On the fourth day of walking east, [Map Line] increased to level 2. It now lasted longer than before, beginning to curve and turn, no longer simply straight. Perhaps it was leading to a specific place, more in tune with where I subconsciously wanted to go.

I had also gained two points in endurance as I forcefully continued to walk without stopping. I was unwilling to let myself rest since it would allow unwelcome thoughts into my brain.

As the days passed, I had become better at moving, my walk no longer an awkward gait that leaned to the left. A little bit of my balance seemed to return, but the space to my right still felt empty—I was not completely sure how to describe it.

Even though Aleya had completely healed my wound, sometimes where Davion had severed my arm seemed to throb. I could almost swear I could feel my missing fingers flex.

The silence was beginning to grow tiresome, as sometimes it felt like I was walking through a void. Blood seemed to drip in the corner of my nonexistent vision. Instinctively, I would move my hand to wipe it away, only to find that nothing was there.

On occasion, the pyromaniac would join my endless march. He would skip through the snow, his red tie fluttering behind him. Then, he would grow furious at the cold, insisting that I “burn the world down, as only then can balance be restored.”

“Let’s do it,” he taunted. “Do it, do it, why won’t we?”

“We don’t have enough mana to burn the whole world,” I muttered back, my chin and mouth covered by my coat.

“It’s enough, it is!” He assured me. “We can burn our world down until nothing remains.” His words incited the fire under my skin, causing sweat to pour down my back, and it soaked my shirt. I tried to push the urge down, its contrast to the cold that bit against my exposed face almost painful.

“Now is not the time,” I told the pyromaniac. He stopped, and I left him behind where he stood in the snow.

The priest would also appear at times, always walking in front of me. His robes trailed on top of the snow, his head sometimes bowed—sometimes it was held high. When he appeared, it was at times where my pace would begin to slow, and he seemed to lead me onward.

He never said anything.

The pained hadn’t appeared in front of me since Drixstead. However, his haunted eyes would stare at me when I tried to sleep and when it grew too quiet. Sometimes it looked like his antlers were piercing flesh, causing blood to pour around his hollow face. But, I would quickly shake my head, and his visage would disappear.

That fourth night, I hadn’t stopped to sleep, and I began to feel as the ground changed. It seemed to slope downwards, and I slowed my pace. It could just be a hill, but the ground had been level so far, so the oddity stood out to me.

The line that had been leading me forward also began to change, wavering and fading in and out. It still led me forward, so I continued to follow it. The decline increased, and my balance started to become unsteady.

[Map Line] suddenly faded then jerked left, curving into an arc. Startled by its sudden change, I quickly turned to follow it. However, my foot slipped in the deep snow, my balance completely disappearing. I fell onto my left side, catching myself with my arm.

The slope was steeper than I had thought, and I began to slide down it. I tried to get up, but my feet couldn’t find traction against the ground. I turned to my back to try and dig my heels and hands into the ground, but I could not find any purchase.

My breath came in harsh pants as my speed seemed to increase, the pulsing red of [Map Line] urging me to backtrack. The ground dropped even further, and I roughly turned to my stomach, trying to get my knees under my body and dig my hand into the ground.

My throat convulsed around the cold air, feeling tight as I fumbled through the blackness. It felt as if I was being dragged into a monster’s mouth, and I wasn’t sure if my fear was irrational or not.

There was no way for me to see what was ahead and how the terrain changed. Was this just a small hill, and I was panicking over nothing? It felt like I had no time to even consider that option, lest it turned out to be false, and I was sliding to my death.

I continued to slip through the snow, and it felt like whenever I began to gain stability, a hand would pull me back down. I was no doubt leaving a trail through the snow which would be covered in a few days, erasing any trace of my existence.

My legs dropped past an edge as my hand finally dug into the hard earth hidden beneath the snow. The remains of my right arm were also uselessly stretched forward. My feet dangled in the air as I came to a stop, the earth suddenly changing to a completely vertical line.

As I hung there, I did not know what to do. A true abyss seemed to lay behind me, and I had no idea how deep it went. Wiggling my fingers deeper into the ground, I tried to flex them along with my shoulder to pull myself up. My breath caught as I slipped backward instead.

I dug my fingers back in, summoning a flame to the tips of them to melt the layer of ice on top of the dirt. After I regained my grip, I froze my body so no further movements would make me fall even farther. I hung there in silence, time passing at an extreme rate.

A hysterical laugh left me as my shoulders started to burn. The bottom of the priest’s robes appeared to my right, and I strained my neck to look up at him.

“Will we fall?” he asked me. “We’ve survived and lost so much; will it come to an end here?”

“I’m not afraid of dying.”

“We know. But is now the time?”

After a moment, I responded. “I don’t think so. It doesn’t feel right.” He nodded his head before looking past me.

At that edge, looking at the feet of my hallucination, I felt the futility of my existence. What was I, in the face of the end? I didn’t feel brave or clever. I felt like I was fumbling again; no matter where I stepped, I would always fall. Would I ever fully get up? It didn’t feel possible even if I escaped from this current plight.

“We have always reached through the darkness,” the priest reminded me. “We have fallen, and others have fallen to us—it is the way of reality.” A laugh left me at those words. I hardly understood what was real anymore.

“If we don’t understand what is real, then reality is whatever we decide it to be,” the priest quietly snarled, his words catching on the wind. “Will we let this so-called reality drag us down any further?”

I had never seen the priest get angry. Perhaps the part of me he represented was sick of my inaction, but I found that facet of myself hard to change.

Still, I gently swung my legs forward, digging the toes of my shoes into the cliff’s wall. It was a perfunctory grip, bound to slip at any moment. I reached with both my arms, digging my fingers in to try and drag my way forward.

The priest had gone, his part seemingly over. I could feel claws digging into my calves, creating burning holes of pain that kept me from moving forward. My throat spasmed as if I wanted to scream, but all the air had been taken from me.

For a moment, just a minuscule moment, I could feel the fingers of my right hand dig into the ground and pull me forward. I couldn’t feel any other part of my missing arm—it felt completely detached.

But as a result, I was able to pull myself out of the pit, and I scrambled on my hands and knees up the slope as quickly as I could. Once I reached level land, I flopped to my back, deeming myself safe.

[Skill Gained] - [Spectral Hand (1)]

[Spectral Hand (1)] - [active. Create an incorporeal hand that can be manipulated.]

I could hardly process the message, feeling drained. Once I did, the skill felt completely unbelievable. But, if I could summon fire, I guess I could summon an imaginary hand.

The skill felt a little unearned, I thought, as I began to calm down. I had only been on death’s edge and reached forward. Well, when I worded it like that, it did seem a little more plausible.

Now that I had regained some rationality, I noticed that almost half of my mana was gone. If I had been unconsciously using mana to help myself, perhaps it had some part in gaining this new skill.

It had worked the same way when I had earned [Summon Flame]—just use mana to manifest what I am imagining. Then, it had been flames, now, it was a hand reaching forward.

The priest’s words hit me then; reality had become what I wanted it to be.

Standing up, I used the skill, feeling an ephemeral hand appear in front of me. It was not connected to my body, but it had been then. I moved it, directing it to the ground. When I moved the hand through the snow and used it to pick up some, my mana drained at a much faster pace.

I stopped it as my pool grew dangerously low, my body feeling heavy as a result. I sat back down, taking some food from my bag, and draining a pouch of water to soothe my aching throat.

Digging out a hole in the snow, I laid down. My bones felt heavy, and sleep found me quickly.

When I woke, it seemed to be long into the day, and a small layer of snow covered me. Standing, I brushed it off, feeling better than I had before.

My heart still began to thud quickly as my surroundings reminded me of what had transpired yesterday. I couldn’t remember what direction the hole was, and I quickly activated [Map Line] with my restored mana.

It led me forward in a curve, and I walked slowly to make sure I was not heading down the slope once again. The ground stayed level, and after some hours of walking, the guiding line began to curve back to the right, and I figured I was now past the pit.

The pulse in my neck noticeably slowed as I walked forward, and my hand stopped shaking. As I thought about it, my fall into the hole reminded me of when Davion had dragged me into his pit, and I wondered if I would develop the fear of falling. It seemed highly plausible.

I tried to push it from my mind, the memory of dangling above an endless pit too fresh and practically traumatizing. I could only do what I always did—move forward.

Another day passed as I followed the line east. I experimented with my new skill as I went, finding that it could drag my body forward like it had before; I just had to consciously attach it to myself, and it took quite a lot of mana.

It was almost like a piece of space that had gained some solidity. When I summoned it, it also felt like a part of my body, even though it wasn’t directly connected to me. It was simply a hand, feeling as real as the priest or pyromaniac. That thought made the priest smile as he walked beside me.

Sighing, he spoke. "Reality is but a restriction imposed by those who fear what they do not know.”