged him deeper.
A quagmire appeared ahead, glowing moss covering what looked like solid ground. Bullet's foot sank immediately, the moss giving way to thick mud that sucked at his leg. His cloak strained as he struggled. The mud pulled at his calf, crimson from his wounds mixing with violet sap.
He caught light on his pipe's metal surface, reflecting the moss's glow into a tendril that was reaching for him. The reflected light seemed to blind it, its writhing slowing. He severed it with a swift strike, more sap spraying, staining his already-filthy cloak.
The jungle's hum rose in response—a soundless scream he felt in his bones rather than heard.
A fungal tree pulsed nearby, its cap swelling. Spores burst out in a luminescent cloud, their whispers immediately invading his thoughts: Rest. Stay. Join us.
The words blurred his vision, clawed at his mind like physical things. It was a siren call, an invitation to join the jungle's eternal stasis.
He held his breath, lungs burning, and slashed through more tendrils. Sap dripped down his arms. The moss flared red beneath his feet, its patterns spiraling like traps being sprung.
The jungle's hive-mind pulsed around him. Tendrils wove elaborate snares, their glow becoming a prison of light. The etched shard in his pocket grew warm, its pulse syncing with the moss beneath his feet. A question without an answer.
The pull was his guide, a fire in his chest. But the jungle's glow felt hollow somehow, masking a deeper threat born from the world's cruel pulse.
He pressed on, alone in the interplay of light and shadow. Guilt pressed down on him—Cowboy's scream, Rivet's blood, Stitch's trust. How many more would he fail?
In Province 1's castle chamber, shadows clung to ancient stone like they'd grown there over centuries. The robed man stood before his console, its lattice of pulsing light casting his gaunt face into stark relief. His sunken eyes glinted with dread. His hands trembled faintly—a tremor he couldn't quite control.
The map glowed before him. Province 837 was fading into Province 269, the bioluminescent jungle shown as an unmapped void where their signals simply died.
The leader sat on his throne, charcoal suit perfectly sharp despite the late hour. His fingers were steepled in thought. His eyes glinted like polished steel—cold, calculating, utterly inhuman in their intensity. His very presence seemed to bend the air around him, swallowing light.
"The sentinel's gone." The robed man's voice was dry as ash, heavy with a fear he couldn't mask. "Its signal vanished completely in Province 837's rock lands. He destroyed it. Shattered it completely."
The leader's eyes narrowed—the only crack in his steel composure. His shadow seemed to grow, drowning out even the console's bright light.
"The Dreadwraith failed as well." Not a question. A statement of impossible fact. "This anomaly defies everything we've built. Everything we've designed to maintain order."
The robed man's hands shook visibly now. "The Dreadwraith's failure should be impossible, my lord. He's demonstrating strength and speed beyond our predictions. That mark he carries—the bullet wound over his heart—he's operating outside our parameters entirely."
The leader stood, beginning to pace. His suit seemed to absorb light rather than reflect it, making him look like a hole cut in reality. Each step was deliberate, precise. A caged predator considering its next move.
"Dispatch the Seeker to Province 618 immediately." His voice was ice—cold, final, absolute. "Interrogate every scavenger, every resident he encountered in that desert camp. Extract everything they know. Names, faces, interactions, anything that might give us insight. Eliminate anyone who resists."
The robed man nodded, his eyes gleaming with an unsettling mixture of fear and hunger. His fingers danced across the console, and a new signal pulsed through the lattice of light.
"The Dreadwraith is reforming," he said. "But the process takes time. Without the sentinel, we're operating blind in that jungle. The bioluminescence interferes with our tracking systems."
"Then be thorough with your interrogations," the leader commanded. "He's in the jungle now. We find him. We contain him. We end this anomaly. No matter what resources it requires."
Somewhere in Province 837, pebbles began to vibrate. Dust swirled in strange patterns. The Dreadwraith's form was stirring, incomplete but growing, reforming itself from scattered matter. Its hum was a faint echo—barely audible yet. But it was there. A promise of relentless return.
Bullet pressed deeper into the jungle, and the glow intensified with every step. Fungal trees pulsed like beating hearts, their caps casting blue light that made his skin look corpse-pale. Sap dripped from above, stinging his wounds, making his shoulder bleed faster. His ribs screamed with each breath.
Tendrils writhed with clear intent now. Their purple glow flickered like eyes watching him, judging him. They were linked by that neural web, steering prey into timeless traps with coordination that suggested real intelligence.
The moss flared with each step, patterns spiraling outward. It was luring him deeper into the jungle's heart. The mist thickened until he could barely see ten feet ahead, hypnotic in its swirling patterns. It wove shapes that looked almost human—figures that dissolved the moment he blinked or tried to focus on them.
The shapes clawed at his mind, suggesting memories that weren't his, histories that didn't belong to him.
A spore cloud burst from a fungal tree without warning. The luminescent haze stung his eyes, disorienting him completely. His calf was bleeding steadily now. His muscles were cramping. His scar blazed like someone was holding a torch to his chest.
His vision blurred. A blackout threatened, and fragments flashed through his mind: A shadowed void. A hand pressing a shard against his chest. Whispers he couldn't quite make out.
He gasped, the pipe nearly slipping from his sweat-slick hand. His scar grounded him, pulling him back from the edge. The pull surged—a fire that refused to be extinguished, refused to let him surrender.
The jungle's pulse tightened around him. Whispers that definitely weren't his own thoughts began filtering through his mind. Myths of the Weaver—something that bound minds in stasis, creating an eternal now where nothing changed, nothing aged, nothing was born. Just endless, unyielding light. A prison masquerading as paradise.
He found the first dreamer almost by accident.
A woman, half-sunk into the glowing moss. Tendrils burrowed into her skin like roots into soil, their purple tips pulsing in time with her heartbeat. Her eyes were open but unseeing, her face serene. Lost completely in whatever visions the jungle was feeding her.
Bullet crouched beside her, pipe gripped tight. Its weight was the only real thing in this nightmare of light and mist.
But she didn't stir when he touched her shoulder. The tendrils pulsed like living veins, their hum a soft lullaby that immediately tried to claw its way into his thoughts.
Another figure appeared through the mist—another woman, this one with skin that glowed faintly with bioluminescence. Tendrils pierced her shoulders like cruel piercings. Her eyes were distant, unfocused. But her wrist bore a scar—pre-existing, from before the jungle had taken her. It glinted under the moss's glow, a mark of whatever past she'd had before this place claimed her.
Bullet swung the pipe, cutting through a tendril with a wet sound. Violet sap sprayed out, burning his hand with a sharp sting that jolted through his entire arm. His ribs ached. His shoulder was bleeding freely now. His scar flared with heat.
The woman stirred slightly. Her voice was barely a thread, woven into the jungle's omnipresent hum: "The singing mountains..."
Her hand shot out, grasping his arm with surprising strength. The world lurched.
He was pulled into a dreamscape—sudden and complete. Reality shifted like water.
A radiant forest-city bloomed around him, impossible and beautiful. Crystal spires pulsed with inner light. Vines sang like harps, their music filling the air with harmonies that felt alive. The air itself glowed with warmth that felt almost like love.
The woman stood before him, whole and healthy. Her skin radiated light, giving her an ethereal quality. She was crafting light-threads into elaborate tapestries that adorned luminous huts, her movements practiced and precise. A weaver of dreams.
"They call me Glow," she said, her voice clearer here than in the waking world. "For obvious reasons."