Bai woke to light, not the warm sunlight of the mortal world, but the cold, sourceless illumination that seemed to define this place. The cliffs were visible again. The frozen trees stood in their silent clusters. The mist valley waited to the north, unchanged.
Morning. Or what passed for it.
First priority: water.
He'd carved out two basins the night before—one for drinking, one for bathing. The thought of bathing seemed absurd, but he'd caught his reflection in a patch of ice. His teeth were starting to turn brown. Divine existence regeneration didn't include automatic purification. Dirt accumulated. Waste accumulated.
He'd deal with hygiene later.
But first: water quality.
He'd left a small amount in the drinking basin overnight to see if anything would settle out. The water appeared clear. Colorless. Normal.
He drank, it tasted normal, clean, cold, unremarkable. But it felt different going down—not wrong exactly, just other. As if the water came from a source that didn't quite match what his body expected.
He'd drink. Nothing more. After resting, he sat down and activated his concept. He was outside himself again, watching his own past unfold. No pain. Just clarity and the growing exhaustion that came from using any concept for extended periods.
He rewound. Saw himself drinking water. Sleeping through the night while roars echoed from the valley. Carving the basins. Building the shelter. Breaking trees.
Rewound further. Waking in this place for the first time. Standing disoriented, trying to understand where he was.
Rewound again. Falling—
He stopped. His heart clenched. Not in the memory. In reality. His hands were shaking.
He was looking at the reception hall. At the tear in space that had opened without warning, consuming everything in its vicinity. At himself standing before it, half his body already swallowed by the rift, his limbs moving without direction as if his consciousness had been severed from his physical form.
And around him—
Horror.
Thunder crashed across the massive space, striking divine existences who'd been too slow to dodge. Ice spread from another source, freezing people mid-motion. Golden blood painted the floor in streams and pools as bodies collapsed under forces that exceeded what Resonance and Attuned stage beings could withstand.
The scene was frozen in his memory—paused in the instant before his fall completed.
He forced himself to look closer. There—movement at the edge of his perception. A figure he'd almost forgotten: Chén Yè.
Running. Bleeding golden ichor from wounds Bai couldn't identify. But that wasn't what made his chest tighten.
Chén Yè was mortal. Awakened stage. His blood shouldn't glow like that—shouldn't carry runes so complex they were visible even from this distance, shouldn't shine brighter than most of the divine existences around him.
What had happened to him?
Bai shifted his perspective, trying to see what Chén was running from. And saw Vera Lin. Crying. Bleeding from a dozen wounds, thunder still crackling across her skin where her Command concept had manifested in ways that were tearing her apart. She was running toward Chén, her hand outstretched, her expression desperate.
But Chén was running away.
Not from her, he hadn't seen her. His focus was forward, survival-focused, unaware that one of his own was dying behind him trying to reach him.
Something twisted in Bai's chest.
Chén was the one Vera had tried to save.
He continued examining the memory.
Chén was mortal. The fall, the thunder, the ambient force of Transcendent combat—any of it could have killed him. Vera had been caught by the same forces that had claimed so many others.
Had they survived? Had Vera reached him? Had they fell through the tear? Had they avoided the tear? He didn't know. He continued the memory playback.
His own body fell through the tear. The scene went blank—no memories during the fall. Then he was falling again, this time through open air above an unfamiliar landscape.
He paused the memory.
From this aerial perspective, he could see the terrain below. The cliffs. The frozen trees. The mist valley. And beyond—
Water. Endless water to the west, stretching to a horizon he couldn't see. More water to the east, but different—broken ships jutted from the surface like the ribs of dead giants, and sunken buildings were visible beneath the waves.
To the north, the mist valley extended deeper than the aerial view could penetrate.
To the south, where he'd landed—the cliffs, the relative safety, the isolation.
He'd fallen furthest south.
And there—scattered across the landscape—other figures falling through the air. Too far apart to reach each other. Too distant to identify clearly. But they were there.
Others.
Survivors.
The memory ended as his body struck the ground.
Bai released his concept and sat in silence.
His hands were still shaking.
He'd gotten off relatively safe. Landed in the most isolated area, away from the obvious dangers, with time to recover and plan.
The others hadn't been so fortunate. They'd fallen north and east—toward the ships, the sunken buildings, whatever had destroyed them.
Bai pulled out a piece of wood and began sketching what he'd seen.
A map. Crude, imperfect, but better than nothing.
He marked the directions. West: endless sea. East: broken ships, sunken buildings. North: mist valley. South: his location.
He studied the sketch and made his decision.
North. Through the mist valley.
The east was too dangerous—whatever had destroyed those ships would be more than he could handle alone. And the survivors who'd fallen in that direction...
Peace be upon them.
Going north meant the mist valley. Meant the creature that had roared last night. Meant dangers he couldn't see or predict.
He would need to scout first. Assess the threat. Find advantages he could exploit when he eventually had to pass through.
And he needed to find the others. Specifically, those with abstract concepts. Physical concepts were common—fire, ice, strength, speed—always multiple wielders.
But he and Seren were unique. Memory and Meaning. The ones in their generation with concepts that operated on such fundamental levels.
That made them priorities.
Bai stood and prepared to move.
Scout the valley during daylight. Return before nightfall. Assess the threats. Plan the crossing.
Simple.
He ran toward the mist, his feet carrying him across frozen ground with the enhanced speed that Resonance stage granted. As he approached the valley's edge, the mist settled against his skin—cold, clinging, reducing visibility to almost nothing.
He slowed his pace and entered carefully.
The cold intensified immediately. Not just temperature—something else. Something that seeped into his bones and made every movement feel heavier, more difficult.
Bai moved forward anyway.
He had work to do.