Chapter 69: Blind Jump

  The Wayline was chaotic. The destruction of the entry gate—the "Sunken Gate" on the Arcanorum side—had destabilized the Wayline. We tumbled through the wayline light, streaked with jagged lines of static, as gravity fluctuated wildly, tossing us up, down, and sideways.

  I drifted near Vrex, tethered to him by the spool I pulled out from my locus. It kept us from being separated by the currents.

  "Status," I called out, my voice sounding tinny and distant in the void.

  Vrex adjusted his trajectory, using his massive density to act as an anchor in the stream. His obsidian skin was scorched white in places from the Ascendant’s erasure beam. He was missing chunks of his shoulder.

  And his right hand.

  The limb ended in a jagged, crumbled stump of granite. He wasn't bleeding—he was stone—but the metaphysical damage leaked a faint, grey mist.

  "Functional," Vrex grunted, staring at the stump. "Mobility is compromised. Combat efficiency reduced by 35%. I will require... masonry work."

  "You require a miracle," I corrected, pulling myself along the tether until I floated right next to him.

  I reached into my Locus. My inventory was intact. I bypassed the pile of Lucent Shards and the crate of bricks.

  I pulled out a Greater Pearl of Vitality.

  It was my second one. I had four left. In the economy of the multiverse, I held a small kingdom’s ransom in my hand. It was a "Get Out of Death Free" card.

  "Here," I said, holding it out.

  Vrex looked at the pearl, then at me. His golden eyes narrowed. "You used one on yourself. That was necessary survival. This... this is luxury. I can repair with common stone and time. Save the asset."

  "We don't have time," I said, shoving the pearl against his chest. "And I don't know where we're going to land. If we drop into a combat zone, I need you at 100%, not 65%. And you literally saved my ass."

  I looked him in the eye.

  "Besides, you lost the hand throwing me to safety. I'm not letting you walk around broken because I'm cheap."

  Vrex hesitated for a second longer, then took the pearl with his remaining hand.

  He crushed the pearl.

  The effect was geological time sped up to a blur.

  The white light soaked into his stone arm. The jagged stump crystallized. New stone surged outward, dark and dense, forming the metacarpals, the phalanges, the heavy, square knuckles. It sounded like a glacier cracking.

  In three seconds, his hand was back. It looked darker than the rest of him, polished and pristine.

  Vrex flexed the new fingers. Grind. Crack.

  "Back to 100%, Thanks Glitch"

  "Good," I said, letting out a breath. "Now, where the hell are we going?"

  I floated back, giving myself space, and summoned the Astrolabe.

  The holographic interface bloomed in the void. Usually, the Orrery of Worlds showed the path ahead—a clear line connecting the world we left to the world we were approaching.

  This time, the line was fraying.

  The destination node pulsed with a dull, question-mark grey.

  [Current Trajectory: Unstable]

  [Destination: The Sunken Gate (Designation Pending)]

  [Tier: Unknown]

  [World Type: Unknown]

  "That's... not promising," I muttered. "Astrolabe, give me a read. What is the Sunken Gate?"

  [Query Failed. No Data Available in Resonant Stream.]

  I frowned. "No data? Not even a basic planetary classification? Is it a gas giant? A rock? A flat earth held up by turtles?"

  [Data Corrupted or Non-Existent.]

  I looked at Vrex. "The GPS is broken. It says 'No Data.' How can there be a Waypoint with no data? Waylines connect established worlds."

  If you spot this narrative on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.

  Vrex floated silently for a moment, watching the chaotic stream rush past us.

  "Usually, yes," he said. "But Waylines are rivers. They flow where the gravity of reality pulls them."

  He gestured back the way we came, toward the invisible point where Arcanorum used to be.

  "Kaelen. You released a Titan. The release of that much raw energy changes the topography of the void. It is like a landslide diverting a river."

  He looked ahead, into the dark tunnel.

  "The explosion may have forced a connection that did not exist yesterday. We are traveling a spillway."

  "So we're the first ones?" I asked, a thrill of fear and excitement mixing in my gut. "We're explorers?"

  "Or we are debris being flushed into a sewer," Vrex countered pragmatically. "It can do that. The multiverse is fluid. New worlds are found. Old worlds are lost. We are drifting into the unknown."

  "Great," I sighed, rubbing my temples. "So, unknown gravity, unknown atmosphere, unknown natives. I really need to upgrade my scanning."

  "We will adapt," Vrex said. "That is what we do."

  I nodded, settling back against the invisible current. The journey felt long, giving me time to think.

  And time to deal with the blinking notification burning a hole in my periphery since the escape.

  [Skill Evolution Pending]

  I focused on it. The text expanded, filling my vision.

  [Skill: Kinetic Grasp]

  [Current Rank: Impulse (Max Level)]

  [Progress: 100%]

  Analysis: User has demonstrated exceptional creativity with telekinesis. Usage includes: projectile manipulation, precision tying, self-propulsion, and structural interference.

  To advance to [Rank 2: Technique], you must specialize. Choose how you apply force.

  Three trees of light branched out before me.

  Option 1: The Heavy Hand

  Focus: Impact.

  Effect: Increases mass limit by significant portion. Your "push" becomes a battering ram. You can crush armor and throw boulders, but you lose fine motor control. You become a siege engine.

  I shook my head. "Too blunt."

  Option 2: The Ghost Limb

  Focus: Sensory.

  Effect: You can "feel" through the telekinesis as if it were your own skin. Range is tripled. You can pick locks from across the room or perform surgery at a distance. Force output is capped at your own body weight.

  "Tempting," I mused. "Being a master thief fits the rogue vibe. But I need to be able to move myself fast, not just pick pockets."

  I looked at the third option. It felt like the natural evolution of how I’d been using the skill to survive.

  Option 3: Kinetic Flow

  Focus: Redirection.

  Effect: Instead of fighting against momentum, you guide it. You can curve incoming projectiles without stopping them. You can apply force to yourself to change direction in mid-air or slide along surfaces.

  It just let me cheat the angles. It was about efficiency—using the enemy's strength, using gravity, using speed.

  "That's it," I whispered. "Don't stop the train. Just switch the tracks."

  I reached out and selected the third path.

  [Evolution Confirmed]

  [Ability Upgraded: Kinetic Flow (Technique - Level 1)]

  A shiver of alignment ran down my spine. The mental muscle that was Kinetic Grasp shifted. It felt less like a stiff, invisible arm and more like a fluid current I could tap into.

  I looked at a piece of debris floating near us—a chunk of wood from the shattered hangar. It was spinning lazily.

  I reached out with my mind.

  I nudged the direction of its spin.

  The wood snapped into a 90-degree turn instantly, maintaining all its speed but changing its destination. It shot past Vrex’s head, missing him by an inch.

  Vrex raised an eyebrow.

  "You are playing," he observed.

  Feeling the drain on my Lumen. It was significantly lighter than before. "I think I can actually steer myself in the air now. No more flailing."

  "Do not test it here," Vrex warned, pointing ahead. "Because I believe we are arriving."

  I looked forward. The chaotic tunnel of the Wayline was widening. The indigo light thinned, revealing a circle of darkness ahead.

  It was the dark, crushing blue of deep water.

  "The Sunken Gate," I remembered the name. "Vrex... I think it's literal."

  "You have the Gill-Mesh Choker?" Vrex asked, checking the seal on his own Mana-Lung, which he had re-equipped.

  "Yeah," I said, my hand going to my throat where the magical item sat. "It's active."

  "Good," Vrex said, bracing himself as the current picked up speed, hurling us toward the exit. "Because I sink."

  "I'll catch you," I promised, flexing my mind with the new Kinetic Flow.

  We hit the threshold. The transition was a pressure slam.

  The Wayline spat us out.

  Cold. Wet. Crushing.

  We were deep underwater. The pressure was immediate and immense, pressing in on my eardrums, my eyes, my chest.

  My Horizon flared, reinforcing my biology against the weight of the ocean. The Gill-Mesh activated, gills forming spectral slits along my neck, filtering oxygen from the water.

  I opened my eyes.

  Bioluminescent moss clung to massive, Cyclopean ruins, lighting the darkness. We had emerged from a giant, shattered archway at the bottom of a trench.

  I looked around.

  "Vrex?" I called out, my voice garbled by the water but audible.

  He was below me, plummeting toward the silt-covered floor of the trench. He sank like a stone.

  I reached out. Kinetic Flow. I pushed him sideways, turning his fall into a glide.

  Vrex’s descent shallowed out. He drifted down, landing softly on a paved road made of giant, hexagonal stones.

  I swam down to join him. My Prismatic body adapted, the water mana feeling cool and slow compared to the frantic energy of Arcanorum.

  "Welcome to the deep end," I bubbled.

  Vrex looked around at the ruins—towers that spiraled up into the dark, covered in barnacles and silent history.

  "No," Vrex corrected, his voice transmitting clearly through the water via his stone resonance. "This is not the deep end, Kaelen. This is a graveyard."

  He pointed to a statue looming over the road. It was a massive figure, robed and crowned, holding a trident. But the statue was melted. Slagged. As if it had been exposed to heat hot enough to boil the ocean.

  "Looks like something burned this world," Vrex said. "And then the water came to hide the ashes."

  I checked the Astrolabe.

  [Location: The Sunken Gate]

  [Tier: 1 (Dead World)]

  [Atmosphere: Aquatic/Toxic Residue]

  "Tier 1," I whispered. "A Dead World. No natives. No economy. Just loot and ghosts."

  "Then we scrounge," Vrex said, starting to walk down the silent road.

  I followed him into the ruins, my new kinetic senses pinging off the currents, feeling the flow of a world that died a long, long time ago. I needed to study this skill more.