I breathe. I feel. I think.
I lower my eyes.
My wrists are chained.
I am a prisoner.
If that brute Évra captured me, then I've been delivered to the government.
Misery…
But if they went to the trouble of bringing me back, they've got an idea behind it.
I won't be executed.
Not yet.
Misery…
Don't tell me I'll have to work for them.
Footsteps.
Someone approaches.
She stops in front of my cell.
The girl with the glasses. The one with the key.
Small. Black hair tied back. Gray shirt and dress. Loafers.
A book in her hands.
Her voice is soft, timid. She pushes her glasses up.
— Hello. My name is Célia. My Word is Sealed. I don't know if you noticed, but I sealed your power. Or rather… a part of it. I'm curious. I'd like to understand how you feel it.
I'm lost.
But I try to follow.
— I just woke up… ah, do you at least know what you sealed?
Her tone changes. Sharper.
Colder.
As if she's stepping into a work zone.
— The most beautiful sealing of my life. I sealed infinity.
She gets carried away.
Like a zealot. Or a researcher who just broke a fundamental law.
— Well, not totally. I restricted it. I created a space, an inner chamber, to contain the infinite. Then I blocked its access to your soul, or to your energy of Words—which is the same thing. It's there… but you only receive a fraction.
She smiles, proud.
— It required extreme precision. I worked on it for months. And now that you're here… you are the proof it worked.
She glows.
— So I'd like to know more. Unless you'd like more details…
I cut her off.
— No, no, thanks. Thanks for saving me. But… I don't see how I can help you.
She seems delighted.
— Go back into your Definition of Soul. You know? That inner world that awakens when you receive your Word. It must have adapted.
Definition of Soul.
I like the term.
— All right. I'm going.
I close my eyes.
I let myself be guided by my Word.
Unbound.
I dive.
It opens like a tear in space.
A dreamlike landscape spreads beneath my eyes.
A meadow. A green almost unreal.
The sky lights the horizon with a gentle, sacred glow.
Perfect calm.
I am high up.
I see everything.
But it isn't happening in front of me.
It's behind.
I turn.
And there…
An ocean.
Blue. Infinite. Alive.
It moves. It growls. It pulses.
It calls.
And before it… six golden gates.
Enormous. Majestic.
They hold the ocean back.
Barely.
If they all open…
everything will be swallowed.
Lower down, I glimpse six valleys.
Six lakes. Empty, or almost.
Aligned. From the smallest to the deepest.
Like a system.
Like a countdown.
The first gate—the one on the right—is ajar.
A thin trickle escapes.
It descends. It fills the first lake.
No more.
I understand.
Each gate is a threshold.
Each lake has a maximum capacity.
I am Dormant.
And I have access only to the first.
A light.
In front of the second gate, it appears.
A key floats. Suspended.
A tablet unfurls. White. Silent.
Passive Ability: 1/7
Second gate locked
I stare.
For a long time.
Behind the gates, I feel a force.
Vaster.
More unstable.
I feel the danger.
But also the promise.
I'm going to have to go there.
Step by step.
Master. Endure. Grow.
But I already have far more energy than before.
I open my eyes again.
Célia is there.
She listens.
I describe everything.
She's ecstatic.
She opens her book, writes aloud:
— A sea. An ocean. A structure. No bottom. The lakes correspond to awakening thresholds. And each passage through a gate opens an entire tier of energy. Fascinating…
She scares me a little, muttering like that.
— And me? What do I do now? I'm your finest work, right? I suppose I'm not getting executed.
She blinks.
Pause. Back to reality.
— Ah yes, I almost forgot. You have to pass an evaluation. Prove you're worthy of your Word.
She opens the cell door.
Takes off the cuffs.
No fear in her gaze.
She knows what I am.
And she doesn't shake.
We walk.
A long corridor. Gray.
Built of a strange stone.
Old-seeming.
At the end: light.
We step out.
And I find myself…
in a coliseum.
A silence of stone and expectation.
Célia looks at me. Serious.
— Go to the center. And good luck with what comes next.
I give her a tired smile.
— Thank you… for everything.
She vanishes into the corridor's shadow.
I move forward.
Unhurried.
Toward the center.
The Coliseum is splendid.
Not in the aesthetic sense.
But as a place built to last.
To judge. To survive whatever is unleashed inside it.
No spectators.
No sound.
Only me.
And this immense presence.
The ground is covered with sand.
Not a pale, warm sand.
No.
A heavy sand.
Dark. Thick.
A sand almost blackened by past battles.
It cracks under my steps, but doesn't slip.
It is there to absorb.
Blood. Rage. Failure.
Beneath the sand, I feel density.
Reinforced wood, perhaps. Or something else.
A floor designed to cushion…
or to trap.
The edges, in turn, are sharp.
A black material.
No grain. No shine.
Not metal.
Not stone.
Something smooth… and indestructible.
A wall built to take the unimaginable.
Not to protect people.
But to hold back those who would get out.