The obelisk floated in silence.
It was massive—taller than any building in the slums, carved from stone that didn't belong to any known asteroid. Blue light pulsed through veins in its surface, slow and deep, like a sleeping heartbeat.
Kay stared through the viewport. "That's it."
Max whistled. "That's a lot bigger than I expected."
Ella ran her scanner. "Energy readings are off the charts. Whatever that thing is, it's not natural." She paused. "And it's shielded. The crystal in your pocket is the only thing resonating with it."
"Then I go alone."
"Kay—"
"No arguments." He grabbed his spacesuit. "You two stay with the ship. If something goes wrong, leave."
"Leave you?" Ella's voice cracked.
"If something goes wrong, I'm already dead. Don't die with me."
Max nodded slowly. "He's right. We're the ride home." He looked at Kay. "One hour. Then we come in hot."
Kay pulled on the helmet. The seals hissed. Air cycled. He grabbed the crystal from his pocket—it was blazing now, almost too hot to hold.
Then he stepped out the airlock.
---
Space was cold and quiet.
Kay floated toward the obelisk, tethered to the ship by a thin cable. His breathing echoed in the helmet. The crystal in his hand pulsed in rhythm with his heart.
Twenty meters.
Ten.
The obelisk's glow intensified. Kay felt something press against his mind—not painful, but heavy. Like someone was watching him.
Five meters.
He reached out and touched the stone.
The world vanished.
---
Kay stood in the slums.
But not his slums. This was wrong. The shanties were burned. The streets were empty. Bodies lay in the mud.
"Father!" Kay ran.
He found Kane on the doorstep of their hut. Not sitting. Lying. His eyes were open, staring at nothing. His chest wasn't moving.
"No. No, no, no—"
Kay grabbed his father's shoulders. Cold. Already cold.
"You did this."
Kay spun around.
Ella stood behind him. But her face was different. Hard. Cold. She held a knife.
"Ella, what—"
"You left us. You went chasing power and forgot about everyone else." She stepped closer. "Karl's family came after you couldn't. They burned everything. Everyone." She raised the knife. "This is your fault."
Kay's hands shook. "You're not real."
"Real enough."
"You're not real!"
He closed his eyes.
The crystal burned in his grip. He could feel it—not in the vision, but in his real hand, back in space. Warm. Alive.
*This is a test.*
He opened his eyes.
The image of Ella flickered. The burning slums flickered. His father's body flickered.
"You're not real," Kay said again. Louder this time. "My father is alive. Ella is on the ship. This is just fear."
The vision screamed.
The sky cracked. The ground split. Kay stood in the middle of chaos, and something massive rose from the darkness—a shape, a shadow, a thing with too many eyes and no face at all.
**"YOU ARE NOTHING."**
The voice wasn't sound. It was pressure. It crushed Kay's skull, his chest, his bones.
**"A SLUM RAT. A WEAKLING. 0.22. YOU WILL NEVER REACH THE STAR."**
Kay's knees buckled.
**"GIVE UP. DIE HERE. IT'S EASIER."**
He almost did.
Almost.
Then he remembered his father's hands, pushing the serum bottle into his palm. Remembered Ella's smile when she gave him the energy monitor. Remembered the kids in the slums who looked up at his rickety ship and cheered.
*"Not bad, huh?"*
Kay stood up.
"I'm not nothing."
The shadow screamed.
**"YOU ARE—"**
"I'm a slum rat." Kay stepped forward. "I'm 0.22. I'm the son of a crippled soldier. And I'm still standing."
He raised the crystal.
"Break."
The vision shattered.
---
Kay opened his eyes.
He was floating in front of the obelisk. His hand was pressed against the stone. The crystal was gone—absorbed into the surface.
Blue light flooded the obelisk's veins. Then it flooded Kay.
Energy poured into him.
Not gentle. Not kind. It burned like fire, ripped through his muscles, his bones, his blood. Kay screamed inside his helmet. His back arched. His teeth clenched.
The wrist monitor on his suit flickered.
**0.25... 0.31... 0.42... 0.58... 0.73... 0.85.**
Stop.
The light faded.
Kay hung in space, gasping. His body felt different. Lighter. Stronger. Like someone had replaced his blood with lightning.
He looked at the monitor.
**0.85.**
His eyes widened. "No way."
From 0.22 to 0.85 in seconds. He was almost at Karl's level. Almost at the academy line.
But something else had changed.
He could feel it. A new sense, like an extra limb he'd never known he had. Space around him wasn't just empty anymore. It was *folds*. Layers. Places he could step through if he pushed.
"Kay! Kay, respond!" Ella's voice crackled in his helmet.
"I'm here." His voice was hoarse.
"What happened? The energy spike—we thought you were dead!"
"I'm not dead." He looked at the obelisk. The blue light had dimmed, but symbols still glowed on its surface—ancient writing he couldn't read. "I'm... more."
"More what?"
"More everything."
He pushed off from the obelisk and floated back toward the ship. His movements were faster now. Sharper. Space bent around him without him even trying.
Then the ship's alarms blared.
"Contact!" Max shouted. "Capital ship signature. Coming out of the asteroid field."
Kay turned.
A massive vessel emerged from behind a rock—Karl family colors, guns charged, sensors locked.
"They found us," Ella said.
Kay's blood went cold. The obelisk's energy pulse. It must have been detected across half the belt.
"Kay, get back here now!"
He was already moving.
Behind him, the obelisk's ancient文字 flashed one last time—a language no one had spoken for ten thousand years.
And somewhere on the Karl family ship, a screen lit up with a single word: **TARGET ACQUIRED.**
---
**(End of Chapter 6)**