Amelia didn't flinch. Instead, her reflection in the vanity seemed to wither. "You think I don't know all that?" she said, voice thin. "I saw you. I saw how he looked at you. I hated you because I couldn't be you."

  Ada froze dead in her tracks. Amelia turned toward her, face pale and drawn. "You're right...I didn't fight. I didn't hold him. I stayed back. But not because I didn't care. I never chose this, Ada. I never chose to love someone who bound me and enslaved me." Her lips trembled, but her voice stayed steady. "You got there first, and maybe you deserved to. But don't mistake my silence for not feeling everything you feel...just louder and longer."

  A heavy silence settled. The anger didn't vanish, but something softened. Ada looked at her for a long time, searching for lies, and found none. "I didn't ask for any of this either," she whispered. "But we're both here. And he's not."

  Their eyes locked.

  Amelia and Ada packed up the spatial tent. They decided to head to the 15th floor for some training.

  Amelia stepped up to the telepad, the magic crackle that it gave off dimmed ever so slightly, like the dungeon was mourning. She felt the bond that held her to Dane sever. She looked, and she was no longer enslaved. She could go back to the Empire, and nothing would happen. She shuddered and felt an emotion she didn't expect: sorrow. Dane's note muddied the waters. Before, she would have rushed off to resume her old boring life, the one with nothing unexpected and success awaiting her.

  Ada began to back up slowly; she readied herself. It was then that Amelia noticed that the party was disbanded. What happened next no one could have expected. She screamed in pain. She quickly pulled up the system interface to see what status effect ailed her. The interface wouldn't respond. The air changed something that had been around Amelia her whole life, and with her since she turned sixteen, just disappeared.

  A weight had lifted, and she began taking small and slow breaths. The feeling of the Emperor's watchful eye was no longer on her. It felt like a massive piece of herself was missing, the Emperor's blessing.

  She stood up, dusted her scout fatigues off, and turned to Ada. The healer was lying on the floor. She couldn't just leave the women. She lifted the surprisingly heavy bronze woman, and a note fell out of her pocket; Amelia read the contents.

  To Ada and Amelia:

  If you're reading this, I'm already on the 23rd floor or beyond. Do not follow me. I need you both elsewhere.

  Amelia, you're in charge. Start clearing out and liberating the remaining slave camps. Prioritize stealth and speed. Not everyone can be saved, but those who are freed must be brought to the lower levels and trained. Use the time dilation to your advantage. Build something.

  Ada, your insight and empathy are critical. Help Amelia keep the recruits together, sane, and sharp when the cracks form, fix them before they break. Keep them alive.

  To both of you: I can't give either of you what you may want from me. Not now, maybe not ever. I care for you both more than I have words for, but I can't afford to divide my purpose. The System we're under must be dismantled. If I let myself be more than a weapon right now… I'll hesitate when it counts.

  This isn't a goodbye. It's just what needs to be done.

  To Amelia:

  Amelia

  I meant what I said. I will not cross that line; I feel there is something between us. But right now, I'm asking you to let that wait. If there's a future where we're free… maybe then.

  Until that day comes, burn this note. Don't carry my ghost with you.

  Dane

  "I swear I'll save these slaves...no, not slaves. Your people." Amelia vowed

  It took hours for the healer's fever to break. She was delirious; and she muttered stories from the tutorial during that delirium. Amelia had always thought the tutorial was glamorous, a place where the Emperor showered the chosen with knowledge and power. The truth couldn't have been further from the truth.

  The world crept back into Ada piece by piece, not all at once like a sunrise, but in fragments, cold stone against her spine, the stale taste of dried blood in her mouth, the smell of smoke and something faintly metallic clinging to the air. Her body jolted as she opened her eyes, and the first thing she saw was Amelia, hunched over her like she had been there for hours, maybe longer, her face drawn with exhaustion and something else that didn't belong, resolve.

  Ada tried to speak, but her voice came out dry and cracked, hardly more than a whisper. "What happened?"

  Amelia didn't respond immediately. Instead, she handed over a waterskin, the gesture careful, almost clinical, but there was weight behind it, something unspoken. Ada drank, letting the water coat her throat, but the silence between them said more than words could manage. After a long moment, Amelia finally spoke, her voice even, as if she'd gone over the words a dozen times in her head before saying them aloud. "The party disbanded. You got hit with most of the backlash." She paused. "Dane's gone."

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  Ada blinked, trying to sit up, but her limbs felt like dead weight, and something deeper inside her was wrong, not broken exactly, but… missing. She reached inward, instinctively, searching for the warmth of Dane's tether. She felt it since the day he fought off the abyss wolves, since the day she knew no other would touch her, not again. She also no longer had the System. Like the world was righting itself, and she could go home to her mother once more.

  There was nothing. Just a void where the connection used to be, an emptiness so complete it almost felt like being born again...if birth came with grief.

  "I can't feel him," Ada whispered, the words slipping out before she could stop them.

  Amelia didn't flinch. "You're free."

  "I read your note," Amelia told the woman.

  The weight of that truth settled over her like a shroud. No system, no divine presence watching from above. No more map lines lighting up under her feet like promises. Just the echo of everything that had been taken, and everything that had been keeping her in place. She turned her head slightly, just enough to look Amelia in the eye. "Is he dead?"

  "No, that man wouldn't die." Amelia's response was quick, certain. "He went deeper. The twenty-third floor."

  Of course he did.

  "What else did he say?"

  That question took longer to answer. Amelia looked away, jaw tightening for a moment, like she was chewing on something bitter that she couldn't spit out.

  "He put me in charge," she said finally. "Told me to free the camps. Train the ones we can save, and use the time dilation in the deeper floors.."

  Ada exhaled slowly, the breath shaky as it left her. She was still trying to wrap her head around the silence inside her, the way the System was just… gone. No status screen. No pings. No interface. Just her. A raw version of who she used to be before the Emperor carved purpose into her spine.

  "So," she said, her voice still fragile, but her words sharper now. "He gave us a war."

  Amelia shook her head once. "No. He gave us a problem."

  There was no accusation in her tone. Dane hadn't chosen her because he trusted she would win. He'd chosen her because he couldn't let himself care too much to fail. That was its own kind of love. Or sacrifice. Maybe both.

  They sat in silence for a long while, the low hum of the telepad off in the distance the only authentic sound left in the quiet. The dungeon, as always, waited. It never moved first.

  "The training bots of the tutorial worshiped the System like it was sacred," Ada murmured after a while. "The Emperor used it to prepare us. But when I was delirious… I remembered everything. Memories that I choose to forget. It wasn't sacred. It was a crucible."

  Amelia didn't argue. She just nodded, eyes tired but alert.

  "The system's gone," Ada said again, more to herself than anything. "We're cut loose."

  "Not entirely," Amelia replied. "We have each other. The bond's gone, but we're still here. And the dungeon gave us time, so we use it. And take this dungeon. One floor at a time."

  Ada studied her for a moment, and for the first time in days, maybe longer, she saw something solid in her, the elf who felt almost like a friend, a center. A command presence Dane had always carried like a weight, now passed to someone who hadn't asked for it. But wouldn't drop it either.

  "Okay," Ada said softly. "General."

  Amelia gave a tired smirk. "Commander, maybe. Let's not get ahead of ourselves."

  "What's the plan?" Ada asked

  "We head for the fifteenth floor, just like we said. We find the camps. We see who's left, who's still breathing, and who can stand. We're not here to be heroes. First, priority is survival."

  Ada looked toward the shimmering blue of the telepad and let out a breath that felt like it came from somewhere far deeper than her lungs.

  "And then?"

  Amelia's eyes didn't waver. "We find Dane for some answers," she waved the note at Ada.

  It came without fanfare, no sudden light, no explosion of sound. Just a subtle change in the air, like the dungeon had exhaled after holding its breath for too long. Amelia felt it first. She paused mid-step, fingers still wrapped around the strap of her pack, something catching in her chest. Pressure, not painful or heavy like a thread being pulled tight from somewhere far away. It wasn't the Emperor's leash, and it wasn't Dane's bond as it had been before, but something about it still felt... familiar.

  "Ada," she said softly, not turning around.

  The healer didn't answer at first. Then Amelia heard the rustle of fabric as Ada slowly sat up from her bedroll, the fever having finally broken hours ago. Her voice, when it came, was quiet and rough, but sure. "You feel that too."

  Amelia nodded, even though Ada couldn't see it. Her system interface flickered open on its own, something she hadn't seen happen since she was sixteen. But there was no Imperial seal. No commands. No blessing. Just scattered lines of code she didn't recognize and a single message that blinked once before fading.

  Soul-Tether Reformation

  Detected Source UNKNOWN

  IDENTITY: Dane McAllister

  WARNING SYSTEM Instability

  Dane's message: "A friend died that you never knew. She forged this System. If the Emperor has shunned you, I hope it gives you strength."

  She stared at the message until it vanished. The feeling didn't go away.

  "I don't understand," Amelia said, her voice barely above a whisper. "The bond was gone. I felt it sever. I knew it was gone."

  Ada had pulled herself up to her feet now, unsteady but alert, her brows drawn tight as she clutched her side like the ache grounded her. "Maybe it's not the same bond," she said. "But it's him. I'd know it anywhere."

  There were no commands in her mind, no weights pressing against her will. But the presence was unmistakable. Fragile but real. It was Dane. He was still connected to them, not by order, not by force, but by something new. Neither of them spoke for a while. Amelia finally lowered herself to the stone floor beside the fire, her thoughts racing. She didn't know what had caused it, there were no signs, no clear answers, but she could feel it in her bones: He wasn't gone. And whatever had brought him back into reach, it wasn't the Emperor's will. That meant something else had taken hold. And for the first time since they'd left him behind, she didn't feel abandoned. She felt chosen.