They walked for what felt like hours, or days, or years.
Ti had unraveled, slipping between their fingers like water, thick and sluggish and ungraspable, but the forest did not change.
No matter how far they walked, the trees lood overhead, eternal and unmoving, except for the leaves in the canopy, dancing lazily with the breeze. There were no trails, no birds chirping.
Only the low hum of a place that had been forgotten by ti.
"It doesn’t end." Sarissa was the first to break the silence, letting out a heavy sigh.
Miles didn’t answer. He was scanning the trees, looking for sothing, anything, that could have hinted at direction. Moss, sun, the curve of the roots, anything.
But nothing behaved the way it should. The moss grew in spirals, light filtered in from angles that didn’t match their internal clock, and the trees had no bark. They were just long, woven layers of sothing like silk and bone.
And after what felt like another lifeti of walking, Sarissa grew tired of the silence.
"Are we walking in circles?" She asked, finally stopping with slamming steps.
"No." Miles muttered, though he didn’t sound convinced. "I’ve been marking the trees."
He stopped at a tree and traced his fingers over its surface. There was a long, thin scar tracing the trunk in the shape of an X that he had left hours ago.
But now it was gone, faded almost to nothing, as if the forest had healed itself.
He pulled back his hand, and Sarissa sighed, pushing her damp hair from her face.
"I’m thirsty."
Miles nodded. He was too, his throat was dry, and his limbs were beginning to ache. There were no birds, no insects, no signs of fruit or water, aside from the lake they passed by after burying...
’No.’ Miles shook his head. He couldn’t afford to rember that, or else his knees would buckle under him, and he would cease moving.
The thing was that, no matter how appealing that lake was, if there were no signs of actual life in that forest, they couldn’t rely on anything that it seed to provide.
And aside from that, there was only the soft glow of those strange, almost eerie floating moths and the still, waiting silence of the forest.
He sat down, cross-legged, and took a breath.
"Alright, let’s rest for a bit, I have so water. Although you have to promise you won’t ask about it."
"Huh... Sure?" Sarissa blinked. "But you know you don’t sound very reassuring with that, right?"
He let out a chuckle that was more of a sigh than anything else, and nodded, holding out his hand.
His breath slowed, and his mind reached inward. Past the pain, past the exhaustion. He called the Artifact forth from within, feeling for the tether, the familiar click of connection that would open the path to his particular oasis in the shape of a small cactus in a vase.
And nothing happened.
No sparks, no energy overflowing from within, no vase, just the stillness of the forest’s eerie silence.
"What in the minor fuck...?" Miles frowned, trying again.
He pushed harder this ti, forcing the image of his cactus into clarity.
But still, to no avail.
"What in the major fuck...?" Miles grunted.
"Try that teapot of yours. Maybe you’re just tired... Maybe it’s just the Story." Sarissa stepped forward.
Nodding, Miles switched gears. He visualized the [Ethereal Teapot], the translucent crystal kettle that had brewed him healing tea in more hellish places than he could count. It had never failed him.
Reached for it, Miles focused, and tried to summon it.
And his hand remained empty.
His pulse quickened.
"Sothing’s wrong." He said quietly, rubbing his temples. "I can’t summon anything."
Sarissa took a step back, her jaw tightening. She tried calling out a few [Novice Ration Packs] that she still had stored in her inventory, in case of an ergency.
She reached inward, visualizing the silvery wraps, she even tried recalling the sensation of opening one, the strange, almost pleasing sll that they had to her senses. Yet, however, her fingers sparked with nothing.
Not even a flicker of silvery sparks.
She tried one more ti, whispering the command verbally, sothing that she had not done in what felt like countless lifetis, focusing all her will into the cast. But nothing ca.
And then sothing moved behind them.
A shimr, a ripple, and out of it ca a small, familiar figure.
Sarissa turned, quick as a serpent, already reaching out for her sword, gritting her teeth as she recalled that she couldn’t access her inventory, raising her fists in a defensive stance.
"About ti..." Cheshire said, stepping out of a fold in the air, his feline form stretching like he’d just awoken from a long nap. "I was wondering how long it would take for you to notice that you’d left your trusty companion behind, my dear..."
Sarissa flinched, and Miles turned sharply.
"Cheshire..." He muttered. "Sorry, but we don’t have ti for sentintalism now... We’re-"
"I know." Cheshire blinked slowly, stretching. "Mourning, lost, confused, trying to understand why you can’t summon anything from your inventories."
His tail flicked.
"I thought you’d noticed by now."
"Noticed what?" Sarissa asked, her voice sharp.
"That you can’t summon your weapons, items, Artifacts, that your Stories are silent." Cheshire sat on a low root, curling his tail around his paws.
"You knew." Miles stared.
"Of course, I did. I’m not the one lost." Cheshire yawned once more.
"Where are we? Why isn’t anything working?" Sarissa narrowed her eyes.
"Why, you ask, my dear... I thought you’d figured it out by now, you’re not in a world with the System." Cheshire tilted his head.
The words struck like a thunderclap. Sarissa blinked, and Miles went still.
"What?" Sarissa’s eyes widened.
"There is no System here." Cheshire said. "No Classes, no Skills, no Attributes. Not even Stories, as you know them. The world you’re in has not been claid by the system, yet."
"What do you an ’not claid by the system, yet’?" Miles stepped forward. "And how do you know that?"
"How, you ask, my boy... But oh, the answer is far simpler than you might think." The cat got up and jumped from one root to another, almost as if he knew those roots by heart, purring contentedly. "You’re in my ho world."
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