CHAPTER 2: The Second Fracture

The knight moves faster than expected—a blur of black steel, all murderous intent.

I raise my arm. Not to block—to shift. A ripple cracks through the air as I twist the scalar constant for gravity. For a moment, gravity turns from gentle pull to violent crush.

The knight slams into the ground like a meteor. The floor buckles beneath him, cracks spreading in perfect hexagonal patterns.

I stagger back, wincing from the feedback. Too much adjustment. Too fast.

Okay. So scalar manipulation isn’t just math—it fights back.

The knight rises without pause. Its armor groans as it recalibrates—then it leaps again.

I grit my teeth and rush forward. Fist to fist. We clash—blow for blow—faster than the eye can follow.

Ten seconds of pure, brutal violence.

Then it changes.

The knight draws a long obsidian blade. It hums—vibrating like a tuning fork in a dead dimension.

It swings.

I duck—too slow. The blade grazes my shoulder. Shallow—but it burns.

Then reality breaks.

Gravity stutters beneath my feet. My scalar field skips like a corrupted frame. The world tilts sideways—no, in every direction.

My body falls up, down, left, all at once.

Vision triples.

That sword didn’t just cut matter—it cut constants. It undoes my equations.

Another swing. I dodge—barely. The air behind me shatters like glass.

I leap back, gasping. This knight was designed to kill people like me.

“God, you’re a pain in the ass,” I mutter.

The knight charges, blade raised.

I duck—not to dodge, but to pivot. I twist gravity and spin into a kick.

The sword flies from its hand—skidding across the platform.

It lands near Saaya. She watches silently.

The knight doesn't hesitate. It lunges.

We trade punches. Heavy ones. Every blow feels like colliding with a meteor.

Shockwaves ripple out from us. Gravity and inertia twist around each move.

I land a punch. Too hard.

Because I cheated.

I rewrote mass for a millisecond. Just enough to amplify the strike.

The knight stumbles.

I smile.

This isn’t just combat. It’s calculus.

And I’m the only one doing the math.

We step back. Breathing hard.

Eyes locked.

I move first.

I thrust my palm forward—then slice downward like a conductor.

The platform beneath the knight fractures. Gravity collapses.

The knight drops—slams thirty meters down. A crater erupts around him. Armor splits.

I drop in after him. Land hard. Right on top.

Then—I let go.

I punch. Again. And again.

All the pain. All the rage. Everything the gods took—I pour into every strike.

Each blow rewrites gravity. I anchor the force. Bend the rules.

Heavier. Heavier. Heavier.

Armor caves. Then shatters.

Piece by piece, the knight breaks beneath me.

Until—

One final punch. A thunderclap of rewritten physics.

The helmet flies off.

Metal crashes to the ground.

I breathe hard. Blood drips from my fists. My body shakes under the fractured sky.

It’s over.

Or… I think so.

Then I look down.

And freeze.

Because the face staring back… is mine.

Same build. Same platinum-silver hair. Same mole beneath the lip.

A copy. A reflection. A nightmare made flesh.

“What the hell…?” I whisper.

Saaya lands beside me. “Sukara, what’s wrong?”

“He looks like me. Exactly like me.”

She studies the body. Nods slowly. “That’s no accident.”

“Is this… a clone? Another timeline? A trick?”

I step back, fists clenched. Scalar energy warps the ground.

Saaya places a hand on my shoulder. Her touch steadies the storm.

“We’ll get answers,” she says. “But first, we heal you.”

I blink. “How? You healed my arm like it was nothing. That’s not normal.”

“I don’t heal,” she says. “I reverse causality. I return things to how they were.”

Her violet eyes glow. A soft pulse of light flows from her hands.

Pain fades. My ribs realign. I feel whole.

“You’re amazing.”

She smiles—gently, but there’s weight behind it.

“The gods feared what I could undo. Just like they feared what you’d become.”

I hold out my fist.

She bumps it.

“Let’s get out of here.”

“Let’s,” she echoes.

But then she stops. Her face tightens.

“The fracture… it’s not silent anymore. It’s watching us.”

A tremor shakes the ground.

“Looks like we just unlocked the next level.”

The silence now breathes.

Saaya stares into the shimmering horizon. “Maybe defeating the knight triggered it. I wandered this place for years. I never saw an exit.”

I nod, the pieces finally fitting.

“This realm didn’t know how to process me,” I mutter. “So it tried to erase itself.”

Then— a pulse of light in the distance.

Reality bends. Gently. Like gravity exhaling.

Permission.

“Let’s go!”

I grab Saaya’s shoulder and twist gravity sideways.

We don’t fly. We fall—eastward.

“Wait—WHAT?!” she yells.

“We’re not flying. I changed what direction ‘down’ is.”

We plummet into the light.

Then—impact. Soft. Welcoming.

We land on something solid. Like compressed memory.

Ahead of us: a ring. A structure suspended in space. Floating metal. Inside: rippling energy.

“A portal,” Saaya whispers.

“Maybe it wasn’t made for you,” I say. “Maybe it needed both of us.”

I approach. Equations flare across the ring’s edge.

Scalars.

They shift as I draw near. Not just organic values—system constants.

“This thing… it’s alive. Or I’ve finally adapted.”

“I need a minute.”

I press my hand to the ring. Glyphs swirl.

“Nothing outpaces science. Nothing outsmarts knowledge.”

The ring hums louder.

And then—it opens.