The world we enter is not the one we left behind.
Ruins stretch out like ribs of a dead god. Cities, frozen mid-collapse. Silence thick as ash.
We walk.
No jump nodes. No shortcuts. Just broken roads and heavier steps.
Freedom is strange. Heavy. Sharp around the edges.
On the third day, we find them.
Survivors.
A cluster of tents stitched from banners and desperation. Faces gaunt. Eyes hollow. Some hold weapons. Most barely hold themselves.
They stare like we're phantoms. Maybe we are.
Kara approaches, hands up. Her blade stays sheathed.
"We're not enemies," she says.
A woman steps forward. Dust-streaked hair, not age. Her gaze is tired, wary. Hope flickers behind her caution—dangerous, fragile hope.
"Then who are you?" she asks.
No one answers.
Until Liora does.
"We're the ones who broke the Cycle."
Murmurs ripple. Fear. Doubt. Something like wonder.
The woman studies us, then gestures toward the fire.
"Come. Talk."
Later, around a weak fire, they share pieces of a broken world.
The Collapse wasn't clean. Whole sectors spiraled into madness. Comms died. Systems burned. Some settlements tore each other apart. Others vanished—swallowed by storms of corrupted memory.
"We heard things," says a boy, maybe fourteen. "About the Heart Sector. About a battle."
He looks at us.
"Was it really the end?"
I glance at Liora. She says nothing.
So I speak.
"No. Just the beginning."
The boy looks down.
They don't ask us to stay.
But they don't ask us to leave either.
That night, Kara stands watch. Navi sleeps with one hand on his weapon.
I sit beside Liora, the fire burning low.
"I thought winning would feel... lighter," she says.
"How so?"
"Like the weight would vanish. Like breathing would be easy again."
I poke the fire, sparks dancing.
"Maybe victory isn't about feeling lighter. Maybe it's choosing to carry the weight anyway."
She smiles faintly.
"For someone who skipped philosophy class, you're surprisingly wise."
I grin. "Trauma has excellent teachers."
She laughs—real and soft. It fills the silence.
For the first time, I let myself believe in something fragile.
Not peace. Not perfection.
Just the road ahead.
At dawn, we leave.
The woman presses something into my palm. A worn pendant. Scarred.
"For luck," she says.
I nod.
We walk into the light—not as heroes, not as legends.
Just as people who refused to break.