(Suggested Chapter Song:Hildur Guðnadóttir – "Vökuró")
.........
That was just great. Perfect.
First day and he already made a dangerous enemy.
The tir trickled down as people prepared.
"Ratler," Vinegar called without turning.
The man wobbled in a hurry to the makeshift work table.
And then he threw her gloves. Without looking back, she caught them.
And then Ratler threw the grappling rig and even a bag.
Vinegar caught all these things without looking back.
So of them seed like they would smack her head, but just before impact, her hand would move to grab it.
But more impressively, to grab it in such a way that did not break the item or wound her.
It was like catching a flying, spinning mug by the handle 100% of the ti.
"Amazing," he complinted.
She raised a brow at him. "Oh, that’s nothing. Just basic Blackfield. Everyone can do that."
"But none better than my pumpkin pie." Ratler pulled against her chin.
Soren was speechless. "Blackfield!?"
The word was new and foreign to him.
Vinegar noticed. "Wait a minute. You can’t use Blackfield?"
She snapped towards Handler. He shook his head.
"He is going to beco potato pudding." Slacker comnted, smacking his tongue.
"How did you manage to kill a Soulbound Knight without Blackfield?" Handler raised a skeptical brow.
Soren just shrugged.
It was not like he could explain that her Shade had been wounded badly because she fed it to an eldritch, and in turn, she carried all that pain because of their bond.
Also, she was sadistically crazy. And lastly, he had to do it a lot of tis—a lot of loops.
"It’s going to be hell for you without Blackfield." Handler added, "But the experience will be good."
"Everyone has a first ti." Ratler wobbled over, his hands heading straight for Soren’s Glassheart.
Soren moved. Dodged.
Even though he knew the Glassheart was empty, that was still invasive.
"That reminds ," Handler massaged his jaw, "is it true that you are F-rank?"
On that question, all eyes turned to him.
Soren was taken aback by the focus. But he nodded.
"Oh...he’s dead." Ratler lanted.
"Tsk tsk tsk." Slacker shook his head.
Handler just face-pald. "It’s nice knowing you, kid." He walked away.
Vinegar, on the other hand, just stood there, staring. She had a sad look on her face.
This was the first ti Soren saw soone react that way to hearing his rank.
Not pity or mocking.
Just... sadness.
"The Glass will open in T minus ten seconds." The chanical voice bood.
Vinegar suddenly stepped forward. "Make sure you stay behind , okay?"
Having fought hundreds of days in. Hundreds of loops, the feeling of being pushed back ca foreign to Soren.
But he did not stop her.
"3"
"2"
"1"
"Glassbreaker Initiated."
Wuuuhummmm
A blue light shot from above, and the path before them cracked like stone against a windshield.
This Crack was far bigger than the one that made him a Soulbound warrior.
What Soren did not know or notice was his pendant, around his neck, glowing softly in response to the Glass.
The overhead blue beam seized.
The crack gave a low green hue—light seeping in from that world.
"Go! Go!! Go!!!"
Everyone rushed forth.
For a second Soren did not move, but Vinegar urged him.
There was sothing about her.
Protective.
Even though she looked fragile herself.
Definitely fragile.
Whoosh
They ran in. Soren followed. His heart raced with a mix of fear and excitent.
However, the mont he passed through the Crack, into that world, a rush of literal confusion slamd into his mind.
Up was wrong, down was wrong, and hell, Soren felt his perception of the entire world go... wrong.
For a second, he did not know right from left or his sides, back from front.
It was as if his brain did a sorsault in his skull.
He fell to his knees.
"Soren..." Her voice echoed. Her face, like a dream, the pictures wriggling.
"Soren... I need you to concentrate. Listen to the sound of my voice." She held him, palms cupping his cheek.
Soon, slowly, her voice got clearer, and so did the image.
He could see her. Brows creased.
She looked worried.
Why does she look worried?
"Can you hear my voice?" She asked again. He gave a forced nod. And she smiled.
"Good, because the hard part has not started."
Blueeergh
He vomited to the side. Nothing—for a lack of breakfast.
Now he understood why they had not been given food before the excursion. It had no use.
She patted his back gently. "Let it out. Let it out. That’s good. Don’t worry, everyone suffers it their first couple of tis."
He wiped his mouth. And then, shakily, he stood to his feet.
For a heartbeat, his weight vanished, like his body had forgotten how gravity worked.
She smiled. "Soren, welco to the glass..."
Soren raised his head, shocked at the marvel before him.
The sky was wrong.
It was not dark or bright—not exactly.
Instead, it was fractured, like dark and night had taken scattered pieces of the sky in a ss.
The light here existed without a source, soft and endless.
Even more confusing, the stars, if he could call them that, forming constellations shifted whenever he blinked, rearranging themselves with inconceivable intention.
Through so of those cracks in the sky, he could see other skies—alien hues, impossible geotries, and colors his mind refused to na but sohow comprehended.
His head hurt. Like his brain had switched places with his mirror self.
He had read of this in the Discipline of Sorrow. The first pilot described this world as Beautifully Wrong.
To Soren, it was breathtaking. But still terrifying.
Soren swallowed.
Vinegar motioned for him to follow her.
He took an unsure step.
The land beneath him looked like earth—soil, stone, sparse grass, but when he took that step, it also felt wrong.
It was like he was using his left leg instead of his right.
Even worse, his foot sank slightly, as if he were walking on packed clouds instead of ground.
Still, every step threatened to lift him.
Every step let him.
"It’s your first ti, but trust , you will get used to it."
Ahead, a distant ridge folded inward when he wasn’t looking, shortening the horizon by hundreds of ters.
A second later, it snapped back into place, unchanged, as if mocking his perception.
Sothing flew overhead.
No—that thing practically teleported.
One mont it was circling high above, a silhouette with too many wings.
The next, it was a hundred ters away, perched atop a floating slab of stone that hadn’t existed before.
It hadn’t moved.
To Soren, it was like it had simply decided to be elsewhere.
"You’ll have to watch your step. One wrong move can kill you."
She had barely finished talking when they saw a corpse ahead. A forr prisoner. It looked fractured between its ti of death and rot.
Blood even flowed out one side, but at the other, it was caked dry.
Like ti had displaced it.
This was the Glass. No wonder they called it Chaos.
Yet, the air here humd, and it was not with sound but with pressure.
Breathing felt deeper here, richer, like each inhale carried aning along with oxygen.
Eldritch creatures in recognizable forms road the distance.
"Don’t worry, we are too close to the Glass to reach the truly dangerous ones." She advised, still walking forth.
Her three dads ca behind them.
"The closer an Eldritch soul is to the Crack, the easier it is to take on the appearance of a creature from our world." Vinegar explained.
But Soren could not quite listen to her. Not that he didn’t, but... but.
This is the first ti I have held a girl’s hand.
His cheek blushed red a bit.
–knock.
Handler gave a knock on his head, "Pay attention, amigo. Death here weighs heavy on the heart."
Soren nodded, pulling his attention from his touch with Vinegar and back to the Eldritch souls.
So walked on land that bent beneath them. Others phased in and out of existence mid-stride, reappearing with soft distortions that made his eyes ache.
Honestly, none of them paid him or the other prisoners any mind.
And that scared him more than if they had.
The Glass, surprisingly, wasn’t hostile.
It felt indifferent.
And sohow... it was beautiful.
Too beautiful.
Like a painting ant to distract you while sothing behind you sharpened its teeth.
Only now did Soren realize that—
This place wasn’t trying to kill him yet.
Instead, it was inviting him to stay....
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