Elias walked, though he wasn't certain where his feet would take him. The blue grass whispered beneath his boots, each step a soft hiss that echoed in the empty sky. The golden light stretched across islands suspended in the distance, enormous machines tracing slow circuits between them. Each pulse of their hum pressed into his chest like a low heartbeat, though he could not tell whether it belonged to the world or to him.
He bent down, brushing his fingers across a blade of grass. It flared briefly under his touch, as if alive. When he released it, the glow faded, leaving only faint traces of light in the indentation of the soil. The sensation was neither comforting nor threatening—it simply existed, like the memory of a storm long gone. Elias let the silence fill him, the weight of a world not his own pressing against his ribs.
Shadows moved between the floating islands. He saw them at the edges of his vision, impossible shapes that blurred with the fog. They were not clouds. Not birds. Not anything he had known. He froze, chest tight. The pulse in his wrist flared faintly, a reminder of the black veins crawling up his skin. Echo of Death. He flexed his fingers, trying to feel what the world meant.
A noise—a low, metallic rasp—shattered the stillness. Elias's eyes darted toward it. It came from below, from the stone and obsidian that jutted like broken ribs out of the ground. A figure crouched there, not quite human. Its limbs were long and angular, joints bending at impossible angles, and its skin—or metal?—glimmered faintly in the golden haze.
The figure froze as soon as it saw him. Elias felt the weight of its gaze, a sensation that pressed against the back of his skull without touching it. He couldn't breathe. Not from fear, exactly, but from recognition. The mark on his wrist pulsed in response, black veins quivering, as if sensing the energy in the being before him.
The creature moved, slow and deliberate. Its head tilted, and Elias realized it had no eyes—at least, none he could see—but still, it knew he existed. Each step it took hummed against the ground, a resonance that made the stones beneath his feet vibrate. He backed away, hands raised instinctively, searching for anything he could use.
A shard of obsidian, jagged and black, lay near his foot. He grabbed it, holding it like a knife, though he doubted it would do much against this thing. The pulse in his wrist flared again. He felt it—not consciously, not yet—but the Echo responded. The last pulse of death, of energy, of life-force.
And then the creature moved faster. Too fast. Limbs snapping, twisting, collapsing and reforming as it lunged toward him. Elias dove to the side, rolling across the glowing grass, feeling it burn slightly against his palms. The shard barely connected with its shoulder. Sparks—red and gold—exploded where it hit, and for a moment, the creature stumbled.
Elias scrambled to his feet. "What are you?" he whispered. The word sounded hollow in the vast emptiness. The creature made a sound, not a voice but a vibration, a resonance that pressed against his ears and chest simultaneously. It wasn't communicating. It was asserting.
He ran. Not because he wanted to fight, but because he wanted to understand. The creature followed, skipping across the warped terrain with a rhythm that made the ground pulse beneath his boots. Elias felt the weight of the islands above, the machines spinning slowly in the distance, all of it bending around him. He could feel the world straining under its own gravity, as though reality itself was holding its breath.
He turned sharply, throwing a shard at the creature. It dissolved into fragments before hitting it, scattering sparks across the ground. Elias stumbled, tripping over a root—or something that resembled a root—and landed hard, gasping. The creature was upon him, limbs striking out. He twisted, barely avoiding a blow that would have shattered his ribs.
Then a flare of black ran up his wrist, tendrils of the Echo reacting to the danger. He clenched his fist, and the energy pulsed outward. The air vibrated, thick and humming, and the creature froze mid-step, its head jerking unnaturally. Something within it broke. A heartbeat—or its approximation—shattered, and a fragment of its being shot into Elias's consciousness.
He saw it then: the core of the creature, molten and bright, a pulse of dying light and sound. He recoiled, not in pain, but in understanding. The Echo had taken it, absorbed the fragment of the machine's final moment, folding it into him. His wrist cooled, the black veins fading slightly, replaced by a faint, circuit-like pattern that mirrored the broken geometry of the creature.
The machine collapsed in on itself, metal snapping, light dimming, until nothing remained. The ground was silent again. Elias sat back on his heels, chest heaving, the shard falling from his hand. The world around him was unchanged, yet somehow different—as if absorbing the fight, registering the pulse of energy, learning.
He pressed a trembling hand to his wrist. "Fragment acquired — Energy Resonance." The words whispered in his mind, as though carried on the same vibration that had ended the machine's life. He could feel it in his veins, in his fingertips, a memory and a tool, both alien and intimate.
The fog shifted, curling along the edges of the floating islands. Elias stood, uncertain whether he had survived or merely been allowed to continue. His eyes scanned the horizon: towers pulsed faintly, floating debris hung motionless, and the golden sky bled into itself. Nothing moved openly, yet the world thrummed with hidden life, watching, calculating.
He took a step forward. Then another. The Echo of Death hummed faintly, a constant reminder that the fragments of death and life could no longer be separated. Each pulse of power was a burden as much as a shield. He couldn't afford hesitation. Not here. Not ever.
A flicker in the fog drew his gaze. Two shapes, humanoid, glinting with faint metallic edges, moved silently between islands. Not machines, not entirely, but not human either. Elias swallowed. They had seen him—or felt him. His wrist pulsed once more. He didn't know if it was warning or acknowledgment.
The ground trembled beneath him. The floating islands shifted, adjusting their weight, dragging with them fragments of the world. Elias felt the instability in his chest, a dissonance he couldn't name. The world wasn't stable. It never had been. And yet, it persisted, fragile and patient, as though it were waiting for him to fail.
He ran again, though there was nowhere specific to go. The Echo whispered faintly, showing him glimpses of potential threats in the patterns of light and metal. He leapt across broken stone, avoiding the gaps that opened suddenly beneath him. Somewhere in the distance, a tower bent unnaturally, its geometry failing, folding inward like paper. The air smelled of ozone and burning metal, faintly sweet.
He paused on a ridge, looking down at the expanse below. Islands floated impossibly in the fog, towers and machines casting long shadows that shifted with the light. The shapes he had glimpsed moved purposefully, watching him, but not yet attacking. Elias exhaled slowly, tasting the tang of fear and exhilaration.
"This isn't just strange," he murmured. "It's alive."
The fog curled around him like fingers, brushing against his coat, teasing, testing. He felt the pull of the world—an invisible current guiding him, warning him, challenging him. The mark on his wrist flared once more, the new circuit-like pattern glowing faintly. The first fragment. Only the beginning.
Elias realized something then, pressing the thought deep into his chest. Across infinite worlds, infinite deaths, he would carry these fragments. They were keys. Weapons. Curses. Memories. And this one, this first fragment of energy, would be the first of many.
He turned his gaze to the horizon. The golden sky stretched endlessly, islands drifting between the light, and he understood: there was no safe place, no home. Only motion. Only survival.
He walked again, shoulders heavy, but feet steady. Somewhere out there, something waited. He didn't know if it was friend, foe, or indifferent observer. But whatever it was, he would meet it. Eventually.
And when he did, the Echo of Death would answer.
End of Chapter 3.