CHAPTER 145: BACKSTORY

"No. Zarah is not. I am the only one in this clan who is...was human."

I exhaled heavily, my hand rising to gesture in a sweep that felt almost theatrical, though the weight in my chest was anything but.

"How did this happen? Not once... not once did I ever imagine something like this," I muttered, the words more for myself than for her, spoken into the silence as if I might make sense of them if I heard them aloud.

But Flogga didn’t speak.

She simply stood there, steady as stone, letting my confusion hang in the air.

I turned fully to face her, eyes narrowing, voice lower now, deliberate.

"Did you also die... and then find yourself in this world?"

"Yes," she said simply, without hesitation. Then, with a strange steadiness that almost unnerved me, she added, "I got hit by a truck on my way back from work."

Just like me.

But wait...what did she say...

"Work?" I asked, the word catching in my throat.

My voice softened, edged with disbelief as I pressed further:

"What kind of work did you do?"

"I worked in a hospital," she revealed, her lips pulling back into a toothy grin that looked far too casual for the kind of revelation she was dropping on me.

"What?"

The word shot out of me, flat and disbelieving.

Then she added, her tone calm, almost matter-of-fact.

"As a nurse."

"What?!"

This time I shouted, louder, my voice echoing against the stone walls.

My hands flew to my head, clutching at my temples as if I could keep my thoughts from boiling over. My skull felt hot, as though every new detail she gave was stoking a fire inside my mind.

I started pacing, my feet carrying me back and forth across the uneven ground, each step heavier than the last.

"What is this... what is happening?"

I muttered, half to her, half to myself, my voice breaking under the sheer absurdity of it all.

The questions piled in, crowding my chest until I could barely breathe.

What was going on? Was this some cruel trick?

Some elaborate prank from Drugar to test my sanity? Or had I finally lost my grip on what was real and what wasn’t?

I forced myself to stop, my pacing halting abruptly, and I turned my head sharply toward Flogga.

"Your reaction is understandable," she said evenly.

Of course it was.

This twist had come out of nowhere, blindsiding me so hard I could barely think straight.

Flogga’s voice cut into my spiraling thoughts.

"When I came here, I also started as a Chosen. My ability was called Divine Touch. It was a healing skill, but not just ordinary healing. It was so powerful I could bring back the dead with it. No graveyard needed. Just a touch, and life would return to a lifeless body."

I stopped breathing for a second. My mind snagged hard on her words. What the hell kind of innate skill was that? That wasn’t just strong — that sounded broken. Overpowered to the point of absurdity.

"What rank was it?" I asked quickly, my voice sharper than I intended, as though the answer might finally give me something solid to stand on.

Flogga’s brow lifted ever so slightly, her expression shifting into one of mild confusion.

"Rank?" she repeated, her tone flat, as if the word itself meant nothing to her.

"Rank... like A, SSS, B, D, E?"

I explained, trying to put it in the simplest terms I could. Surely she had to know what I meant.

But Flogga only shook her head slightly. "I do not understand what you are talking about, Chief."

I frowned hard, my thoughts tightening into knots. How could she not understand? Every Chosen I’d encountered had the system. It wasn’t just common — it was the foundation of everything. Which meant... if she was truly a Chosen, then she should have had one as well.

"The system," I pressed, leaning toward her, my voice lowering as if the word itself carried weight. "Do you have that?"

Her eyes didn’t flicker with recognition, not even the faintest hint of understanding. Instead, she tilted her head slightly. "What is a system?"

The answer hit me hard.

She had no idea what I was talking about.

Why?

Why would she not know about the system?

Was it possible she came here under different rules?

"Chief," Flogga said suddenly, her voice breaking through my storm of questions.

Her eyes were locked onto me with a prodding, almost demanding look, as though she could see the gears turning in my head and wanted to pin me down before I spun too far into confusion.

I forced myself to wave the question aside, burying it for later.

There were already too many riddles gnawing at me, and pressing her harder wouldn’t get me the answers..

"So," I said carefully, steadying my tone, "what happened after you first arrived here? What did you do with your ability, and how did you lose it?"

Flogga exhaled heavily, her chest rising and falling as if just dredging up the memories took effort.

The weight in her eyes told me enough — this wasn’t a story she shared lightly.

But she began, her voice low but steady:

"When I appeared, I was placed within a clan. And with that ability, with the mark carved into my shoulder, I found myself in a position of power almost instantly. I didn’t even need to use Divine Touch. Just the sight of the mark was enough. The clan chief at the time, along with the others, treated me as if I were some living deity."

Her lips pulled thin, and for a heartbeat, I thought I caught a shadow of bitterness. "But it didn’t last. Another Chosen found me, and in that clash... I was killed. When I came back, my ability was gone. Just like that. Stripped away as if it had never been mine to begin with."

I kept my silence, letting her continue.

"Long story short, I was the only one who survived the destruction of that clan. Alone, stripped of everything, I did whatever it took to keep living. I hid when I had to, fought when I couldn’t avoid it, and tried not to die in the process. It was... difficult." Her voice faltered just slightly, but she pressed on. "Eventually, I found another clan. By luck or fate, its leader was also a Chosen. He took me in. We became mates."

Her eyes dropped for a moment, softer now. "But he died. Many of them died. Always dying. And I... I survived. Again and again, I survived. I kept moving forward, did whatever I could for the ones left, for the children, for the grandchildren. But no matter what I tried, our numbers dwindled. Year after year, the faces disappeared, until annihilation seemed certain."

Flogga finally lifted her gaze back to me, her expression unreadable, though her words carried a quiet finality.

"Until you arrived."