CHAPTER 53: DRIFT (3)

Lucen landed in a crouch. Hand snapped up.

[Shockweave Bolt – Fired]

The tracking dart hissed through the air, light-blue, sparking.

The creature reached up.

And caught it.

Barehanded.

Lucen stared.

Then his spell shattered in its grip like it had never been cast.

A pause.

Then the thing said, softly, inside his mind:

"You don’t belong here, Sovereign."

Lucen’s blood went cold.

Not because of the word.

Because it wasn’t guessing.

It knew.

—

Lucen didn’t move.

His fingers flexed slightly, but no sigil formed. Not yet. Not while the thing stood motionless three meters away, the air between them quiet as a broken seal.

The mask didn’t change. Still blank. Still bone-pale with that single black slit where the eye should’ve been. Nothing inside it.

Just dark.

He swallowed once.

Then spoke. Calm. Even.

"Say that again."

The thing didn’t.

Just tilted its head half an inch. Not confused. Not curious. Just like it was replaying some memory it didn’t need to share.

Lucen’s throat stayed dry.

He let out a breath slow and flat through his nose. Mana curled under his skin.

"How do you know that word?" he asked, low.

Still no sound from the figure. But the voice returned. Inside. Not loud. Not harsh.

Just... present.

"I see threads. You wear too many."

Lucen didn’t respond.

The system pulsed in his periphery.

[Drift Entity Classification: Unknown — No Record in Sovereign Archive]

[Error: Thread Recognition Loop Failed]

[Warning: Mana Signature Leaking at 0.2%]

’Leaking,’ Lucen thought. ’Great. Love that for me.’

He raised one hand slowly. Not to cast. Just to test. No glyph. No build.

The creature didn’t react.

Lucen’s eyes narrowed. "You’re not from this drift."

Silence.

Then, inside again:

"I am the seam."

Lucen stared at it.

It didn’t move.

But behind it, the glyph spiral on the floor began to pull inward, quietly, almost elegantly. Not erasing. Rewinding.

Like time itself was peeling the chalk back from the stone.

He took one step left. Just a test.

The figure mirrored him.

Lucen’s jaw tensed. "You’re watching my system."

No answer this time.

Just the faintest edge of pressure, like a closed door rattling one room away. Not a threat. A statement.

He tapped his thumb against his forefinger.

’Okay. Can’t scan it. Can’t trace its casting logic. It’s nulling active tags without even flinching. And it speaks like it has admin access to reality.’

Lucen tilted his chin up slightly. "You’re not just a boss mob, are you."

"You are not just a tracer."

Lucen smiled.

It didn’t reach his eyes.

’Yeah, alright,’ he thought. ’You wanna play subtle? I’ve got layers too.’

He stepped forward.

One pace.

Mana flooded his right hand, not to cast, but to bait.

The creature didn’t flinch.

But the floor behind it... shifted. Subtly. Not like movement. Like suggestion.

Lucen’s smile stayed in place. "So why talk? You could’ve tried killing me already."

The voice responded slower this time.

"I’ve killed many Sovereigns. But none who built from scratch."

Lucen’s heart paused.

Just a second.

Then picked up again like nothing happened.

’Right,’ he thought. ’That’s new.’

The entity’s mask leaned ever so slightly closer.

"You are early."

Lucen narrowed his eyes. "Early for what."

Silence.

This time, even the mana in the air stopped moving.

Then, softer:

"Collapse."

The spiral behind the creature exploded.

Light. Heat. A pull like gravity remembered it had a grudge.

Lucen spun a glyph into the air by reflex.

The ice spike slammed up through the side of the blast, anchoring him to the edge of the arena as everything sucked inward.

The creature stood dead center, unmoved.

It didn’t resist the pull.

It was the pull.

Lucen felt the edge of his coat tear. Mana ripped off like old paint.

And then—

It stopped.

The spiral vanished.

The floor was bare.

The creature was gone.

Lucen dropped to one knee, hand still glowing, breath held.

His system pinged.

Once. Then again.

[New Drift Signature Logged: Unstable / Collapsing]

[System Message: You were observed.]

[Warning: "Seam Entity" recognized. Recommend exit.]

Lucen stared at the empty floor.

Then stood slowly.

One hand brushing dust from his sleeve.

He muttered, "I am going to get so many snacks after this."

And turned toward the way out.

—

Lucen turned his shoulder toward the exit arch. His bag still slung, hand still half-glowing, frost crackling quiet beneath one boot.

The air hadn’t recovered yet.

It felt like breathing through a filter that didn’t fit. Thin. Pulled wrong.

His fingers twitched. Not from nerves. From instinct. The kind of afterburn you get from holding a spell too long in a room that forgot which way was up.

The system’s last message hovered dim in the corner of his vision.

[You were observed.]

’Yeah,’ he thought. ’No kidding.’

He started walking.

One step. Two.

His own footsteps echoed louder than they should have. The space felt deeper now. Wider, maybe. Or just emptier.

He passed the first spiral, a minor ward gate. Half-fused. Still pulsing a little where the containment array used to be.

It didn’t react to him.

Didn’t need to.

’Whatever that thing was, it had clearance,’ Lucen thought. ’Not for the gate. For me.’

He let his fingers trail across the glyph wall as he passed it. Cold stone. Slight vibration, like the ambient mana was still chasing its tail from the blowout.

Up ahead, the corridor narrowed. Pillars on either side. They hadn’t looked like teeth on the way in. Now they kind of did.

A drip echoed somewhere.

Mana-water. Or drift sweat. He didn’t want to check.

Lucen paused under the archway. Turned his head just enough to glance back.

Nothing.

No movement.

No mask.

Just raw stone and a quiet that felt too intelligent.

He shifted the weight of his bag. Kept walking.

The path rose in a slow grade. Stairs that hadn’t been there before unfolded from the wall like someone realized too late that he’d need an exit.

The system pinged again.

Not an alert. A thread.

[Path opening. Containment breach sealed.]

[Casualty Report: 0]

Lucen blinked. "That was generous."