Chapter 7 - The Last Goodbye

Elias stared at the ceiling, the dim glow of streetlights outside barely filtering through the curtains. His room was a mess—half-empty reagent vials, stacks of old notebooks, crumpled clothes scattered across the floor. It wasn't laziness; it was the mess of someone lost in thought, too far gone in his own head to care about the small details.

He wasn't sure when he'd see this room again. Maybe never.

With a slow breath, he turned over and grabbed his phone. His fingers hovered over Orin's contact before finally pressing the call button.

The line clicked almost immediately.

"Took you long enough," Orin's voice came through, dry but sharp with awareness. "I figured you'd be holed up in that lab of yours, brooding over whatever mess you've gotten yourself into."

Elias chuckled, but it sounded more hollow than he intended. "Yeah, well. Shit's complicated."

"No kidding," Orin replied, his tone dropping slightly. "The Guild Syndicate's after you. Something about a 'high-priority asset gone rogue.' Care to explain that?"

Elias hesitated. There was a time when he could tell Orin everything, but now? Now, he wasn't sure what the hell he even was anymore. "It's better if you don't know," he finally said, the words tasting bitter. "For your sake."

Orin scoffed, but there was an edge of concern beneath the sarcasm. "You sound like some tragic anti-hero, man. Look, I don't know what you did, but if the Guild's involved, you need to lay low. This isn't some petty bounty—this is serious."

"Yeah," Elias muttered, staring at the mess around him. "I know."

Silence fell between them, thick with things left unsaid. After a moment, Orin sighed. "Whatever you're planning, just… don't be an idiot, alright?"

"No promises." Elias smirked, though it lacked any real warmth, and hung up before Orin could argue further.

The conversation left a sour taste in his mouth. Orin was right—the Guild Syndicate wasn't something you pissed off and walked away from. But Elias was running out of options.

He'd tried to sleep. Tried to reach Elysium the way he always had.

Nothing.

Only a suffocating, dreamless void.

Something inside him had shifted. His connection to the Soulweave System was gone—fractured. He couldn't even reach the other side anymore, not the way he had for years. The system didn't know what to do with him. He was stuck here, trapped in the waking world.

Which meant there was only one way out: The Gateway.

It was reckless. Stupid. Borderline suicidal. Soulforge Gateways weren't meant for living beings. No one had survived the attempt. The logs spoke of a process so excruciatingly brutal, it tore the body apart at a cellular level, only for the pieces to be reassembled on the other side—if you were lucky.

But Elias wasn't exactly normal anymore.

The Void inside him whispered—Maybe, just maybe, you'll survive.

Before leaving, there was one more thing to do.

His parents were still awake when he stepped into the living room. His father, Darius Varian, sat at the kitchen table, nursing a cup of coffee as his eyes flicked across his laptop screen. His mother, Mira Varian, was scrolling through her tablet, likely catching up on some research. They'd always been like this—two brilliant minds managing to balance academia and parenthood.

Mira glanced up first, her eyes narrowing as she took in his disheveled appearance. "You look like you're about to do something stupid."

Elias snorted, trying to force a grin. "That obvious?"

Darius set his cup down, gaze sharpening. "You never come out here unless you need something. What's going on?"

Elias rubbed the back of his neck, trying to figure out how to explain what he couldn't even understand himself. "I… need to go away for a while. I don't know how long."

His mother's expression darkened. "The Guild?"

"Among other things." He hesitated before adding, "It's not safe for me to stay."

Darius exhaled sharply, but didn't push further. "Elysium?"

Elias nodded. His parents didn't need to ask how he knew. They understood the dangers better than anyone else.

Mira leaned forward, her voice soft but heavy with concern. "Are you in danger?"

"Yes."

A long pause. Then, to Elias's surprise, Darius nodded, as if the weight of the decision had already been made. "Then do what you need to do."

Elias blinked, caught off guard. "Just like that?"

Darius met his gaze, his expression unwavering. "You're not a child anymore. If you say you need to leave, I trust your judgment."

Mira's lips tightened into a thin line, but she nodded. "Just… stay alive, okay?"

Elias swallowed hard against the lump in his throat. "I'll try."

The Lonely Gateway was an old, nearly abandoned Soulforge structure on the outskirts of the city. Still active, but never used—not after the accidents. The Nightspires controlled the major Gateways, and only the desperate or the insane ever dared sneak through the ones that were unregulated.

Elias fit both categories.

The machine hummed ominously as he approached, its Aetheric field swirling around it like an otherworldly pulse, waiting.

He took a deep breath.

No turning back now.

He stepped forward.

For a moment, nothing happened.

Then the world shattered.

Raw, searing pain ripped through him, pulling him apart as if the fabric of his very being was being stretched across existence itself. It wasn't just his body—it was his mind, his soul, every part of him unraveling and twisting into something unrecognizable.

For a second, the Void stirred inside him.

Something ancient. Something wrong.

The Gateway shouldn't have worked. His body should have been lost, scattered between realms. But the Void in his veins—it held him together. It stitched him back into a new form, one that shouldn't have been possible.

He wasn't just passing through.

The Void was pulling him somewhere else.

Then, just as suddenly as it began, it stopped.

Elias gasped, collapsing onto cold, hard ground. His vision blurred, and he fought to push himself up, disoriented.

Everything felt wrong. The air was thick, heavy with something unnatural, something foreign. His heart hammered in his chest as he looked around, trying to make sense of his surroundings.

This wasn't where he was supposed to be.

He had made it to Elysium.

But he had no idea where the hell he was.