Chương 8: The One Everyone Follows

They moved on. But nothing felt the same as before. The first clash had not lasted long. On the surface, it might almost have passed for something clean: a few vermin, a narrow corridor, a group holding formation, enemies cut down, no losses. From the outside, yes. From the inside, no. They had been messy. Fast, at times. Reactive, yes. But not clean. Not truly coordinated. They had clung to each other on instinct, like people thrown together into a space too narrow to let them think for long.

And above all, Zayn thought as he walked, there was one obvious truth no one had yet put into words: they had held because they were monstrously advantaged. Not by experience. Not by discipline. Not by familiarity with blood. By their soul strength. Even now, after the fight, it could still be felt. Their breathing was heavy, but not broken. Their muscles had taken more than they should have. Their reflexes had recovered too quickly.

The shock of first contact had not destroyed them the way it would have destroyed ordinary people. Even Lena, least oriented toward combat, was still moving properly despite the visible tension in her shoulders. Even Jonah, who had taken the most frontal pressure by holding the line, still had a solid step. Even Elias, who had borne the point of the group, did not look on the verge of collapsing from fatigue the way any normal twenty-year-old boy should have after skewering a creature dragged out of a nightmare.

And Zayn… Zayn felt the difference more cruelly than anyone. His forearm still throbbed where the vermin had hit him. His legs were heavier than the others'. His breathing came back more slowly. Simply keeping up with their pace without already looking like he was dragging had become a conscious effort. Seven. The number kept returning. Still there. Still uglier every time he heard it. The group pushed deeper into the galleries.

Sometimes the walls drew in around them, then opened into transition chambers lined with ancient seals. The dampness thickened. In places the air carried a sharper, more organic smell, as though some of the things locked down here had never fully agreed to die. The sabotaged seal followed them all in silence. Someone had opened that vermin pocket before they passed. Not to kill them immediately. To watch. Very bad news. At last, Voss raised a hand.

"Halt." The group stopped near a side alcove where several still-active sealing pillars cast a more stable light than the rest of the corridor. It was probably the best place to breathe without being completely blind to any sudden movement. The captain turned toward them.

"We take stock." Jonah raised an eyebrow.

"So you can speak normally after all." Voss did not even react.

"You just had your first real contact. It was sloppy." Good. At least someone was willing to say it. The captain continued:"You held because your baseline is absurd for people your age and from your world. Not because you know how to fight together." This time, no one protested. Not even Elias. Voss tilted his chin toward Jonah.

"Your line slowed the breakthrough. Without that, they hit us too fast." Then Elias.

"You already take the center naturally. The others settle around you before they even think about it." Then Lena.

"Your support links kept the group from collapsing on first impact." Then Mira.

"Your eyes read the angles better than the rest of the group." At last, his gaze slid to Zayn.

"And you didn't freeze when something entered your range. That's already better than a lot of soldiers on first contact." Zayn was not even sure whether that was supposed to be a compliment. Probably not. Voss crossed his arms.

"Now we get to the part that should have been done before you were dropped into sealed galleries. Each of you explains your power. Clearly. No poetry. No bullshit." Jonah gave a crooked smile.

"Ah. So now we finally start doing things intelligently." Elias turned toward the others.

"I'll start." Of course. Not to take the lead. Because someone had to do it. And, as always, the group accepted that fact immediately. Zayn felt it with almost painful clarity. Even when no one names him leader, he takes the shape of the center. Elias drew a breath.

"Standard of Dawn." He searched for his words for a second.

"At first I thought it was just some kind of command ability. It isn't exactly that." He lowered his eyes to the short spear he had been given.

"The system showed me something very clear after the ritual. Every time I save a life, or prevent a death that should have happened, my strength increases. Not permanently in some absurd explosion. More like a cumulative rise… especially in moments when I directly protect someone." Lena frowned slightly.

"So the more you save people, the stronger you become?"

"Yes. But it's not instant, like some crude bonus. It's more…" He searched again.

"As if my soul densifies around that role. As if the more I fulfill that function, the more it recognizes me." This narrative has been purloined without the author's approval. Report any appearances on Amazon. Mira nodded.

"That would explain why you stabilized so quickly in the fight." Elias nodded back.

"I also think the more people recognize me as a point of support, the easier it becomes for them to align around me. Not control. Just… coherence." Jonah let out a faint breath.

"Yeah, we noticed. The natural hero." The tone was mocking. Not entirely unfair. Elias accepted it without defending himself. Which somehow made it worse. Lena raised her staff slightly.

"Sanctuary Thread." Her voice was less certain than Elias's, but it quickly grew clearer as she began talking about something she already understood better than the world around her.

"I can create links between myself and the people I choose. For now, I have to be part of the link too. I can't just connect two other people to each other." She looked at her fingers as if she could still feel the trace of those invisible threads.

"These links let me share or soften part of the damage, shock, or fatigue. And…" She hesitated for a second.

"I can heal. But not for free. If I close something in someone else, I spend my own endurance. Maybe later it'll cost something else too. I don't know yet." Mira studied Lena with interest.

"So your power is based on exchange. Not pure creation."

"Yes."

"How many links can you maintain at once?" Jonah asked.

"I'm not sure. Two were still stable earlier. Three… maybe. But I think I'd collapse if I forced it too far." Voss gave a brief nod.

"So we don't turn you into a mobile hospital." Lena shot him a sharp look.

"Thank you, Captain. I might have thought of that myself." Good, Zayn thought. She knows how to bite too, when she has to. Mira continued without being invited.

"Severance Sight." Her tone was as clean as a blade laid on a table.

"I see fractures." Jonah raised an eyebrow.

"Very poetic for someone who asked for no poetry."

"I'm simplifying." She did not even look at him.

"I can identify physical weak points, certain flaws in structures, breaks in spells, inconsistencies in energy flow. And sometimes…" This time, she paused slightly.

"…in people." The silence sharpened a little. Zayn immediately hated that detail. Mira went on:"Not their secrets as if I were reading their minds. But when something doesn't sit straight, I see it better than other people. It's the same for a wall, a seal, a stance, a sentence that doesn't match what it's trying to hide." Voss nodded once.

"Hence the sabotage."

"Yes," Mira said.

"The seal had been opened cleanly. Without this power, we might have noticed. Later. Or not at all." Elias looked at Jonah.

"Your turn." Jonah spun his blade once in his hand before sheathing it.

"Lineholder." He gave a short grin.

"The system loves dramatic names. In practice, my power lets me impose a temporary rule on a line." Lena tilted her head slightly.

"A line?"

"A space. A front. A breaking point. A trajectory." He shrugged.

"The idea is that I can declare something has to hold a certain way, and the closer the enemy is to me in strength, the harder the rule takes hold." Mira cut in immediately.

"And if the power gap is too large?"

"Then the rule holds less well. Or not at all." He looked back down the corridor.

"Earlier, I set: 'No one gets through.' Against minor vermin, it slowed them enough for you to cut them down before they broke through." Voss nodded again.

"Good corridor power. Good for siege, holding, retreat, tactical locks." Jonah pointed a finger at him.

"Yeah, thanks. I already know I'm going to end up holding doors while the shining heroes get all the big moments." Elias replied very simply:"Holding a door, when it really has to hold, is already a big moment." Jonah stared at him for a second, as if trying to decide whether to mock him or give him that point. Then he looked away. No answer. Then the eyes turned to Zayn. Of course they did. The problem was that he had nothing to offer of that kind. No clear skill. No usable description.

No noble function inside the group. Just a black lock and seven sealed lines. He immediately felt the reflex rise. Stay vague. Avoid. Make the subject unpleasant enough to cut the question off. But this time, even that felt insufficient. Because now the others had spoken. Actually spoken. The invisible reader of the scene—the group itself—had been given what it needed to understand who they were in combat. And he was still going to be the hole in the map.

"Zayn?" Elias asked. Not pressing. Always worse that way. Zayn looked at the floor for a second, then lifted his eyes.

"I don't have anything usable right now." Jonah frowned immediately.

"Nothing?"

"Nothing unlocked." Mira spoke before he could elaborate or evade.

"So your ability isn't active." He pressed his lips together slightly.

"It exists. But it's locked." Lena studied his face.

"Completely?"

"Yes." Jonah let out an irritated breath.

"Fantastic. So they sent us down here with a fifth summoned at seven soul strength and a unique skill that's locked shut."

"Jonah," Elias said.

"No, sorry, this time I'd rather we actually talk normally." His voice hardened for real.

"We just found out we're in another world, we get sent into a sealed sanctuary, somebody sabotages monster pockets along our route, and on top of that we've got a guy whose ritual exploded in the kingdom's face now telling us, 'by the way, my power exists but doesn't work.'" He looked directly at Zayn.

"You do understand that's a problem, right?" Of course he understood. That was exactly why the question was unbearable.

"Yes," Zayn answered. Nothing more. Just yes. That seemed to throw Jonah off more than sarcasm would have. Mira resumed, calmer:"Locked how?" Zayn hesitated. Then, because he could not keep offering only outlines forever without eventually driving them all against him:"There's… a lock." Jonah blinked once.

"Sorry?"

"On my ability." Lena frowned slightly.

"A symbol?"

"Yes. Black. And… seven sealed lines." Mira was the only one who did not look surprised in any simple way. She looked as if she were recording it.

"Seven lines," she repeated.

"So several stages." Zayn disliked how quickly she understood.

"Probably."

"And do you know what they are?"

"No." At last, Voss spoke.

"So your power isn't absent. It's conditional."

"Yes." The captain studied him for a second.

"And you don't know the trigger."

"No." Jonah crossed his arms.

"Great. Even better." But Lena shook her head slightly.

"No. Not necessarily." Everyone looked at her. Even Zayn. She drew a breath.

"If his power is really sealed in several parts, that means he isn't just empty. It means the world… or something… is waiting for precise conditions." Mira nodded almost immediately.

"Yes." Then, to Zayn:"So your real problem isn't just your weakness. It's that your power will probably unlock under circumstances we still don't understand." Lena tightened her grip on the staff a little.

"Which means we need to avoid pushing it blindly." Jonah looked at her.

"Or it means we should know immediately what might trigger it." Voss cut through it:"Both." At last, the captain pushed himself off the wall.

"From now on, we stop pretending you already form a combat group. You're five summoned with absurd soul reserves, unstable unique abilities, and no shared experience." He pointed down the corridor ahead.

"So we keep it simple. Elias in the center." No one looked surprised.

"Why him?" Jonah asked anyway, more out of principle than genuine confusion. Voss answered bluntly.

"Because that's already what happens naturally. And because his power gets stronger when he saves lives. So the more the group holds, the more he rises. He's the best backbone you have right now." Then Mira.

"To his right. Angle reading, flaws, seals." Then Lena.

"To his left or just behind, depending on space. Support, healing, links." Then Jonah.

"You close the line. Door, breach, retreat, tactical lock." At last, his gaze came to Zayn. Not hostile. Exact.

"You stay where you can survive without getting in our way. You strike only when something actually enters your range, or when someone gives you a clear opening." The sentence should have humiliated Zayn even more than it did. But deep down, the worst part was that it was correct. Not glorious. Not noble. Just correct. He nodded once.

"Fine." And this time, even Jonah looked at him as if he had not expected him to accept so quickly. Then Elias spoke again, calmer.

"We don't need to pretend we're already good. We just need to hold long enough to understand how we function." He looked at each of them.

"So if someone sees something, they say it. If someone's weakening, they say it. If someone doesn't understand how to use their power in a situation, they say that too." His gaze lingered on Zayn for one second longer. Not as accusation. As inclusion. Always the same problem. Always that ability to create a center where even someone like him ended up existing inside the structure whether he wanted to or not. Zayn looked away first. Of course he did. They moved on. This time, the group had a more conscious shape.

Not perfect. Not elegant. But more real. Elias in front, slightly off-center so he would not block all of Mira's sightline. Lena close enough to cast a link within a second if needed. Zayn where Voss had placed him: neither at the core nor cast aside, simply in the zone where he could still be protected and used on a small scale. Jonah behind, blade ready, paying more attention now to the group's overall rhythm than to his own irritation. And Voss… Voss stayed mobile. Neither inside nor outside.

Like a second line of truth in case the first one broke. The corridor descended even farther, then opened into a broader chamber. Ancient. It could be felt immediately. The ceiling rose higher, held by rough arches older than the current sanctuary. Sealing chains hung from the vaults, some broken, others still stretched between engraved pillars. At the center, an empty circular basin was ringed by black grooves, as though something had been drained there for a long time before drying out. The air was worse there.

Not merely colder. Older. As though the place had absorbed too many remains ever to become neutral again. Mira stopped first.

"Something's wrong." Jonah sighed.

"Yes. Everything."

"No. Something specific." She advanced two steps, very slowly. The silence stretched. Then a sound rose. A scraping sound. Not from the floor. From the ceiling. Everyone looked up. And this time, there were not five vermin. There were far more. Shapes pressed flat against the stone, nearly invisible until they moved. Thinner than the previous ones. More numerous. Their bodies seemed to have learned how to cling to the ceiling's contours like insects too large and too badly made. Some had extra limbs.

Others had mandibles opened into several petals of flesh. Every one of them was already turning its black beads toward the group. Lena went pale.

"Oh shit…" Jonah raised his weapon.

"Yeah, this one speaks to me a lot less." Voss swore under his breath.

"Hanging nest." Mira never took her eyes off the creatures.

"No." Her voice hardened.

"Not just that. Look at the chains." Elias tipped his head higher. Zayn followed the movement. And he saw it too. One of the great sealing chains crossing the chamber had been severed. Not gnawed through. Not broken by age. Cut. Cleanly. Someone had not only opened a small pocket along their route. Someone had prepared this room too. The entire nest had been destabilized. The creatures began peeling away from the ceiling. One. Then three. Then a whole rain of gray flesh and quick bones hurled itself toward them.

Elias stepped forward. And almost in the same movement, the whole group reorganized around him. Not because they were already good. Not because they knew exactly what they were doing. But because in the middle of the fall, he was already the one everyone followed.