The Altacian stood against the rising sun, the wind tugging at his tattered cloak, golden eyes unreadable.
Pag approached, still stiff, still bruised, but somehow stronger than the day before.
He stopped a few paces away, waiting.
Meowtimer spoke without turning.
"Training within stone walls is one thing," he said. "Training where the world itself wants to devour you is another."
Pag said nothing, his chest tightening slightly.
Meowtimer turned then, face grim.
"You’re being sent into the Ashen Wilds."
Pag’s stomach dropped.
He had heard the stories.
Everyone had.
The Ashen Wilds — a scorched wasteland lying east of the Draggor Kingdom’s border. Once a vibrant stretch of forest and valley, now twisted by centuries of rogue magic, natural disasters, and the unrestrained aftermath of ancient wars. A place where mana flowed untamed, where beasts mutated and landscapes shifted like living nightmares.
A place where order did not exist.
Meowtimer stepped closer, the faint scent of fire clinging to him like a second skin.
"You will survive alone for five days," he said. "No rescue. No backup."
He paused, voice hardening.
"And no second chances."
Pag swallowed.
"And if I lose control?"
Meowtimer’s smile was razor-thin.
"Then the Wilds will finish what you cannot," he said simply. "Or worse, they will change you into something you can never undo."
The ember inside Pag pulsed, not in fear—but in hunger. In challenge.
Pag nodded once.
"I’ll do it."
Meowtimer's tail flicked once, approving.
"You leave within the hour."
The Edge of the Ashen Wilds
By midday, Pag stood alone at the crumbling boundary where the normal world ended and the Wilds began.
Beyond the ruined marker stones, the landscape twisted into something wrong. Trees without bark or leaves stretched skeletal limbs into the grey sky. Pools of liquid mana steamed on cracked earth. Winds howled low and mournful, carrying scents of burning, rot, and something metallic.
The ground itself shifted in subtle pulses, like something breathing deep beneath the surface.
Pag tightened the straps of his travel leathers, feeling the meager supplies at his back—bare essentials: rations, a flask, a small iron dagger, and a single thread of reinforced mana-binding rope.
No weapons of real power.
No potions.
No fallback.
Just him, his wits, and the unstable ember burning quietly under his skin.
He stepped across the boundary stone—and the world swallowed him whole.
The First Day
The Ashen Wilds were worse than any tale.
The very air shimmered with wild mana currents, distorting vision, tugging at spells unpredictably. Time itself seemed to stretch and contract without warning—an hour could pass in a blink, or a minute could drag on into exhaustion.
The beasts here were twisted reflections of nature.
Pag spotted them from a distance: wolves with six legs and eyeless faces; birds that flew backward in drunken, spiraling dives; trees whose roots slithered after anything warm.
He kept his distance, moving carefully, trusting instinct over reason.
Twice he nearly unleashed his Emberkin power when cornered.
Twice he held back—barely.
The fire inside him writhed under the pressure, desperate to lash out against the madness around him.
But Pag remembered Meowtimer’s words.
Control wasn’t suppression.
Control was acceptance.
He whispered to the ember under his breath, soothing it, promising it that its time would come.
It listened.
For now.
The Second Night
Pag crouched in a shallow ravine, curled around a pitiful fire of twisted ashwood that barely gave off heat.
Above him, unnatural stars wheeled and twisted in the sky, sometimes blinking out of existence for minutes at a time.
He slept in fits, waking often to the feeling of unseen things passing nearby—things too fast, too silent to track.
At one point, he woke to find a thin, black mist coiling toward him from the ravine walls.
He recognized it immediately: Mana Wraith Vapor.
One breath of it would hollow a man from the inside, leaving a body standing but a mind eaten away by magic.
Pag forced himself to stay utterly still, letting the ember heat his blood just enough to raise the temperature around him.
The vapor recoiled, slithering away like a wounded beast.
He shivered after it was gone—not from cold.
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But from how easy it would have been to lose himself.
One slip.
One breath.
One mistake.
End of the Third Day
Pag crossed a barren hilltop and froze.
Ahead, a clearing opened around a dead, gnarled tree. In the center of the clearing, a shimmering pool of liquid mana reflected the distorted sky.
A figure stood at its edge.
Not a beast.
Not a soldier.
Another human.
Pag crept closer.
The man’s back was to him, robes scorched and ragged. His skin cracked and glowing with slow ember-like fissures—eerily similar to Pag’s own burns during his first Emberkin eruption.
But there was no control here.
The ember had consumed him.
The man turned.
His face was hollow, eyes burning coals, mouth opening in a silent scream of endless pain.
A Broken Emberkin.
>Warning: Mana Aberration Detected Advisory: Extreme Risk<
Pag’s hands trembled.
This is what you could become, the ember whispered inside him.
This is your fate if you fail.
The Broken Emberkin lurched toward him—every step leaving charred footprints in the grassless earth.
Pag didn’t summon fire.
He didn’t unleash destruction.
Instead, he braced himself, rooted deep, and whispered through gritted teeth:
"Not today."
The ember pulsed—recognizing the command.
When the Broken Emberkin lunged, Pag dodged—not with rage, not with wild power, but with control.
He tripped the creature at the edge of the mana pool.
The Broken One fell in—and the liquid mana consumed it instantly, ripping it apart molecule by molecule in a silent, horrid implosion.
Pag stood shaking at the edge of the clearing, his lungs burning, his body near collapse.
But he was still Pag.
And the ember was still his.
For now.
The fourth night in the Ashen Wilds was the longest.
Pag huddled in the lee of a broken ridge, exhaustion gnawing at his mind. He had crossed valleys of whispering ash, scaled cliffs where the stones sang maddening songs, and fought through tempests of raw magic that peeled the very bark from the earth.
Through it all, he endured.
But the ember inside him stirred restlessly, like a caged beast sensing the walls weakening.
Pag tightened his fists.
Hold. Hold just a little longer.
And then — salvation.
A flare of pure, stable mana cut across the corrupted sky: a signal rune, burning crimson.
Not an enemy.
A summons.
A command.
Return to the Core.
Pag stared at it for a long moment, heart hammering, then turned away from the dying light of the Wilds and began the long trek home.
Two Days Later — Arcane Core, Inner Courtyard
The walls of the Core had never seemed so solid, so real, as they did when Pag stumbled through the gate.
Behind him, the Wilds howled in distant frustration. Ahead of him, cold stone and colder discipline awaited.
Pag barely crossed the threshold before collapsing to one knee, gasping.
Meowtimer was already there.
The Altacian stood with arms folded, tail lashing once in what might have been approval—or impatience.
"You returned," Meowtimer said, voice calm. "Not broken. Not lost."
Pag looked up, every limb screaming, ember pulsing faintly under his bruised skin.
"Barely," he croaked.
Meowtimer crouched, bringing his golden eyes level with Pag’s.
"Good," he said. "Because now your real trial begins."
Inner Sanctum — Later
Pag knelt before a low, circular table deep within the Core’s fortified heart, the walls around him inscribed with layer after layer of binding wards and ancient protections.
Meowtimer leaned over a parchment map, claws tapping lightly against an old, worn emblem etched into its center: a sunburst wreathed in flame.
"The Arcane Core," Meowtimer began, voice low and careful, "was founded not only to protect the kingdom—but to seal away that which should never rise again."
Pag listened, forcing himself to stay upright despite the exhaustion weighing him down.
"There is an artifact," Meowtimer continued. "An Emberkin relic. Sealed long ago beneath the ruins of Cael'Brith—the Fallen Temple."
Pag frowned. He had heard whispers of Cael'Brith: a place cursed, abandoned, forbidden.
"It’s waking," Meowtimer said grimly. "The Empire feels it. Their agents have already moved."
Pag’s blood ran cold.
"You want me to find it?" he asked.
"No," Meowtimer corrected. "I want you to claim it."
He unfurled a secondary map—a broken, jagged stretch of mountains and scorched valleys, with a single red ‘X’ marked deep within.
"You," Meowtimer said, tapping the mark, "are the only one who can survive what lies within. The only one who can withstand the Emberborn Seal without being consumed."
Pag stared at the map.
At the distance.
At the certainty of death waiting along the path.
He exhaled slowly.
"What happens if the Empire gets it first?"
Meowtimer’s tail lashed once, a blur of motion.
"If they awaken the relic," he said, "the next war won’t be one we can win."
Pag closed his eyes briefly, feeling the ember within him stir, not violently this time—but with grim, heavy purpose.
He looked up at Meowtimer.
"When do I leave?"
The Altacian smiled, slow and sharp.
"Tonight."
As Pag rose, feeling every wound, every scar, every hard-won inch of survival carved into his bones, he realized something:
He was no longer surviving simply for himself.
He was no longer running from his fire.
He was walking toward it.
Toward war.
Toward destiny.
Toward something ancient and burning and terrible.
And he would meet it head-on.
He blinked into the darkness of his helmet then pulled it off and lay there regaining his bearings. He stared up at the ceiling of his pod unit and sorted through everything that had happened in game while thinking of every possible reason that they would have had to pull him from the game. Was it because of the error? Well there was no way to know until they told him and they likely wouldn’t do it from the other side of the door. He reached over, pressing the release button and the door hissed open. With a groan he pulled himself from the pod and stood slowly, allowing himself to stretch his complaining muscles slowly. When he was done Pag straightened and looked around, his eyes finally adjusted to the light they landing on the figure leaning idly against the wall near the door.
He waved a Pag and offered a winsome smile. “Hey. Sorry to interrupt your game time bud. There’s a bit of an issue with your pod, I’m sure you saw the lines of error codes, so we just need to switch you over to a new one. I’ll just need you to sign this form, same as the last one you signed before getting in this one for the first time but we are required to get another copy each time you enter a new pod.” he said holding out a clipboard.
Pag took it and scrawled his name across the line before handing the paper back to the man and following him out the door,
“You good to hop back into the system? Need a restroom break or something to eat?” He asked Pag as they walked down the hall.
“Maybe a restroom break but I think I'm good on the food until I log out for the day. I have what. 3 more hours real time and I’m good right?”
“Give or take yeah, and to make up for the disruption we will be bringing you a steak dinner, it’ll be waiting for you once you log out.” He said as he turned down a hallway. They walked in silence for a while until he pulled the door open and motioned Pag in.
“There’s a private restroom in there, there’s also a basket of snack foods in case you changed your mind. There may be a slight lag or glitch here and there as the system ports all your data from the other pod to this one. Don’t worry, it’s just the system trying to repair the broken source code. If you need anything or experience any issue in the game just send a message to me, just select developer message and click on Dave.”
Pag nodded and stepped into the room, his brows arching as he took in what must have been the latest design for pods. The sleek black metal was ran through with veins of red light that seemed to pulse, the door hanging open like gull-wing door from a Delorean. He shoved his hands into his pockets and padded over to the open door that led to the restroom to attend to his needs. Even the bathroom was fancy. The toilet bowel was a black shot through with veins of gold and the sink looked like half of one massive amethyst geode that seemed to have had resin poured over the crystals to prevent breaking or protect you from cutting yourself on them while a silver square faucet stuck from the wall far enough to pour water into the geode though had no visible handles to turn it on though did appear to have a sensor set in it to know when hands were near.
Once finished Pag washed his hands beneath the square silver faucet, the suds collecting geode bowl of the sink, the lights overhead dancing through the water and crystals, before he shook them dry, stopping to rub them on his pants for extra measure having been unable to locate any paper towels. With a glance over the basket of snack sized chip bags and other junk food he frowned and shook his head, none of it sounded particularly appetizing, before slipping into the pod.
The material hugged him as he sank into it leaving him to feel like he was floating on water once he settled himself. He reached up and pressed the button to close the door, his heart race picking up as the light around him faded until finally he was bathed in nothing more than the pale red light pulsing from the back of the pod.
With a shudder screens began to pop up and minimize in his view overhead on the roof of the pod, a headache beginning to form just behind his eyes, surging to feel as if an ice pick was rammed into his left eye and vanished. A white light filled his vision, forcing tears from his eyes and he closed his eyes. There was a soft chime and he opened his eyes, a new box popped into view and stayed put, the white light fading to a tolerable level as he stared.
He pressed the yes button and looked around him, suddenly standing in an empty white room.
Pag frowned and shook his head, there was no way he was giving up all those stats and that gear he had just gotten just to start over especially since you weren’t allowed to have alts on this game yet and given everything he had already gone through. He had worked too hard to throw it away, he tapped the resume button and blinked. He stood in the courtyard of the Arcane Core again. That had to be the smoothest transition he had ever had for a log in. The improvements didn’t stop there either it seemed. He grinned as he slowly rotated and took in the view that some how seemed even more realistic than it had previously. This was a definite upgrade.
He looked around again and jumped as he saw Aviva staring at him, mouth agape and a look of pure incredulous disbelief painting her face. The crystal in her forehead glowing slightly as she began to slowly shake her head.
“Wh-what?” Pag asked as he looked her up and down.
“There is no way.” she said shaking her head harder she muttered before turning to walk away.
Pag frowned in confusion and shook his head as he began to walk towards mount dealers on the edge of the city.
Pag stopped in his steps and slowly turned around to see the girl huffing as she stalked towards him. He felt his brows furrow as he declined the invite and began to walk again
He waved the invitation away, not missing a step and picked up his pace.
“Don’t you dare decline again.” Her voice was low as she finally caught up with him and crossed her arms.
“I cant join a party with you to complete whatever quest it is that you need, I just got handed quests related to the war that kinda take precedence over social quests.” He said as he reached up to wave the invitation away.
“Ya well I just got the same quest, I’m now part of the group you’re supposed to rendezvous with.” she said grabbing his wrist. “I’m not letting you out of my sight” she huffed quietly as she shook her head.
“Wh-what why?” Pag asked as he took a step back trying to pull his wrist from her grip.
“Because, it makes no sense why someone like you was able to synchronize, and at 100 percent no less.”
“What do you mean?” he asked furrowing his brows.
“That pod they put you in, it hasn't worked despite everyone's best efforts. In fact every single player who tried to use it before you died.”
“Did one of the devs rewrite your coding to screw with me, because I feel like one of the devs rewrote your coding just to mess with me. Sounds about right that they would rewrite an NPC’s programming just to mess with me.” Pag said with a laugh.
“No, I’m an A.I.” Aviva said as she began to inspect him with a perplexed expression.
“You’re the games A.I. ?” he asked trying to pull his wrist free again. “Sure and I am from the planet Mars.”
“No, not the A.I. I’m only one of them.” she said as she circled him and poked at him in random places.
“Cut it out.” he said swatting at her and jogging a few paces away from her. “Look what ever this is, I’m not interested.” He said.
Pag growled and reached up to dismiss the invitation.
Pag stared at her and shook his head slowly. With a wave he brought up the message menu and clicked until he located Dave’s name. He stared at the blank message for a moment before settling on what to send. He tapped a short message out on the small transparent keyboard that popped up then hit send.