The forest ended like a wound torn open in the world.
The trees didn't simply thin; they recoiled. Roots curled back from the edge as if the earth itself refused to touch what came next. Beyond that trembling border stretched a flat, cracked plain the color of old ash.
Dust spiraled through the air on an invisible current, whispering with a sound that wasn't quite wind. It hummed through Erevan's bones—thin, electric, unnerving. Every step made the ground tremble faintly, as though he was walking over the skin of something alive.
He winced and muttered, "Tell me this isn't normal."
Kaelith didn't answer right away. Her bow was already half drawn, shoulders coiled tight, eyes sweeping the horizon with the precision of someone who trusted nothing. "Nothing here is ever normal," she said finally. "But this…" Her gaze narrowed. "This feels wrong even for the system."
Vega's outline flickered beside them, their holographic form struggling against the distortion in the air. When the static cleared for a heartbeat, their voice emerged—soft, steady, and layered with a faint electronic undertone. "It's not the terrain," they said. "It's the zone. A trade hub built inside corruption. A market coded into collapse."
Erevan blinked. "A market. Out here."
"One of the Whispering Markets," Vega replied. "They only appear where the system loses control. They sell what no other place can."
Sir Quacksalot, perched indignantly on Erevan's shoulder, gave a low, suspicious quack that somehow managed to sound both judgmental and prophetic.
Erevan rubbed his temple. "Great. A haunted flea market. Can't wait to see what they charge for existential dread."
Kaelith didn't laugh. Her fingers tightened on the bowstring until her knuckles whitened. "If Vega's right," she said quietly, "we tread carefully. These markets don't appear by chance." Her golden eyes met Erevan's. "They're invitations."
Invitations, in Erevan's experience, never ended well.
The further they walked, the more the world unraveled. The cracked plains rippled like disturbed water, then folded in on themselves. From the fractures rose black arches of glassy stone, stretching toward a sky that seemed to pulse with colorless light.
Lanterns blinked into existence one by one, suspended in midair, each burning with violet-blue flames that cast shadows in directions that made no sense. Beneath them, stalls began to unfold—snapping into being like glitching pop-up windows.
Figures manned them. Or tried to.
Their faces were static-filled placeholders, shifting every time Erevan tried to focus. Looking too long made his eyes ache. The world didn't want him to see them.
And yet, the place was alive.
Whispers slithered through the air—hundreds of overlapping voices bartering in languages he couldn't name. Prices weren't spoken in numbers but in promises. In memories. In things that might have been souls.
One stall displayed glowing fragments pulsing with the same light as the shard buried in Erevan's chest. Another offered weapons shaped like thoughts—blades bent at impossible angles, bows strung with strands of living code that hissed when touched.
And one merchant sold jars filled with muffled screams. The glass trembled with every breath.
Erevan stopped dead. "Yeah," he muttered. "I definitely hate this place already."
A flicker of light crossed his vision.
(System Alert: Zone entered – Whispering Market)
(Warning: Purchases may carry permanent consequences)
(Currency accepted: Glitch Points, Fragments, Stability)
Kaelith read the glowing projection beside him and exhaled a bitter laugh. "Stability. Of course."
"Of course," Erevan echoed. He pressed a hand over his chest where the shard pulsed faintly beneath his skin. "Sell your sanity, buy a nice hat. Classic capitalism."
Sir Quacksalot quacked again. Not reassuringly.
Vega moved ahead, their flickering shape steadier here. If anything, the corruption seemed to stabilize them. "Sometimes surviving isn't about strength," they said softly. "It's about what you're willing to trade."
Erevan gave a hollow chuckle. "Yeah, well, I'm running low on 'willing.'"
Still, he followed.
They pushed deeper into the maze of stalls, every step tugging them further into the market's rhythm—its pulse of whispers, color, and wrongness. The world shimmered at the edges, caught between dream and data.
He caught glimpses of impossible things:
A clock with no hands ticking backward.
A mirror that reflected the future.
A sword forged from the echo of a heartbeat.
From one stall, a merchant leaned close, voice like silk soaked in static. "Traveler," they hissed, holding up a cube filled with dim light. "Care to hear what your name sounds like when reality remembers it?"
Erevan frowned at the cube. A whisper came from within—his own name, distorted, breaking apart like glass. Erevan… Erevan… until it no longer sounded human.
He shoved it back at the merchant, grimacing. "Yeah, no thanks. I've already got enough voices living rent-free in my head."
Kaelith glanced at him, her mouth twitching. "You're learning."
Another stall keeper raised an arrow that pulsed faintly, alive with someone else's heartbeat. "This will pierce the heart of anyone you think of," the merchant purred.
Kaelith's eyes hardened. "No."
The merchant smiled wider—and vanished in a burst of static.
Erevan looked at her sideways. "You sure? Could've been handy for—"
"Don't," she said, her tone sharp enough to slice through the air.
He raised his hands in mock surrender. "Right. No murder-shopping. Got it."
Then he saw it.
A small, almost unnoticeable stall wedged between two larger ones. Unlike the rest, its merchant wasn't blurred. The hooded figure's face was pale, smooth, and unnervingly clear. Their eyes gleamed silver—mirrors that reflected everything except whoever looked into them.
On the table before them rested a single object.
A mask.
Plain. Black. Smooth. Featureless.
Until Erevan leaned closer.
The surface rippled. And suddenly, his own face stared back at him—cold, lifeless, still.
He stumbled backward, heart hammering. "Nope. Nope. Triple nope."
The merchant's voice slid through the air like oil. "It lets you wear the system's blind spot," they whispered. "You become nothing. Unseen. Untouched."
Kaelith's voice was tight. "What's the cost?"
"A memory," the merchant murmured, smiling. "One you cannot choose."
Erevan swallowed. "So I put it on and forget… what, my birthday? My name?"
Vega's glitch flickered down their neck like static lightning. "Or worse."
Erevan didn't ask what worse meant. He already knew it would be bad. He turned away quickly, ignoring the way the mask's empty face seemed to follow him.
Every step felt louder than it should. The air pressed close around him, thick with whispering static. Somewhere deep in his chest, the shard pulsed once—slow and deliberate—like it was listening too.
The deeper they went, the stranger the world became. The lanterns dimmed, their flames shifting to bruised shades of violet and blue. The market no longer felt like a place but a memory of one, glitching in and out of existence.
"Feels like walking inside a corrupted save file," Erevan muttered.
Kaelith's expression stayed composed, though a flicker of unease passed through her eyes. "Whatever this is," she said quietly, "it's ancient. Older than the System itself. It's rewriting even as we stand here."
Sir Quacksalot gave a long, low quack—unusually subdued. Even he seemed to sense the gravity of the place.
Vega stopped before a raised platform made of fractured glass panels. Beneath them, streams of living code pulsed, each beat sending ripples of light across the floor.
"We're close to the market's core," they murmured. "This is where the trades that matter take place."
Erevan tilted his head. "So all that nightmare window-shopping was just the tutorial zone?"
Vega didn't answer. Their gaze fixed on the crowd gathering ahead. Murmurs were rising, sharp and anticipatory.
A wide circle had formed around a dais of black crystal, and something floated at its center—just out of reach, thrumming faintly like a heartbeat.
The hum at the heart of the market grew louder, resonating through the fractured glass beneath their feet. The air thickened—buzzing with anticipation, tension, and a faint electric ache that set Erevan's teeth on edge.
The crowd was already shifting toward the dais, their movements slow and synchronized, like puppets pulled by invisible strings.
Then the sphere at the center of the black crystal pulsed once.
Light burst outward, sharp and cold.
(System Alert: Market Event – Auction of the Shardbound Relic)
Kaelith's eyes narrowed. "A relic," she said under her breath. "That never means anything good."
Erevan didn't answer. The shard inside his chest was already reacting—thudding in rhythm with the floating sphere as if recognizing something. Each pulse sent a thin vein of light crawling up his arm.
He pressed his palm against his chest, grimacing. "Because it is trouble," he muttered.
The announcer emerged from the darkness.
If it could even be called that.
Its body was a cluster of faces—flickering in and out of sync, mouths speaking different syllables that never quite aligned. Each time it moved, the world seemed to glitch around it.
"Behold," it said—or rather, they said, a dozen voices layering together like metallic echoes. "The Shardbound Relic, drawn from the heart of the Anomaly itself. With it, one may command the whispers. One may bend corruption to their will."
Gasps rippled through the crowd.
Bids began almost immediately. Not in numbers, but in horrors.
Promises.
Names.
Fragments of time.
A man offered his reflection. Another whispered the laughter of his firstborn.
Erevan could barely breathe. The relic's pull was magnetic—terrifyingly so. His shard burned in his chest, syncing perfectly with the rhythm of the light above the dais.
Kaelith saw it instantly. "Erevan." Her tone was sharp, but underneath it, there was worry. "What's happening?"
He forced a laugh that sounded far too thin. "Oh, you know. Just my chest trying to outbid everyone."
Vega's outline flared brighter, static crawling across their frame like lightning on glass. They were transfixed. "It's resonating with you," they said quietly. "The relic recognizes your corruption. It's part of the same code."
Erevan shot them a look. "Yeah, that's exactly what someone says before I get possessed by something shiny and evil."
But even as he joked, the pull deepened—like gravity itself had chosen him.
(System Alert: Resonance detected – Relic compatible)
Erevan groaned. "Oh, come on. Not again."
Kaelith's hand went to her bow, eyes darting between him and the relic. "If someone else wins that thing, they could weaponize it. And if you let it connect—"
"Then the System won't let me walk away," he finished for her.
Her silence said she agreed.
Vega turned their half-flickering gaze toward him, voice calm and terrible. "Sometimes the world doesn't ask what you want, Erevan. It decides what you're meant to become."
Erevan let out a quiet, humorless laugh. "Great. Another cosmic promotion. Just what I needed."
On the dais, the auction reached its peak. Bids rose higher—Glitch Points in impossible quantities, offerings of stolen time, stability traded away like coins. The announcer's flickering faces merged faster and faster, their words spiraling into distorted shrieks.
"Final call!" they cried, voice fracturing through the market.
The shard in Erevan's chest pulsed hard enough to knock the breath from him. Text cut across his vision.
(Special Option: Link bid using Shard Resonance)
(Cost: 10% Stability)
His hand hovered over his heart. He could feel it—instability writhing just beneath his skin, waiting to be unleashed.
Kaelith grabbed his wrist, her voice raw. "Don't."
For a heartbeat, he actually hesitated. Her eyes—usually unshakable—were wide with something like fear.
Then he smiled. Crooked. Tired. Brave in the wrong kind of way.
"When have I ever listened?"
And he activated the link.
The world split open.
(Stability: 26% → 16%)
A searing beam of static light shot from the dais, striking him square in the chest. He gasped as the relic fused with his shard—its glow sinking into him, syncing with his pulse. White fire raced through his veins.
(Relic Acquired: Shardbound Core)
(Effect: Corruption Affinity Unlocked)
(Warning: Instability Increased)
Erevan dropped to his knees. The market spun around him, warping, whispering, screaming.
Kaelith was there in an instant, catching his shoulders. "Erevan! Look at me!"
He tried to grin, but it came out as a ragged breath. "I'm fine. Just… you know, glowing from the inside. Again."
"You reckless idiot," she hissed. "You could have—"
"Yeah, yeah. Died. Imploded. Pick one." He coughed a laugh, dazed. "On the bright side, at least I didn't forget my name buying a cursed mask."
Vega crouched beside them, their glitching outline steady for once, eyes like shards of light. "No," they said softly. "He's not reckless anymore. He's chosen."
Erevan wheezed out a laugh. "Do I get a badge? Maybe a cursed T-shirt?"
Kaelith didn't answer. Her gaze had gone past him, and the color drained from her face.
"Erevan…" she whispered. "Don't move."
Everything stopped.
The noise of the market cut off—every whisper, every flicker of sound—gone, like someone had muted the world.
Then something stepped forward.
From the far corner of the plaza, a shape began to emerge—cloaked not in darkness, but absence. Wherever it passed, the air folded inward. The ground beneath its feet dissolved like corrupted data.
Its face was nothing. A void. The code of reality bent away from it, refusing to touch.
When it turned toward Erevan, the world seemed to hold its breath.
He didn't hear words.
He felt them. Cold pressure in his mind, like a glacier settling into place.
(New Threat Logged: The Whisperer)
(Objective: Unknown)
The shard inside him convulsed, light flaring violently beneath his skin. The relic answered in kind, pulsing in perfect opposition—like two hearts at war.
The arches around the market twisted and buckled, folding in on themselves.
Sir Quacksalot let out one single, terrified quack before even he fell silent.
The lanterns went dark.
Then the whispers returned.
Thousands of voices, all speaking his name.
Not shouting. Chanting.
Erevan. Erevan. Erevan.
The sound wasn't heard—it vibrated through him, through every nerve, every thought. His vision fractured into light and static as the world began to collapse.
The market imploded in silence.
One blink—and everything was gone.
No stalls.
No arches.
No sound.
Just darkness.
And the faint, steady hum of the relic buried deep inside him.
For a long moment, Erevan knelt there in the void, the echo of the whispers still crawling under his skin.
Then—so soft it barely existed—something whispered back.