Big Good

I stepped out of my building and descended into the bustling streets of Clockthon. Strangely, despite spending the whole night without sleep, plotting my response to The Consortium, I didn't feel the slightest bit tired. Perhaps it was a side effect of my strengthening nadir circuit, or maybe it was the adrenaline from the new game I was about to play. The world felt clearer; every sound and sight was processed by my brain with exceptional efficiency. I walked along the cobblestone roads, past the facades of grand, classically styled shops and homes that were beginning to show signs of aging. The moss growing in the cracks of the brickwork was a kind of beauty to me, quintessentially classical, just as I remembered from the past.

I arrived at the South Gate, one of the four main exits from the city of Clockthon. It wasn't as majestic as the North Gate, which faced the academy, rather, it was more functional and grimy. This gate faced the Lower City, the garbage heap of the kingdom. The guards here had an aura distinct from those of the academy. They were rougher, more alert, their eyes constantly scanning for threats.

"Halt," said one of the guards, stopping me with the steel tip of his spear. His heavy metal armor covered his entire body, making him look like a faceless golem. "Show your identification."

"I have it," I replied, deliberately raising my voice slightly to sound younger. I reached into the pocket of my cloak and pulled out two cards. The first was a standard citizen ID of the Eastern Cledestine Kingdom.

"Anything else?" he asked, his eyes behind the helmet focusing on my mask.

I understood his implication. He wanted the more important card. I handed over the second: a thin metal plate bearing the insignia of the Essence Keeper Order. I had renewed it a few weeks ago. It read: Archetype 7, Channel: Tenebris. A high enough classification to make a guard think twice, but not so high as to draw unwanted attention.

Another guard stepped closer. "Be careful, kid," he said, his voice gentler though still laced with warning. "The Lower City is dangerous. Watch out for High-Archetypal. You probably already know, but I'll remind you, be wary of anyone with abnormal Essence fluctuations. They're likely Type 1 through 4. I'm not saying those below that aren't dangerous, but the upper tiers… they're terrifying."

"I understand the risks," I said. "May I pass now?"

"Of course," the first guard said, retracting his spear. "If you're in danger, run back here as fast as you can. General Vlashmir Gurdner stationed one of his best units near this gate for emergencies."

I gave a brief nod and stepped through the gate. The air changed instantly. The stench of rotting garbage and disease mixed with the damp scent of wet soil. Before me lay a broken plain littered with trash and rubble. I could feel the barrier between the grandeur of Clockthon and the anarchy of the Lower City. The real city wall wasn't a towering military fortress, it was a four-meter-tall barrier that functioned as an air filter, powered by Essence-fueled relics. Its purpose was to keep the stench and chaos of the Lower City from seeping into the civilized capital.

I kept walking, and the scenery shifted into slums. Tents made from torn tarps, shacks built from rusted metal and rotting wood. These were homes for those cast out by the system, refugees from border wars, workers crippled in factory accidents, sufferers of infectious diseases too poor to afford treatment. Amid this despair, I searched for one man. I didn't remember Silas's face clearly, just a faint memory from the original Welt Rothes, of a kind-faced, skinny man who once gave him bread. His skin was tan, and his eyes weary yet warm. How could someone like that be "The Healer" in a place like this?

I began asking around, using the most efficient method, transactions. I approached a group of men sitting around a small campfire, their eyes empty and suspicious. I didn't offer money. I offered something more valuable here, food. I pulled a pack of bread and dried meat from my bag.

"I'm looking for someone," I said. "They call him 'The Healer.'"

One of the men, his arm amputated, snorted. "Everyone's looking for The Healer. You think he's got time for someone like you?"

"I'll pay for his time," I replied, placing the food on the ground between us.

Another man, his face covered in burn scars, grabbed a piece of meat. "He doesn't take payment," he said, chewing greedily. "You only meet him if you really need him. If you're sick, dying, he'll find you."

"Where can I find him?" I pressed.

"He doesn't have a fixed spot," the first man said. "He moves. Today maybe he's at the emergency clinic in Sector Three. Tomorrow, he could be at the leper tent in Sector Five. He goes where he's needed most."

Sector Three. That was my starting point. I left the rest of the food for them and continued my journey, deeper into the maze of the Lower City. This place had no clear roads, only narrow, muddy alleys between shacks. I passed people who stared at me hungrily, some with hatred, others with total indifference. My porcelain mask served as a shield. I needed to hide my identity and appear as something alien, untouchable.

After nearly an hour of searching, I found what could be called an "emergency clinic." It was a partially-collapsed old brick building, the only permanent structure in the area. Inside, dozens lay on makeshift beds, groaning in pain. A few nurses, or perhaps volunteers, moved among them, their faces tired yet determined.

I asked one of them about The Healer. She eyed me with suspicion. "He just left," she said. "Headed to St. Jude's Orphanage, by the Grey Riverbank."

A flicker of frustration stirred in me. He was always one step ahead. I thanked her and immediately left, following her direction.

St. Jude's Orphanage was a large wooden structure, fragile-looking, standing by a river whose waters were thick gray from upstream industrial waste. As I approached, I heard the laughter of children, a sound sharply contrasting with the harsh surroundings.

I stepped into the muddy yard of the orphanage. There, among a group of ragged orphans, I saw him.

He was kneeling on the ground, wrapping a little girl's wounded knee. He was thinner than I remembered, and the once-black hair now streaked with gray. His face was etched with weary lines, but his eyes… his eyes were the same, brown eyes… tired, yet radiating a calm, nonjudgmental kindness. It was Silas.

The children gathered around him showed no fear, only affection. He was the center of their tiny, sorrowful universe.

As he finished tending to the girl's wound, he seemed to sense my presence. He looked up, and his eyes met my mask. There was no shock on his face, only deep sorrow.

"I knew you'd come one day," he said, his voice hoarse and gentle. "You've grown, Welt."

How did he know? I wore a mask. I had become a completely different person.

"How did you know it was me?" I asked, my voice sounding foreign even to myself, muffled by porcelain.

"I didn't see your face," he replied, slowly rising to his feet. "But I felt it… the emptiness inside you. The same void I left in you that night."

He stepped forward, the children moving aside to give him space. "I'm sorry," he whispered. "I never meant for this to happen to you. I was only trying to protect you."

"Protect me from what?" I asked. My mind raced, trying to connect the pieces.

"From them. From the Fravikveidimadr," he said. "And from myself."

Suddenly, he coughed harshly, a deep, dry cough that shook his whole body. He covered his mouth with a handkerchief, and when he pulled it away, there was blood on the cloth.

"What's happening to you?" I asked, instinctively stepping forward.

"This is the price," he said with a bitter smile. "The power to heal others. Every time I heal someone, I take a small piece of their illness or wound into my own body. I'm not that strong, Welt… I transfer their injuries into myself…"

I was stunned. This was a power mechanism I had never heard of, a Channel based on absolute self-sacrifice. The Fravikveidimadr hadn't imprisoned him. They had released him here as part of a long-term experiment. They wanted to see the limits of this strange Channel, even if it meant sacrificing the subject.

"Why?" was all I could manage to ask. "Why would you do this?"

He looked at the children around him, who stared at him anxiously. "Because if I don't… who else will? This world's already taken enough from them. I'm just trying to give a little back."

His logic was flawed. Sentimental. Inefficient. Yet I couldn't refute it. In the face of such pure self-sacrifice, all rational calculations felt… irrelevant.

Gerald was right. I had encountered something I couldn't calculate.

"They're watching you," I said to him. "Fravikveidimadr. This is all an experiment to them."

"I know," he replied. "But even inside the cage of an experiment, you can still choose to do good."

At that moment, I sensed another presence. Several figures emerged from the shadows around the orphanage. They wore no uniforms, but their movements were coordinated and deadly. Assassins. One of them bore the faint insignia of House Droct on the hilt of his blade.

My war against House Droct had seeped into this place. Perhaps they were tracking me, or perhaps they were here for another reason.

"Go, Welt," Silas said, pushing me behind him. "This isn't your fight."

"I'm not leaving," I said. This wasn't about my mission anymore. It had become personal.

The assassins spread out, surrounding us. Their leader, a man with a scar across his face, looked at Silas with disdain. "The Healer," he hissed. "You've been a thorn in the side of our operations for far too long. Disease is profitable. And you're ruining our margins."

So they were here for him. Apparently, House Droct ran a black-market medical syndicate in the Lower City, and Silas's free healing was disrupting their business.

"These people have nothing," Silas replied calmly. "How could you possibly take more from them?"

The leader laughed. "That's the beauty of poverty. There's always something left to take." He gave a signal, and his men attacked.

I moved. I shoved Silas behind me, and the Void Essence coursed through my body. I wouldn't kill them. That would be too messy and attract too much attention. I'd just disable them.

I faced the first wave, two assassins. My movements were efficient, using their momentum against them. A strike to the neck, a kick to the knee. They dropped silently.

But there were too many. While I was occupied with those two, the others closed in on Silas.

Just as a blade was about to cut him down, something unexpected happened.

Silas's body began to glow with a soft golden light. The ground around him trembled. The assassins nearby suddenly froze, confusion flashing across their faces, then overwhelming pain. Old wounds on their bodies, scars, improperly healed fractures, all suddenly reopened, as if time had reversed. Dormant illnesses hidden deep in their blood surged to the surface.

They screamed in agony and collapsed, their bodies convulsing.

The golden light around Silas dimmed, and he fell to his knees, coughing harder than before, blood now trickling from the corners of his lips.

It was then I understood, Silas could not only heal disease, he could return it. He could send back the sickness and injuries he had absorbed, either to the original source or even to someone else. It was a terrifying defensive power, one that came at a heavy cost to his own body.

The assassin leader looked at his fallen subordinates, then at Silas, with a mix of fear and greed. "Power like that... in the right hands…"

He raised his sword, ready to finish off the weakened Silas.

I wouldn't let him. I dashed forward, Void Essence coiling in my hand, ready to strike with precision.

But before I could reach him, a shadow darted between us. A figure, faster than my eyes could follow, struck the leader with brutal force. I heard bones snap as the man was hurled into the orphanage wall and crumpled, unmoving.

I halted, alert. The uninvited savior stood over the leader's body, back to me. She wore a tattered black cloak, and from under the hood, I caught sight of messy red hair.

She turned slowly. It was a girl, probably my age. Her face was angular, her amber eyes burning with wild intensity. In her hands were a pair of jagged daggers, dripping with blood.

She didn't look at me. Her gaze was fixed on the collapsed Silas.

"You owe me, Healer," she said, her voice hoarse and full of resentment. "You saved my brother. Now I've saved you. We're even."

With that, she glanced at me and the remaining assassins, who were now fleeing in terror.

"Next time, don't expect me to be this kind."

She turned and vanished into the narrow alleys of the Lower City as quickly as she'd appeared.

I was left alone in the chaos, with a dying Silas and more questions than answers.

Who was that girl? Why did she help, but with so much hate?

I knelt beside Silas, trying to stabilize him. "You need to get out of here," I said. "They'll be back."

"I can't," he whispered, his breath shallow. "These people… need me."

"They'll die if you die!" I snapped, frustration rising in my voice for the first time. "What kind of logic is that?"

He smiled weakly. "Heart logic, Welt. Something you might never understand."

At that moment, I made a decision. Not based on calculations or strategy, but on something else. Something I'd taken from the remnants of the original Welt Rothes's memories.

"Then I won't let you die," I said. I didn't know how, but I would protect him. Not because he was an asset or a part of my plan. But because, in a world drowned in darkness, his illogical kindness was an odd too precious to let fade.

My task this dawn had been to observe. But I had become more than an observer. Damn it, I was now a player in a game far more personal, and dangerous. And I realized, with a cold, creeping fear, that for the first time, I wasn't fully in control.