Edrin did not stop walking until night fell.
Only when the lights of Branford were far behind him did he slow down. He followed the road south until it narrowed into a dirt path, then left it entirely and entered the forest.
The trees were bare from winter. Branches reached upward like skeletal fingers, and the ground was uneven with frozen roots and stones.
It was quiet.
Too quiet for comfort.
Edrin welcomed it.
He made camp near a shallow clearing, far from any road or settlement. There was no fire. He did not want smoke or light to draw attention.
When he finally sat down, exhaustion caught up with him all at once.
His hands were shaking.
Not from cold.
From fear.
He pressed his palms against his knees and forced himself to breathe slowly. Each breath hurt. His chest still ached from the river, a deep, lingering pain that reminded him of what had happened.
He had drowned.
There was no uncertainty about that.
Yet here he was.
Edrin closed his eyes.
I need to know, he thought.
Not out of curiosity.
Out of necessity.
If he continued living without understanding what had changed, then one day something far worse than death might happen. To him, or to others because of him.
He could not allow that.
He started small.
That night, he did not eat.
Hunger gnawed at his stomach, sharp and insistent, but he ignored it. He wanted to know whether deprivation would weaken him normally.
By morning, he felt lightheaded and weak, just as expected.
Nothing unusual.
He continued walking.
On the second day, he cut his palm with a shard of broken stone.
The pain was immediate and sharp. Blood flowed freely, dark against his pale skin. He wrapped the wound in cloth and waited.
The bleeding stopped within an hour.
By evening, the cut had already begun to close.
Edrin stared at his hand in silence.
It was too fast.
Not impossible, but wrong.
He felt no relief.
Only unease.
That night, fever came.
His body burned. Chills wracked him. Sweat soaked his clothes, and his thoughts blurred. He lay curled on the forest floor, breathing shallowly, convinced that this would finally be the moment things went too far.
Fever killed people all the time.
He knew that.
By morning, the fever was gone.
Pain remained. Weakness lingered.
But his body had stabilized.
Again.
Edrin sat up slowly and looked at the sky through the trees.
He laughed once.
The sound startled him.
It was not hysterical. It was quiet, short, and hollow.
"I'm still here," he muttered.
The words tasted wrong.
Over the following days, he continued testing.
Carefully.
He let himself go hungry longer than was safe. He exposed himself to cold rain without shelter. He pushed his body until his muscles tore and refused to respond.
Each time, the result was the same.
Pain came.
Weakness followed.
Collapse happened.
But the end never arrived.
His body always pulled itself back from the edge.
Slowly. Imperfectly. But inevitably.
That frightened him more than dying ever had.
Because death was final.
This was not.
One evening, as he rested near a stream, Edrin noticed something else.
The animals avoided him.
Not dramatically. Not as if sensing a predator.
They simply kept their distance.
Birds did not land nearby. Small animals paused at the edge of their paths and turned away.
He watched this happen several times before acknowledging it.
Something about him felt wrong to the world.
On the sixth night, Edrin made a decision.
He stood near the edge of a rocky slope overlooking a ravine. The drop was not enormous, but it was enough to kill a man if he landed badly.
He hesitated.
This was different.
The river had taken him by surprise. This would be deliberate.
His heart pounded.
Fear surged.
Good.
Fear meant he was still human.
Edrin stepped forward.
The fall was short and violent.
He hit the rocks hard, pain exploding through his leg and side. Something cracked. He screamed despite himself and rolled to a stop at the bottom of the ravine.
For a long time, he could not move.
His vision blurred. His breathing came in ragged gasps.
This time felt worse.
This time felt final.
Edrin closed his eyes.
And waited.
He woke hours later.
Pain flooded back first. His leg screamed in protest when he tried to move it. One arm felt useless, hanging limply at his side.
But he was conscious.
Alive.
Again.
Tears welled in his eyes, unbidden.
Not from pain.
From certainty.
Edrin lay there until dawn, then dragged himself to the stream and drank.
It took him two full days to climb out of the ravine.
His leg healed crookedly at first, forcing him to limp. By the fourth day, it straightened on its own.
He did not feel relief when that happened.
He felt dread.
Edrin stopped testing himself after that.
Not because he had learned enough.
But because he was afraid of what further answers might do to him.
He sat beneath a tree one evening and stared at his hands.
They were scarred now.
Marked.
Proof that pain still mattered.
Proof that he was not invulnerable.
And yet…
Proof that death no longer completed its work.
Far beyond the forest, far beyond mortal lands, the great record continued its endless process.
Entries were written.
Entries were closed.
Balance was maintained.
But somewhere deep within that system, the absence had grown large enough to distort the count.
A discrepancy had formed.
It was still small.
Still ignorable.
But it existed.
And systems that governed reality did not ignore discrepancies forever.