The grass whispered when Caelum moved.
It wasn't wind—there was none, not really—but a faint, responsive murmur, like the land acknowledging pressure. Each step bent the pale blades without breaking them, and when his foot lifted, they rose again, pristine and unmarked.
Too perfect, Caelum thought.
He stopped walking.
The whispering ceased.
Around him, the plain stretched outward in gentle rises and shallow dips, broken by the occasional ruin: a half-collapsed wall here, a stairway climbing toward nothing there. Far above, fragments of stone and metal drifted lazily through the layered sky, their shadows bending at odd angles before dissolving altogether.
No sun. No moon. Just light—everywhere, evenly spread, without warmth.
Behind him, voices grew louder.
Fear, once sparked, spread quickly.
"—telling you, this isn't real."
"My phone doesn't work. Nothing works."
"Does anyone remember how they got here?"
Caelum turned back toward the gathering cluster of people. They were drifting together without deciding to, pulled by the same instinct that had drawn their eyes to the distant Gate. Some clung close to one another. Others hovered at the edges, alert and wary.
He counted quickly.
Too many to track individually. Too many variables.
A man staggered as the ground subtly tilted beneath him, catching himself on a broken stone pillar. The moment his panic spiked, the grass around his feet darkened slightly, blades stiffening as if bracing.
Caelum frowned.
Emotion affects the environment, he thought. Or the other way around.
Either possibility was unsettling.
---
Aarav Malhotra crouched near a low outcropping of stone, flexing his fingers again and again as if trying to convince them they still belonged to him. Each movement sent faint tremors up his arms, a residual echo of that invisible force that had caught him earlier.
He hadn't imagined it. That much was clear.
"I pulled on something," he muttered, glancing at his hands. "Or it pulled on me."
Nearby, Élise knelt beside a shallow depression where moisture had collected, testing the water with cautious fingers. It was cool, clear, and tasted—after a hesitant sip—normal.
Her relief was short-lived.
When she straightened, the glass shard at her collarbone glimmered faintly, catching the ambient light. For a heartbeat, a reflection flickered within it: the café again, laughter frozen mid-motion.
Élise gasped and clutched the shard, her breath coming fast.
The image vanished.
Something tightened painfully behind her eyes.
She pressed her fingers to her temple, steadying herself, and very deliberately *did not* look at the shard again.
---
Li Xueyan walked the perimeter.
She paced in a wide circle around the forming group, steps light, eyes sharp, cataloging everything: who was armed, who was injured, who looked likely to panic. She noted the ruins' spacing, the absence of obvious predators, the way the land subtly rose toward the distant Gate.
The Gate.
Even from here, it felt wrong—too large, too present, like a thought she couldn't shake. She forced herself to look away.
Groups get people killed, she reminded herself. Groups hesitate. Groups argue.
Yet she stayed close enough to hear.
---
Jonah Whitlock was already making himself useful.
"Alright," he said again, louder now, palms open. "Let's spread out just a little. Not too far. We need water, shelter, and a sense of where we are."
A few people nodded. Others glared.
"Who put you in charge?" someone snapped.
Jonah didn't bristle. He smiled faintly, a gesture more tired than smug.
"No one," he said. "But unless someone else has a better plan, this is what we've got."
Silence followed.
No better plan emerged.
Caelum watched Jonah closely this time. There was no power behind the man's voice—no force, no compulsion—yet people listened. They adjusted their stances, shifted their weight, waited for instructions.
Expectation, Caelum thought. That was all it took.
He stepped forward before he'd fully decided to.
"There's water," he said, gesturing toward Élise's find. His voice carried easily, though he hadn't raised it. "At least enough for now."
A ripple of relief passed through the group.
Élise looked up, startled, then nodded in confirmation.
"Thank you," Jonah said, meeting Caelum's gaze. Something curious flickered there—not suspicion, but interest. "Name?"
"Caelum."
"Jonah." He inclined his head slightly. "Stick close, Caelum. We'll need steady eyes."
Caelum almost laughed at that. Almost.
---
They moved slowly, cautiously, the cluster stretching into a loose formation as people began to explore within sight of one another. Someone found edible roots beneath the grass—bland but filling. Another discovered that the floating ruins above cast faint distortions in gravity directly beneath them, making jumps longer, landings softer.
Rules, Caelum realized. This place has rules.
They just weren't written anywhere obvious.
The ground shifted again—just a subtle incline correcting itself—and a woman cried out as she lost her footing. Takahiro was there in an instant, catching her wrist, his grip iron-steady.
"Thank you," she breathed.
He released her at once, bowing slightly.
"Be careful," he said, voice calm. "The land listens."
She stared at him, confused, but nodded and moved away.
Takahiro closed his eyes briefly, feeling the hum of the blade at his side. It had not moved. It had not been needed.
Good.
---
By what felt like late afternoon—though the light never changed—the group had settled into a tentative rhythm. Scouts moved out and returned. Food and water were rationed. The initial panic dulled into a constant, low-grade tension.
No one slept.
They didn't trust the ground enough to try.
Caelum found himself sitting on a broken slab of stone, watching as people passed by him without really *seeing* him. Conversations flowed around him. Arguments sparked and faded.
And through it all, something strange persisted.
They stumbled less when he was nearby.
When voices rose in anger, they fell again before breaking into violence. When someone made a reckless decision, another happened to intervene at just the right moment.
No one commented on it.
Not even Caelum, though he felt it, faintly—a sense of alignment, like standing at the center of a balanced scale.
---
It was Li Xueyan who noticed first.
Not the effect itself, but the *pattern*.
She watched a man trip over uneven ground, only to be caught by another who had no reason to be looking that way. She watched a heated argument dissolve into uneasy compromise the moment Caelum stepped between the speakers, saying nothing.
Dangerously average, she thought again.
Yet the thought didn't sit right.
She shifted her gaze from Caelum to the Gate, then back to the group.
Dependency is subtle, she reminded herself. It looks like cooperation until it isn't.
---
The first real conflict came with hunger.
By the second cycle of eating—if it could be called that—tensions flared. Supplies were limited. Patience wore thin.
Rakesh Singh, broad-shouldered and loud, made his move openly.
"We need to consolidate," he said, stepping forward with an easy grin that didn't reach his eyes. "Food, water, all of it. One place. One set of hands managing it."
"And those hands would be yours?" someone asked.
Rakesh shrugged. "Someone's got to."
A murmur of unease rippled through the group.
Jonah watched silently.
Caelum felt the air tighten, the grass stiffening underfoot as emotions spiked. He rose without thinking, stepping into the space between Rakesh and the others.
"Or," Caelum said evenly, "we keep sharing like we have been. No one's starving yet."
Rakesh's eyes flicked to him, assessing.
"And who are you supposed to be?"
"No one," Caelum replied.
The words landed heavier than they should have.
For a long moment, Rakesh said nothing. Then he scoffed, waving a hand dismissively.
"Fine," he said. "For now."
He turned away, but the resentment was clear.
Li Xueyan filed it away.
---
Night—if it could be called that—brought no darkness, only a subtle dimming of the layered sky. The ruins glowed faintly, etched with symbols too worn to read.
Samuel Crowe emerged from the shadow of a collapsed archway like a ghost.
He was older than most, his expression lined and weary, eyes sharp despite it. No one noticed him until he spoke.
"These ruins," he said quietly, "used to hum louder."
Heads turned.
"What do you mean?" Jonah asked.
Samuel gestured vaguely. "The Ascent used to echo. Power rang through these places. Now…" He shook his head. "Now it's quieter. Like something's pressing down on it."
Caelum's skin prickled.
"Pressing down how?" Élise asked.
Samuel's gaze drifted across the group, lingering on no one in particular.
"Like a cradle," he said. "To keep things from breaking too early."
Before anyone could ask more, the ground trembled again.
Stronger this time.
The Gate in the distance pulsed, its fractured edges glowing faintly as space itself seemed to fold inward around it.
A low sound rolled across the plain—not a roar, not a voice, but something vast and impersonal.
Waiting.
Caelum felt it settle into him, a weight and a pull all at once.
Somewhere deep within the Threshold Fields, something had shifted.
And whatever rules governed this place, they had begun to take notice.
The whispering grass stilled.
The light held its breath.
Far away, the Gate watched.
And the first true step toward it had already been taken.