I couldn’t go anywhere. All I could do was lie in the hospital bed and read the latest webnovels on my phone.
It wasn’t exactly refined entertainment. In this age of information—games, films, everything was within reach.
But I no longer had the energy for any of it. I couldn’t focus. In games I’d forget what I was doing mid-match and get cursed out by teammates. If I tried a movie, one lapse and the screen would already be rolling the credits.
So I read webnovels instead. Cookie-cutter plots, interchangeable prose. Precisely because none of it was worth remembering, I could read with a clean conscience.
Food wouldn’t go down. A bite and I’d feel sick. I tapped into the newest chapter, trying to distract myself:
“Your crimes end here, Ross! Today I’ll repay, in blood, the innocents you lured and killed!” Nolan, exhausted, drew his sword and stared at the black sorcerer, certain the other man was in even worse shape than he was.”
“Heh. You think I’ll just surrender?”
“But to his surprise, the black sorcerer thrust out both hands and punched through the chests of two companions. The warped hearts beat in his grasp.”
“The black sorcerer split his monster’s grin and swallowed the pair of hearts down.”
“Heh-heh-heh—The Seed is the source of our power. Now I shall receive the Abyss’s favor—thrice over!” Ross roared. Moments ago he had been spent, yet now he unleashed power never seen before.”
“Then, with the Abyss’s blessing, Ross purified Nolan with primordial force and scattered the Abyss’s power to every corner of the continent. All living things returned to the Mother’s embrace.”
“The end.”
“What trash!” I’d been expecting the hero Nolan to pull off a last-minute reversal and cut a swath through the enemy; faced with this lazy chapter, I couldn’t help cursing. “Meteor escape? Cash grab and run? After all the money I dumped in—No. I’m flaming him.”
I lunged into the comments, eager to see other readers mercilessly roast this pay-to-win garbage—only to find row after row of default avatars and random nicknames:
“Praise the Abyss.”
“Praise the Abyss.”
“Praise the Abyss.”
“Praise the Abyss.”
“Praise the Abyss.”
“Praise the Abyss.”
…
The screen was a solid wall of “Praise the Abyss.” What was this? Had the site been infected? Panic spiked. I hammered the back button, terrified my phone would catch whatever this was.
Just then, the site popped a dialog over the page:
“Do you agree to the User Agreement?”
“Yes / No”
At the very bottom ran a minuscule blue hyperlink, cramped letters that seemed to read “Explanation of Responsibilities Regarding the Apostle of the Abyss Contract,” with a pre-checked box beside it: “I have read the above User Agreement.”
I was frantically tapping to exit—but my shaking finger slipped and hit “Yes.”
And so, the contract was sealed—
Nolan Cyril set out early that morning, trudging more than ten miles from his village to the nearest free city: Romern.
On his back he carried a long cloth-wrapped bundle, taller than he was, which made him look particularly odd.
Even more conspicuous than that was his plain, threadbare clothing—painfully out of place in this prosperous northern free city of the Empire, fattened by trade and kissed by the sea.
Of course, that didn’t mean Romern had no poor in rags. They existed—packed into the slums of the lower city. Most would live and die merely gazing up at the splendor of the upper city.
But Nolan, a shabby pauper, strode right into the city and onto the central commercial boulevard the citizens prided themselves on, his expression oddly numb and calm.
He could read. He looked up and saw a small storefront with a signboard that read “Magical Sundries,” and a painted conical hat in black.
He had the sense not to enter the gilded palaces along the avenue. Dressed and aged as he was, he’d be turned away for certain.
So he tried his luck at a hole-in-the-wall.
“Kid, this isn’t a place for you.”
The robed old man gave the boy a bored glance.
“I have something to sell,” Nolan said, steady—no hint of fear, he thought.
“We don’t buy trash,” the old man sniffed.
“You haven’t even looked. How do you know it’s trash?” Nolan slipped the long bundle from his back and thumped it onto the floor.
The weight alone drew the old man’s eye. He adjusted the single gemstone lens over one eye and watched as Nolan peeled back the wrappings to reveal a weapon cold and glittering—
“A greatsword—” The old man came around from the cluttered counter and examined the blade, his gaze running from the runes along the spine to the sea-blue gem set in the guard.
Just like the boy’s eyes.
“This is an enchanted weapon,” he said, frowning slightly as he studied Nolan. “Where did you get this? We don’t take goods without provenance. If you can’t explain, I’ll call the guard—”
“It’s my great-grandfather’s relic,” Nolan answered smoothly. “My great-grandfather, Fenn Cyril, was a knight in receipt of a patent.”
“How will you prove it?” the old man asked.
“With the letters patent.” Nolan was quick as ever, drawing a sealed parchment from his bundle.
“That won’t be necessary. How much for the blade?” the old man said, waving off the document.
“Ten gold,” Nolan answered at once.
The old man blinked, then laughed.
“Came prepared, did you—That is indeed the going rate.”
“But I won’t pay you that much.”
“Why not?” Nolan asked.
“Because I still have my wits. ‘Cyril’—I remember that name.” The old man tapped the sword. “Ten gold is the price for a named antique with clean provenance. Plenty of grandees will buy it to hang on a wall or dole out as a reward.”
“But with this surname, it can only sell as a weapon—seven gold. Not a coin more.”
Relief loosened Nolan’s chest—seven gold. He’d feared being bargained down to five.
“Done,” the boy said, lifting the greatsword in both hands and laying it on the counter.
The old man shot him a look of surprise. He hadn’t expected someone so young to handle a weapon many grown men couldn’t even manage.
But that wasn’t his concern. He counted out seven full-weight gold coins and passed them over.
“Pocket it. Don’t let anyone see.” The old man sighed and, ignoring the boy, began admiring the blade—a piece of craftsmanship near to art.
Nolan tucked the coins away, wrapped them tight in cloth, and turned out of the shop.
His stomach growled—he’d only had a scrap of black bread before setting out. The smell from a streetfront kitchen made his mouth water, but the weight of gold at his belt told him not to linger.
“Sis—this should cover tuition,” he thought, quickening his pace for the city gates—then checked himself, worried that moving too briskly would draw eyes. He forced himself to slow.
“Hey, kid.”
The thing he’d feared came to pass.
Just out from the upper city’s passage, three roughs in their twenties closed in, scowling.
“We just watched you stroll right between the guards. How’d you get into the upper city?”
“Gentlemen, I’m on an errand for a lord outside the walls. Please don’t trouble me.”
Nolan stopped. He didn’t mention his line—descended from a knight. As for getting in, of course he’d relied on the letters patent to bluff his way through.
“Outside the walls… tsk. Another backwater hayseed noble,” one thug spat.
They cut a glance at the guards by the passage and, though they grumbled, they moved aside.
Romern was a free city, self-governed by imperial charter, beyond the reach of landed nobles. But even street rats measured risk before they bit.
Nolan shook them off, walked out the gate, and made for home on foot. He kept on until the sun dipped and blood-red dusk spilled over the earth. Only then did the village at the mountain’s foot come into view, its dinner smoke curling into the sky.
He didn’t live in the village, but up the slope.
He passed through, traded greetings with familiar faces, and climbed the evergreen path. His cabin came into sight.
By this hour—his sister should have had the fire going. So why was there no smoke?
A bad feeling struck. He lengthened his stride and burst into the yard. His sister, Diya Cyril, stood at the door, staring at him in fright.
“Brother—”
She cried out:
“A bear, in the back—there’s a bear in the yard!”
A bear? Nolan’s head rang. How could there be a bear? Around here there weren’t even many wolves! And it was winter—the season bears hibernated!
He snatched up the hay rake by the wall. “Diya, hide. I’ll look.”
Diya nodded in a panic, gathered her skirt, and ran to the front yard.
Nolan swallowed, gripped the rake, and stepped into the cabin, pressing to the rear door to look out.
A bear. A massive, terrifying bear, reeking of rot, lay as if asleep across the little vegetable plot.
“No…” Nolan muttered. The bear didn’t seem to be breathing. It looked dead. Suspicion stirred. He edged closer and prodded its flank with the rake—then flinched as the tines sank in.
Startled, he yanked to pull the tool free, but the iron teeth had hooked the hide. The hulking beast, which seemed all muscle and menace, came apart like softened butter, torn open by the rake.
A wave of stench billowed out. Murky fluid and rotting entrails sloughed from the rent belly.
And with them, a slender figure spilled forth.