A lone teenager sat in the now-empty stadium.

  Eric’s friends had left a couple of hours ago. They had tried to get him to come with them. They had tried to comfort him, to tell him it was not his fault. He listened, nodded, and stayed put anyway.

  The debris of the battle was still everywhere. Broken boards. Cracked plastic seats. Dried blood staining the concrete steps and smeared along the bleachers. None of it shocked him anymore. That was the worst part. It should have, but it did not.

  He looked down at his hands. They were clean, but they would not stop trembling.

  He did not feel clean.

  He felt used.

  When Chris first told him the plan, Eric had pushed back. He had seen where it would go. He had imagined it clearly enough that it had made his stomach turn. He had said no.

  Then he had caved, like he always did.

  He told himself he was doing it because he needed to leave the West. Because the barriers would open, and if he could make it out, maybe he could find his dad. Maybe he could find something that still resembled a life.

  Now the barrier was about to open, and he could not even stand up and walk away from a set of bleachers.

  At first, he felt ashamed. Then frightened, waiting for the blame to land on him. Waiting for someone to point at him and say it out loud - You did this.

  But nobody did.

  Instead, the shame had settled on the Four Horsemen. Jess. Shawn. Siva. Chris.

  Eric should have been relieved.

  He was not.

  The longer he sat there, the more a different feeling pushed its way to the surface, hot and sharp.

  It was anger.

  Chris had pulled him into it. Chris had pushed. Chris had asked like it was just another step in a plan, like Eric’s hands were tools and not hands.

  And after it was done, Chris did not even come back to check on him.

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  Eric’s fingers curled into fists as he opened his loot tab again. He had gotten rewards before. Everyone did. But this one was different. It wasn’t just more gold or more potions. It wasn’t just another gadget to fix a problem.

  This felt like a higher calling.

  He read the item title again, because he could not stop himself.

  [Limited Reality Engine]

  A footstep scraped against concrete behind him.

  Eric did not look up. “Go away,” he said, flat and exhausted. He assumed it was one of his friends coming back to try again.

  The person did not move.

  And that’s when Eric felt it.

  A pressure in the air. A presence that did not belong here. Not like a human walking up behind you. This was something heavier. Something that made the hairs on his arms lift.

  Eric turned.

  A pale, gaunt man sat down beside him like he had always been there. He wore a black-and-purple cloak, the sleeves stitched with intricate runes that caught the light even in the dim stadium. The man stared out at the empty field for a moment, then turned and smiled at Eric like they were meeting at a café.

  Eric stood so fast his chair scraped back. He stepped away, heart thudding, eyes flicking toward the exits.

  “Wait,” the man said, raising one hand. His voice was calm and controlled. “I’m a friend.”

  Eric did not sit and he did not relax.

  “Who are you?” he demanded. “What do you want?”

  The man studied him, not with concern, but with interest. Like Eric was a problem he already understood.

  “I know what you’re carrying,” the man said. “I can feel it. The anger. The way it keeps circling back, no matter what anyone says.”

  He stood and took one slow step closer.

  Eric’s fear flared, sharp and immediate, but curiosity crept in behind it. The man did not feel like the Temple. There was no mechanical hum. No obvious augmentation. No signs of the upgrades that had fallen apart yesterday.

  “I said who are you,” Eric repeated, and this time his voice did not shake.

  The man did not answer directly. He kept talking, like that was not the important part.

  “Do you want to get back at them?” he asked. “For what they made you do. For what they turned you into. Leaving you behind while they move on like you were just another tool left behind after a job is done?”

  Eric swallowed.

  Images flashed in his head. The plan. The truck. The bodies. The screaming. His hands. His hands.

  He thought about Chris. About being needed, and then being discarded the moment it was over. Like his only value was what he could hack, what he could shut down, what he could pull from the system.

  Eric stopped backing away.

  He searched his thoughts, and when that failed, he searched his feelings instead.

  The anger was there. It had been there the whole time, growing louder every minute he sat alone.

  He looked the man in the eyes and said, quietly, “Yes.”

  The man took the last step forward and offered his hand, an age-old gesture of friendship.

  “Good. I’m Azim,” he said. “Now listen very carefully.”