Thirstfall - Memory of a Returnee-Chapter 23: Negative Space

​We move through the arena like a dysfunctional parade.

​Veric takes the lead, his chest puffed out, acting the part of the gleaming vanguard. I walk in his shadow, conserving energy. Lola trails behind us, using Veric’s massive frame to block the sun, her eyes darting nervously around the chaotic battlefield.

​She stays silent, but her eyes are loud, judging every single frame of reality.

​Veric points his sword toward a group near the fountain. A Rank D Cryomancer is unleashing a barrage of ice spikes against a distant wall, shouting incantations that shake the ground.

​"Him," Veric suggests, analyzing the tactical advantage. "High damage output. Good range. He fits the formation."

​Lola peeks out from behind Veric’s cape. She crinkles her nose instantly, shrinking back.

​"Smells like dead fish," she whispers, covering her mouth with her sleeve. "And pennies. Bad pennies. The shouting... it’s jagged. Like broken glass."

​Veric sighs, the sound of a man losing patience. "We are in a war zone, girl. Everything smells like burnt OXI and sweat."

​"No," Lola insists, shaking her head frantically. "He vibrates wrong. If he joins, I’ll vomit."

​I signal Veric to drop it.

"Next."

Lola seems to relax behind Veric’s cape, trusting my call without question. It’s immediate, automatic—the kind of trust that makes my skin itch. She’s known me for fifteen minutes.

​We continue as the minutes tick by. The "Safe Zone" of the initial confusion is fading. Teams are solidifying, and we are running out of options.

​Veric tries again. A heavy-armored Knight radiating a blinding holy aura—maybe a Paladin—is banging his shield to intimidate a group of newbies.

​"Too loud," Lola whines before Veric can even open his mouth. She presses her hands over her bear ears. "He’s a bell. A bad bell. Make it stop."

​"He is a tank!" Veric snaps, turning to me. "Sands, reasoning with her is impossible. We are letting prime recruits slip away because they ’smell funny’ or ’vibrate wrong.’ We need a fourth, or we are disqualified."

​"We don’t need a prime recruit," I say, scanning the crowd. "We need someone who fits the ecosystem. Someone Lola won’t execute—or worse, someone who won’t trigger her to explode us."

​We turn a corner near the edge of the arena, where the fighting seems sparse.

​Lola stops.

​She steps out from behind Veric. Her twitching fingers go still. Her breathing slows down.

​She stares at a shadow near the wall.

​That’s when I notice it.

​It’s not what I see. It’s what I don’t see.

​The crowd flows around a specific section of the wall like water diverting around a stone. Students running for their lives unconsciously veer away from that spot. No one looks at it. No one attacks it. It’s a blind spot in the collective consciousness of the arena.

​A negative space.

​In the center of that isolation sits a girl.

​She is huddled against the stone, knees pulled to her chest. She wears a tattered, oversized grey cloak that swallows her small frame. Her head is down, hiding her face.

​But it’s her hands that catch my attention.

​She is wearing thick, heavy leather gloves—industrial grade, meant for handling hazardous materials. They are stained and scratched, but she keeps her fingers interlocked tight, as if afraid to let them touch anything, even the air.

​"Oh," Lola breathes.

​Veric follows her gaze. His expression shifts instantly from annoyance to pure, superstitious revulsion. He takes a step back, his armor clinking.

​"Absolutely not," Veric hisses, his voice dripping with venom. "Are you insane? That’s the Leech."

​"The Leech?" I ask, feigning ignorance.

​​"Don’t you check the rumors, Sands?" Veric keeps his distance. "She’s a parasitic anomaly. No mana pool, and if she links on you... your OXI is gone."​

He points a metal finger at her, keeping his distance.

​​"She wears those gloves so she doesn’t accidentally kill the people next to her. That’s why she declared herself as ’Support’ just to get in, but nobody wants a support that kills you by shaking your hand."

​​Veric wasn’t being dramatic. In this world, OXI theft is a death threat.

​Then, I look at Lola. She isn’t scared. She is mesmerized.

​She takes a step toward the "Abomination," her eyes wide and sparkling with pure delight.

​"She’s... quiet," Lola whispers, a soft, dreamy smile spreading across her face.

​She raises her hands, miming a soft, round shape in the air.

​"Do you feel it? The air around her... it doesn’t scream. It just... vanishes. Like snow falling in a dark room."

​Lola turns to me, bouncing slightly on the balls of her combat boots, looking adorable and completely detached from Veric’s horror.

​"Can we keep her? She feels like a pillow. A cold, empty pillow. If I stand next to her, the static stops."

​"She will drain us dry, you idiot," Veric growls. "She is a parasite!"

​"I don’t care," Lola hums, hugging her own case. "She’s soft. I want the soft one."

​I look from the disgusted Noble to the excited Artificer. Then, I look at the girl.

​The girl looks up.

​Under the hood, stray strands of dark hair frame a face that would be strikingly beautiful if it wasn’t marred by grime and exhaustion. But her eyes... they are the most unsettling part. They are a storm-cloud grey. Hollow. There is no hope in them, only a crushing hunger that she has learned to endure in silence.

​It’s Rhayne. The girl I paid for at the gate.

​I intend to agree with Veric. An OXI-eater is a liability. I can’t command a squad if one member accidentally drains the others. It’s bad strategy.

​I open my mouth to say "No."

​But then, it hits me.

​*Zzzzt*

​A sharp pain spikes behind my eyes. The world tilts.

​It’s not a headache. It’s a memory. But not one I lived recently. It’s deep, buried under ten years of trauma, dredged up by the sight of those hollow grey eyes.

​*Flash.*

​Five years from now. The Eastern Front.

I am looking at a map of Sector 7. But the map is wrong. There is a hole in the middle of the continent.

Not a crater and not a ruin, or any natural formation.

A perfect, spherical void where a city used to be. The report on the desk is stamped with the highest clearance level: OBLIVION.

"Cause Unknown," the report reads. "Mana Signature: Null. Matter Signature: Null. The target didn’t implode. It simply ceased to exist."

*Flash.*

​I gasp, stumbling back a step. The present rushes back in. The noise of the arena returns.

​​I feel my heart trying to leap out of my throat, struggling to catch my breath.

​I look at the girl huddled in the corner. Everyone sees a parasite. Only the sensible Lola sees a silence filter.

​But I know what I’m looking at now.

​She isn’t weak. People just don’t know what she is. I’d bet even she doesn’t know herself.

​And she’s sitting right there, hungry and alone.

​"Sands?" Veric asks, noticing my pale face. "You agree, right? We leave it where it belongs. We don’t need a support mana-sponge, no one does!"

​I swallow dryly, forcing my composure to return. A cold, predatory excitement begins to coil in my gut.

​If I leave her, history repeats itself. She starves, she snaps, she goes down in history as a top-secret classified report.​

But if I feed her? If I control the hunger? The chaos theory already showed its teeth to me.

​"Lola is right," I say, my voice steady, betraying none of the terror I just felt.

​Veric gapes at me. "What?"

​"Lola needs stability," I lie smoothly.

If the ’Leech’ keeps the noise down, then she is an asset. A happy Lola is a safe squad.

The thought tastes worse than I expected. But I swallow it anyway—I’ve done worse for less.

​I turn to Veric and extend my hand, palm up.

​"Give me a Shard."

​Veric blinks. "Excuse me?"

​"I tapped out my liquid assets at the gate," I say flatly. "You want to win this wager? Give me a Shard. Consider it... operational expenses."

​Veric grumbles, cursing under his breath about "bad investments," but he reaches into his inventory and slaps a glowing blue Shard into my hand.

​"Fine. But if she eats my OXI, I’m taking the difference out of your hide."

​I take the Shard.

​"Besides," I whisper to myself, a grin tugging at the corner of my mouth. "I think I know exactly what to feed her."

​I walk toward the girl in the grey cloak.

​I stop in front of Rhayne. Her shadow falls over me. Even sitting down, the aura of ’nothingness’ around her makes the hair on my arms stand up.

​She flinches, pulling her gloved hands tight against her chest. She expects a kick. Or a spell.

​I don’t offer a hand—I value my life.

​Instead, I crouch down and place the glowing blue Shard on the stone between us.

​"You look hungry," I say softly. "Again..."

​Rhayne stares at the Shard. Her throat moves. A desperate, animalistic sound escapes her lips. She recognizes me from the gate. The one who paid.

​"My name is Dryden," I say. "And I’m hiring."

Rhayne stares at the Shard, the hunger in her grey eyes warring with fear. She looks at the glowing crystal, then at my face.

​She doesn’t reach for it. Instead, she slowly shakes her head. A silent, passive refusal. She nudges the Shard back toward me with the tip of her boot. Run away, she is saying. I will eat you.

​I don’t flinch. I push the Shard right back, pressing it against her knee.

​"I know what you are," I whisper, locking eyes with the void. "And I’m not asking for safety. I’m asking for a contract. Take it."

​She freezes. She searches my face for madness, but finds only calculation. Slowly, her trembling hand reaches out.

​Her leather glove brushes the crystal.

​*WAAAAOOOOO.*

​A deafening siren rips through the air, shattering the moment. The sky turns red.

​"PHASE ONE COMPLETE," a mechanical voice booms from the heavens.

​I look down. My hands are dissolving into particles of white light. Veric is shouting, but he is fading too. Rhayne clutches the Shard to her chest as she disintegrates.

​The tutorial is over. We are going up.