WHERE UNBOUND WAITS

The place where the Unbound came together wasn’t buried beneath secrecy—it decayed in the open.

It existed in a pocket of the neglected city—a half-demolished transit hub sealed off after a catastrophic accident decades ago. Suppression fields failed constantly there, not because they were attacked, but because no one bothered maintaining them. Magic leaked freely, curling through the air in faint threads that danced like smoke. It felt alive, restless, even sentient.

Akiro felt it before he stepped fully inside, nausea rising like bile in his throat. The hairs on his arms stood up, prickling with a thousand tiny warnings.

“There is still time to turn back,” Rin said quietly, walking beside him, eyes sharp and scanning. Her hand hovered near the edge of her jacket where she carried her seals.

He shook his head, jaw tight. “If I don’t see it, I’ll keep wondering.”

Her eyes softened briefly, a flicker he almost missed. “You’re stubborn.”

“Not stubborn,” he muttered. “Curious.”

“Still the same,” Rin said, looking away.

They descended into the broken station, footsteps echoing across cracked tiles and rusted metal rails. Torches burned along the platform—real fire, not conjured. The smoke didn’t irritate him as much as he expected. Somehow, the scent of burning wood felt grounding.

Symbols were carved into pillars and walls, glowing faintly, alive but uncontrolled. Some shimmered with residue-like veins, others flickered like dying stars. Akiro’s mark pulsed faintly beneath his skin as if it could sense its kin in the air.

And there they were.

The Unbound.

Not a mob. Not a cult. People.

Some sat talking in clusters, casual, laughing softly over what seemed like petty disagreements. Others argued more heatedly, voices rising and falling in almost palpable tension. A few practised crude magic with mixed success: sparks fizzled, shadows bent in odd ways, and occasional blasts of uncontrolled energy rattled tiles. A handful just watched, expressionless, like spectators at a theatre that didn’t need tickets.

Kaito stepped forward, smooth, deliberate, his scars catching the firelight. “You came,” he said, smiling. Not triumphantly, not menacingly, but like a man greeting an expected visitor.

Rin’s posture stiffened instantly, hands curling into fists at her sides. “This is reckless,” she said, voice low but cutting.

Kaito shrugged. “Why are you then? I invited Akiro to search for me, not you.”

He turned towards Akiro, eyes soft now, human in a way that unsettled him. “How do you feel?”

Akiro opened his mouth, then closed it. Paused. Words felt thin, inadequate. “…Fine,” he said finally, barely above a whisper.

Kaito’s smile faltered. He crouched slightly, like speaking softly would reach deeper than volume could. “Clearly you’re not.”

A murmur rippled through the group, subtle but tense, like a striking wind before a storm.

“You’re being hollowed out,” Kaito continued, his voice low, calm, precise. “And they’re calling it balance. They’ll tell you it’s fairness, that it’s protection, that it’s the right way. But it isn’t balanced—it’s erosion.”

Rin snapped, stepping closer. “You don’t care about him.”

Kaito’s gaze didn’t leave Akiro. “I care about choice.”

Akiro swallowed, feeling the burn of every fragment he had already lost. “What happens if I stop?”

Rin stiffened, her jaw locking. He could see the lines of tension along her arms, the way her posture stiffened, ready for action.

Kaito answered gently, almost soothingly. “The system adjusts. Or it breaks.”

“That’s not enough for me to stop,” Akiro said flatly, feeling the hollow echo of his emotions.

“No,” Kaito agreed. “But it’s either that or you become an empty vessel.”

Akiro looked around the broken station—the uncontrolled magic sparking faintly, the danger simmering beneath the surface, the sheer humanity of the people who had survived this way. He could feel the pulse of the place, chaotic and unbound, but alive. He looked back at Rin—the woman who had trained him, protected him, pushed him.

“I don’t know who I am without this,” he admitted finally, voice quiet but raw.

Rin’s voice softened, almost a whisper. “You’re still you.”

He wasn’t sure she believed that anymore.

Kaito watched them both, silent. He didn’t need to speak; the air itself seemed to pulse with his intent.

Above them, far beyond the broken station, the seals trembled again. The lattice that had held for generations strained under the weight of fractured human intent and uncontrolled magic.

This time, the system did not correct itself.

Akiro felt it in his chest, subtle but undeniable. A thread of certainty, a small piece of his centre, slipped away quietly, like sand through fingers. Not violently, not dramatically—just gone.

Not yet noticed. Not yet mourned.

He glanced at Rin. Her eyes narrowed as if she could sense the same shift, a change in the delicate balance she had fought to maintain.

“What did I just feel?” he whispered. Tears were dripping down his face.

“I believe you just lost a piece of you,” Rin replied, voice low. She swallowed hard. “I’m sorry.”

That was the first time Akiro ever heard Rin apologise.

“That’s the first cost of this… not the magic itself, but the environment. The pressure. Exposure.”

Akiro’s stomach twisted. “So even being here… I’m losing more?”

“Yes,” Rin said. “Every second. Every breath. Every pulse of magic.”

“Dammit,” he muttered. “I didn’t sign up for a quick death.”

“I told you we shouldn’t have come here,” she said, looking at Akiro with sadness in her eyes.

He laughed softly, bitterly. “R- right, I- I should’ve listened, please don’t look at me like that,” Akiro said, alarmed by Rin’s new emotions—expressions.

Kaito stepped closer, tilting his head. “Do you feel it? The Void creeping?”

“Yes,” Akiro said, voice flat, almost disinterested. “It’s…dark.”

“Dark isn’t harmless,” Kaito said, leaning closer, eyes softening. “It’s dangerous. It’s the first warning your system gives you. You adapt to losing fragments until one day… nothing triggers at all.”

Akiro’s stomach knotted. “Nothing?”

“Nothing,” Kaito confirmed. “No fear, no hope, no joy, no panic. You continue because you must, but you cease to care. And that’s when the system decides you’re ready to be recycled.”

Rin’s hand touched his shoulder lightly. “Ignore him,” she said sharply. “His warnings are… abstract. We need to focus on what you can control.”

“I can only control staying upright,” Akiro said. His hope shattering, “That’s it!”

“And that’s enough,” Rin replied, mending the hope that’s shattering. “Focus on the now. Your footing. Your awareness. Your breathing. Everything else is a distraction.”

Akiro closed his eyes briefly, inhaling. Counting. “One… two… three… four…”

Kaito’s voice cut softly through the quiet. “You’ve already lost more than you realise. Each fragment gone leaves a ghost in its place. You’ll notice in time. Or you won’t, and the ghosts will notice you instead.”

Akiro swallowed hard, eyes opening to take in the Unbound around him. They were dangerous, yes, but they were also alive in ways he hadn’t expected. Unpredictable, flawed, passionate, and uncontained. He saw flashes of himself in them—fragments of his potential, of his fear, of his resilience.

“Are they wrong for doing it this way?” he asked, nodding toward Kaito.

Kaito’s gaze softened again. “Not wrong. Just… untampered. Free, yes, but at the cost of stability. Everything has a price.”

“And if I stay with the Wardens?” Akiro asked, voice tight. “If I keep being a void?”

“You pay differently,” Kaito said. “Fragments vanish slowly, quietly, leaving nothing behind but the shell. With us, you risk chaos, sudden failure, and… mortality. With them, it’s patient erosion.”

Rin’s voice cut in, ice-cold. “You stay with me, and you survive. You don’t flirt with annihilation for the sake of philosophical experiments.”

Akiro looked between them—between the radical honesty of Kaito’s world and the structured, suffocating order Rin offered. He felt his mark pulse hotter under his skin. Every choice, every step, every fragment lost or preserved felt heavier now.

“I don’t know who I am without this,” he said again, softer this time.

“You are still Akiro,” Rin said, voice gentle. “Even when the pieces start disappearing, even when magic carves away your edges, you are still you.”

Akiro wanted to believe her. He clung to the words like a lifeline, but the hollowness in his chest made him wonder if he would ever recognise himself again.

And somewhere, deep within the labyrinth of magic and human error, the system watched. It waited. It measured. And for the first time, the cracks weren’t just localised—they were spreading.

Somewhere inside Akiro, a vital piece slipped quietly, unnoticed by everyone except the lattice itself.

Not yet.

But soon.