The next step is pretty obvious — figure out what these new skills do. There's a thrumming in my body that I assume is this Firmament thing, and it's aggravating in the sense that it makes all my injuries feel worse. The energy courses through my body, and every little scrape and bruise I have feels like it's flaring up.

I sigh, and force myself to sit up, and survey the landscape.

I've made the observation before, but Hestia 307B — I don't know what those numbers are, but I make a note of them, as I do everything else — is teeming with plantlife. I'm surrounded by trees with leaves that are a vibrant orange, and wood that's the deepest shade of purple I've ever seen in any kind of natural life. It doesn't even smell like grass and fresh dirt.

It... it mostly smells like moss? Just... a lot of moss. It's weird.

If there's any animal life, none of it is anywhere near me, and I can't blame them for it. With a crazy mantis-thing running around stabbing things, I'd run away, too. The result, though, is that the forest around me is eerily silent. I can't even hear the sound of chirping insects.

All I hear is the rustling of leaves, as a cooling wind blows through them.

At least that's the same.

I take a moment to situate myself; to absorb the familiar comfort of the wind and dirt, even if everything else is unfamiliar. It takes me a moment to realize that all my cuts and scrapes are just... gone, and that burning pain has largely subsided. I frown and stare at my skin — it's as soft and pliable as ever, when I poke and pull at it — but when I try to dig into it with my nails, I don't even leave an impression.

The effect of Tough Skin, I suppose. That's pretty cool, actually. It hammers home that I stand to gain a lot of power if I work with this Interface thing in just the right way — though I remind myself that this gift is likely a poisoned one. I'll have to be careful.

There was also that mention of unlocking a chat function, which means I might be able to contact the outside world. I have no idea how that would interact with the temporal anomaly I'm in, but that's something I'll have to deal with when I get there.

Nothing to it but to explore, I guess. I give Temporal Echo a try, just so I know the full extent of my abilities, but the skill gives me nothing when I nudge at it with my mind, though I can feel that it's there. A second, proper attempt just gives me an error.

[ Error: No temporal record found. Recording. ]

"Wanna tell me what Temporal Echo does?" I ask into the air, a touch of sarcasm in my voice. The Interface answers, but the answer is... predictably useless.

[ The function of all skills must be independently discovered by the Interface user. ]

I sigh. I really hope I haven't just wasted a skill — Firmament credits seem a little harder to get than the other categories. The mention of recording, at least, gives me some idea about what it does, and if I'm being entirely honest, Firmament seems to be both harder to come by and more likely to yield powerful skills. I'm going to have to be careful with how I handle that.

There's the skills I got to choose between, too. A sample size of six is nearly nothing, but they almost seem related to the fight I had just beforehand. Multifaceted Vision and Bladeshift are both definitely related to the mantis in some way...

Something to keep in mind.

I push myself to my feet, wincing at the phantom pains that erupt across my body; Tough Skin has evidently healed my skin, but not the muscles beneath. Without adrenaline to push it away, the pain rushes back to the forefront when I try to take a step.

I force myself to ignore it. I pick a direction, make sure to mentally mark it down, and tell myself what I need to do: I need to at least try to find the exit, which is likely going to mean multiple loops.

Before I go, I grab the scythe-limb from the creature's head and pull it out. The burn in my arms and chest is intense, and I nearly collapse by the time it releases with a squelch, but now I have a weapon.

Time to explore. Hopefully one of the features I unlock is a map, because I'm going to need one.

----------------------------------------

I don't manage to get very far before I hear a noise.

It's a sort of chittering gasp that's eerily similar to the mantis-thing. I freeze in place, looking around carefully; the forest around me still looks largely the same. There's a few more mushrooms in this area, but there isn't anything that stands out.

There's that sound again, and this time it sounds suspiciously close to a sob. Not a human one, but I feel my heart thundering in my chest anyway. There might be someone else here. If there's someone else here, and they were in the same situation as me—

I break my way into a clearing, and then stop in my tracks.

There's some sort of mantis-creature in front of me. It's familiar, even; something about the shape of its head reminds me of the one I just fought, except... it's inarguably more humanoid, and the way it moves is...

It moves like a person.

It's huddled up against a tree, arms wrapped around itself, and—

—and one of its eyes is missing.

I don't know why my thoughts skitter to a stop at that little detail. I don't know why bile rises up in my throat, a sudden nausea washing through me. Typical, right? I can handle nearly dying to a giant monster, but face me with a dying person with one of their eyes gouged out and I don't know what to do.

It's covered in blood. Green blood, but I'm pretty sure it's blood, because it's the same color as the stuff that's still all over me and my clothes. I swallow and hide the scythe behind my back. That's not going to do me any good if I try to approach.

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The question I want to ask — the question screaming in my mind — is why it looks so much like the thing that just tried to kill me. The thing my Interface called a Broken Horror.

Before I can do anything else, it looks up and sees me. It jerks, some mixture of anger and fear burning its way into a reaction that's pure instinct. I can see it's painful, too, from the way it immediately winces and lets out a small trill.

[ Interface translation in progress... ]

"S-stay away."

They are a person. Their voice is small and weak and tired. I don't move from my spot, even though everything in me wants to.

"Are you okay?" I ask instead, and wince even as I do. It's a stupid question, but it's the one I've learned to ask.

"I'm... dead." The mantis-person lets out a wheezing laugh, and the Interface doesn't bother translating it. It comes out as a broken sort of chitter, with a wetness in it that I'm pretty sure isn't supposed to be there. "I'm so... tired. Haven't... haven't seen you before. That's new. You're... new. I don't usually see new things."

"I don't know what that means." I keep my tone carefully even. Half my mind is racing, trying to find a way to help; the other half is wondering if this is one of the Integrators, and if I should be angry. Somehow, I doubt it. I make my way through the implications of the mantis' words, a burgeoning — and worrying — suspicion in my mind.

Another wheezing laugh makes me wince. I have to force down the desire to tell them to stop. I'm not sure there's anything I can do for them except listen.

For now, anyway.

"I'm... too tired to explain it." They grin at me. It's a humorless grin. I can read it in the way they spread their mandibles and lift their forelimbs, in a sort of helpless shrug...

Or the Interface is interpreting for me. I don't really care.

"Did you do it?" they ask. I see them scrutinizing me — their eyes flicker over the green blood splattered all over my clothes, the scratches torn open in the fabric. My skin is unblemished underneath, but there's red blood soaked in around my scratches, which might tell the story of my fight. "Did you... kill me? Did you start all this?"

Did I kill them? I'm almost indignant, but... I see the light fading from their eyes, and I realize what's actually happening.

They can't actually see me, can they? Maybe the vaguest blob of human, and a splash of green that looks like blood. They might not have seen who did this to them at all.

"It wasn't me," I say truthfully. "I got attacked and I killed the thing attacking me, but it wasn't you."

It looked a lot like you, though. I don't add that part. They don't need to know.

"Well," the mantis-person says. Their tone is alarmingly conversational, like they're not in the process of dying. "If you were... you win. I... give up."

The dots connect.

"Wait," I say. I start forward, my feet moving faster than my brain; I find myself scrambling to find the right words. "Don't. Please. I can help—"

I stop right in front of them, because they've stopped moving, and though I don't want to believe it, I know exactly what's happened.

They're dead.

----------------------------------------

I spend some time making sure that they're actually dead — I don't know much about mantis physiology, after all — but considering the blood isn't moving through their body and they're not breathing, I'm pretty sure they're well and truly gone.

I take the time to bury them. It doesn't really matter, I suppose. They'll be back once I die. But I think... I think it's important.

There's something going on here. The mantis spoke like they were in a time loop themselves — like that was their last loop. The similarity between them and the creature I have to fight at the start of mine is uncanny, and I can't help but wonder what the connection is.

The anomaly here is temporal. Maybe not everything happens in a linear order. Maybe that was one of their loops. Maybe it's just a terrible, awful coincidence.

I don't have enough information.

I take the time to steady my breathing and calm myself down. Witnessing the death of a monster is one thing, especially one that tried to kill me. What I witnessed there was...

...I don't want to think about it.

There's nothing else useful that I can get here. I'm not above looting if it'll help me survive, but they aren't carrying anything useful — if they had a weapon, it's long gone.

I spend a moment on grief, as is appropriate. Even for a stranger.

Then I move on, and leave the clearing behind.

----------------------------------------

It's almost a relief when I encounter something that isn't more forest.

At first, I hope that I've been impossibly lucky — that I've stumbled across the exit that was mentioned. I don't plan to go through it immediately, of course, but it'd be good to know where it is for when I do decide to leave.

I'm not nearly so lucky, of course. The thing that I've found is enormous and terrifying, but I don't think it's an exit. My Interface confirms it as soon as I step onto the packed dirt that separates it from the forest.

[ You have discovered a location! Location Found: The Fracture ]

[ Map feature unlocked! Your progress in Hestia 307B will be tracked on your map. ]

There's a part of me that twinges in annoyance at the map feature unlocking after I've spent hours carefully mapping where I'm going, but that emotion takes a back seat to the view in front of me.

The forest ends in a way that looks distinctly artificial. Stretching ahead to the right and left is, as far as I can tell, a long stretch of empty desert — if I want to explore in that direction, I'm going to have to find some way to carry water with me. Or get a few skills in Durability that let me survive. I have no desire to die of thirst.

Directly ahead of me, on the other hand, is a massive, yawning chasm in the ground.

It's so big it gives me a sense of vertigo just looking into it. There are homes built into the walls, though it's hard to make out the details from where I stand. There are torches, even, which gives me hope — maybe there are people living here. I'll have to be careful, of course, but the need for that doesn't eliminate my hope at the possibility that I might meet someone. That I might learn more. The mantis-person I met has made me a great deal more suspicious about what's happening here.

The Fracture is an appropriate name. The chasm looks like the bedrock of the desert has been cracked open by a massive sword; fissures run from the edges to the surrounding stone. There are steps built into the sides of the chasm, but even those steps are remarkably precarious. They're sticking out rather than carved into the stone, like wooden planks just glued on to the side of the walls.

The steps are rather conveniently close to me, even.

I take my first few steps into the chasm, grimacing at every crack I hear and every tiny shift I feel beneath me. It doesn't help that my muscles still burn, and I see distinct bruises forming where the cuts had been, no doubt from some small amount of internal bleeding.

As I make my way down, the wind whistles through the Fracture, creating a high-pitched sound that does absolutely nothing for my nerves.

I might be able to reset, but I don't particularly enjoy the thought of dying from a fall.

Especially when I can't even see the ground.

Remarkably, though, the steps aren't what kill me. It's the moment I make my way on to solid ground, near one of the houses built into the sides of the chasm. Some sort of stone construct whips its way out the moment my foot touches the ground, and though I react quickly — I was expecting something to go wrong, after all — the scythe I'm holding and my Tough Skin isn't nearly enough to stop the construct from bashing my skull right in.

[ You have died. +3 Strength credits. +5 Durability credits. +2 Reflex credits. +2 Speed credits. ]

[ New feature unlocked! Your Interface will now tell you the danger ranking of a new area before you proceed into it. ]

[ Loop 5 terminated. ]

[ Status:

Name: Ethan

Durability Skills: Tough Skin (Rank F)

Firmament Skills: Temporal Echo (Rank D)

Credit Distribution:

Strength: 7

Durability: 5 (9 banked)

Reflex: 8

Speed: 7

Firmament: 0 (2 banked) ]