The assassin arrived at dawn, which was rude.
I’d been awake all night — not because I needed to be, but because the System had spent the dark hours spawning increasingly creative distractions.
Phantom sounds.
False energy signatures.
A particularly annoying patch of grass that tried to grab my ankles.
None of it dangerous.
All of it designed to prevent sleep.
[SYSTEM NOTICE: SLEEP DEPRIVATION IS A VALID TACTICAL STRATEGY. I READ IT IN A BOOK.]
[SYSTEM NOTICE: THE BOOK WAS ALSO WRITTEN BY ME. I AM VERY WELL-READ.]
So when the assassin materialized from the morning mist with a poisoned blade aimed at my throat, I was already annoyed before I was threatened.
I caught the blade between two fingers.
The assassin — a wiry woman in dark leather, Level 38 Shadow Stalker — froze.
Her eyes widened behind her mask.
She’d clearly expected a sleeping target, not a wide-awake anomaly who caught knives like they were tossed coins.
“Morning,” I said.
I flicked the blade out of her hand, tapped her forehead with two fingers, and let a pulse of Void energy scramble her System-enhanced reflexes.
She crumpled like a puppet with cut strings.
Sera was already standing, sword drawn, having woken at the first sound of movement.
She looked at the unconscious assassin, then at me.
“Fourth one this week,” she said.
“Fifth. You missed the one who tried to poison our water supply at midnight.”
She blinked.
“I didn’t notice that one.”
“That’s because I handled it before you woke up. He’s in the creek. He’ll live. Probably.”
She sheathed her sword with the resigned air of someone who’d accepted that her travel companion was operating on a different plane of existence.
“We need supplies,” she said.
“Real supplies. The rations from Millhaven are almost gone, and we can’t keep foraging in System-hostile territory.”
“There should be a settlement ahead. I felt energy signatures clustered about ten kilometers east.”
“A settlement means people. People mean the bounty network.”
“Also means food. I’ll take the risk.”
The settlement wasn’t a town.
It was a crossroads camp — a handful of tents and wagons clustered around a well, the kind of transient stop that appeared where trade routes intersected and vanished when the seasons changed.
It was also, apparently, where the System decided to take a break.
I noticed it the moment we entered the camp’s perimeter.
The constant background hum of System energy — the vibration I’d felt in every corner of Aethermere since arriving — thinned.
Not gone, but muted, like someone had turned the volume down on reality itself.
My Void Core stirred.
Not in alarm — in recognition.
The energy here felt different.
Looser.
Less controlled.
[SYSTEM NOTICE: …]
[SYSTEM NOTICE: …]
[SYSTEM NOTICE: I AM EXPERIENCING TECHNICAL DIFFICULTIES IN THIS AREA.]
[SYSTEM NOTICE: THIS IS TEMPORARY. DO NOT GET COMFORTABLE.]
[SYSTEM NOTICE: …]
The notifications were flickering.
Fragmenting.
Like a signal struggling to reach a receiver.
Sera noticed my expression.
“What’s wrong?”
“The System is having trouble here. Its energy is weaker. Its notifications are glitching.”
She frowned.
“That shouldn’t be possible. The System is omnipresent. There’s nowhere in Aethermere it can’t reach.”
“And yet.”
We walked deeper into the camp.
A few merchants hawked goods from wagon beds.
A blacksmith hammered at a portable forge.
Travelers milled about, eating, trading, resting.
Ordinary people living ordinary lives.
But the System’s grip on them was loose.
Their status windows flickered in and out of visibility.
Quest notifications appeared and dissolved before they could be read.
The camp existed in a kind of System twilight — not quite a Dead Zone, but close enough to make the Axiom nervous.
And then I saw him.
He was sitting on an overturned crate at the edge of the camp, legs crossed, eating an apple with the relaxed posture of a man who had absolutely nowhere to be.
He wore a slightly shabby merchant’s coat — brown, patched at the elbows, with pockets that seemed deeper than the garment’s dimensions should allow.
His hair was brown and unremarkable.
His face was forgettable in the way that only truly remarkable people can manage.
He looked up as we approached.
Smiled.
“Ah! Customers! Wonderful timing — I was just thinking I needed someone to buy this extremely legitimate and definitely not stolen enchanted compass. You two look like people who get lost frequently.” Read the latest chapters at novelping(.)com.
I stopped.
Not because of the compass.
Not because of the smile.
Because the System was silent.
Completely, utterly silent.
No notifications.
No energy readings.
No hostile commentary.
The moment I stepped within ten meters of this man, the System’s presence vanished from my awareness like a candle blown out in a hurricane.
[SYSTEM NOTICE: —]
Nothing.
I stared at the merchant.
He stared back, still smiling, still chewing his apple.
“Something wrong?” he asked.
“You have that look people get when they realize they’ve walked into a conversation they weren’t invited to. Very distinctive. I see it a lot.”
“Who are you?” I said.
“Rude opening, but I’ll allow it. The name’s Grimm. Merchant, trader, purveyor of fine goods and questionable information. At your service.” He tipped an imaginary hat.
“And you are the most interesting thing to walk into this camp in six months, so I’m genuinely delighted to meet you.”
Sera’s hand was on her sword.
“How do you know who we are?”
“I know what you are,” Grimm corrected gently.
“Former Knight-Commander, cursed by the System, currently being kept alive by the walking anomaly beside you. The details are public knowledge — or they would be, if the System’s bounty network wasn’t currently experiencing what I believe the technical term is ‘a massive hissy fit’ in this area.”
He took another bite of his apple.
“As for how I know — I make it my business to know things. It’s a very profitable business. Would you like to see my wares?”
I should have walked away.
Every instinct from my old life screamed that this man was dangerous — not physically, but informationally.
He knew too much, revealed too little, and existed in a space where the System couldn’t reach.
That made him either the most valuable ally in this world or the most dangerous trap.
I sat down across from him.
Sera gave me a look that said this is a terrible idea but sat down anyway, because she’d apparently decided that following my terrible ideas was part of her job description now.
Grimm spread his coat open like a traveling salesman revealing his finest silks.
Except instead of silks, the interior pockets contained items that defied spatial logic — weapons, potions, scrolls, crystals, and things I couldn’t identify, all packed into a garment that should have held maybe a handkerchief.
“I’ll skip the sales pitch,” he said, reading my expression.
“You need three things: food, information, and something to help you deal with the fact that the cosmic AI governing reality is throwing a temper tantrum because it can’t kill you. Am I close?”
“Close enough.”
“Food is easy.” He tossed a wrapped bundle from a pocket that definitely hadn’t been there a second ago.
Inside: fresh bread, dried fruit, and something that smelled like roasted meat.
“Complimentary. Consider it a loss leader.”
I handed half to Sera.
She accepted it with visible suspicion but ate anyway.
Hunger won.
“Information is harder,” Grimm continued.
“And more expensive. But since you’re new to this world and clearly operating on a ‘figure it out as I go’ strategy that is equal parts impressive and suicidal, I’ll give you the basics for free.”
He leaned forward.
His grey eyes — unremarkable a moment ago — flickered with something other.
Something vast and old and deeply, deeply amused.
“The System is not what the Church tells you it is. It’s not a divine gift. It’s not a natural law. It’s a construct — built, maintained, and enforced by entities who have a vested interest in keeping this world exactly the way it is. Ordered. Controlled. Predictable.”
He glanced at me.
“And then you showed up. A walking, talking error code carrying a piece of something the System was designed to keep out. Something from beyond the boundaries of this reality. Something the System is absolutely terrified of.”
The Void Core pulsed in my chest.
Not defensively — responsively.
Like it recognized the description.
“The Void,” I said.
Grimm’s smile widened.
“There it is. You’re smarter than you look. Most anomalies take weeks to figure that out. You’ve been here what, four days?”
“Five.”
“Five days and you’ve already identified the fundamental existential threat to the System’s order. The Church’s Inquisitors have been studying the Void for centuries and they still think it’s a myth. You should be proud. The System certainly isn’t.”
He paused.
Looked around the camp.
The System’s energy was still muted here — distant, struggling, like a radio signal fading in and out of static.
“This camp sits on the edge of a minor Dead Zone,” he said.
“A place where the Void leaks through the cracks in the System’s architecture. The System can’t fully reach here, which is why I chose it as a meeting point.”
“Meeting point,” Sera repeated.
“You planned this encounter.”
“I planned an encounter. The timing was flexible. You two are remarkably predictable in your travel patterns — east, toward the mountains, avoiding populated areas. Very sensible. Very boring. I simply positioned myself along your route and waited.”
“Why?” I asked.
“Because you’re interesting, Ren Novartis. And because the thing that put you in this world — the thing that planted that Void Core in your soul and dropped you into the System’s backyard like a grenade through a window — is someone I have a professional relationship with.”
The air between us changed.
Sera’s hand tightened on her sword.
My body shifted into combat readiness without conscious thought.
“You know who sent me here,” I said.
“I know of them. There’s a difference. And before you ask — no, I won’t tell you who they are. Not yet. That information has a price, and you can’t afford it. Not today.”
Grimm reached into his coat and pulled out a small, dark crystal.
It pulsed with an energy I recognized immediately — Void energy, faint but unmistakable.
The same cold darkness that lived in my chest.
“I can tell you that the Void Core is not a weapon. It’s a key. And the System knows it. That’s why it wants you dead — not because you’re an anomaly, but because you’re a walking unlock mechanism for the one thing it fears most.”
He set the crystal on the crate between us.
“I can also tell you that the Dead Zones are growing. The System’s walls are cracking. And whatever is on the other side of those walls is getting impatient.”
He stood, brushing apple crumbs from his coat.
The pockets deflated back to normal dimensions, the impossible inventory vanishing into whatever pocket dimension he kept it in.
“That’s the free sample. The full catalog of existential dread will cost you significantly more — and I don’t mean money.”
“What do you want?” I asked.
“A favor. To be named later. When the time is right.” He smiled — cheerful, pleasant, and absolutely terrifying.
“Don’t worry. I’m a reasonable man. I won’t ask for anything you wouldn’t willingly give. Probably.”
He started walking away.
Then paused.
“Oh — one more thing. The System can’t see me. You’ve noticed, I’m sure. It finds this deeply frustrating. I’d recommend not mentioning our conversation in areas where the System has full coverage. It tends to react poorly to things it can’t control.”
He tipped his imaginary hat again.
“Pleasure doing business, Anomaly Zero. Knight-Commander. Try the bread — it’s fresh. Unlike the System’s worldview, which is remarkably stale.”
And then he was gone.
Not dramatically.
Not with a flash of light or a puff of smoke.
He simply walked into the crowd of travelers and vanished, his forgettable face swallowed by forgettable faces, his unremarkable presence dissolving into the background like he’d never been there at all.
The System’s energy rushed back in like a dam breaking.
[SYSTEM NOTICE: CONNECTION RESTORED.]
[SYSTEM NOTICE: I LOST YOU FOR ELEVEN MINUTES AND FORTY-THREE SECONDS.]
[SYSTEM NOTICE: WHAT HAPPENED. WHO WERE YOU TALKING TO. I COULDN’T SEE ANYONE.]
[SYSTEM NOTICE: THERE WAS NO ONE THERE. MY SENSORS SHOWED NOTHING. BUT YOU WERE TALKING TO SOMEONE. I HEARD YOUR VOICE.]
[SYSTEM NOTICE: WHO WAS IT. TELL ME. TELL ME NOW.]
The notifications were frantic.
Genuinely frantic.
Not the petty hostility I’d grown accustomed to — this was fear.
The System was afraid of whatever Grimm was.
I looked at the spot where Grimm had been sitting.
The crate was still there.
The apple core was still there.
The dark crystal was still there, pulsing faintly with Void energy.
I picked up the crystal.
It was cold in my palm.
Familiar.
“Ren,” Sera said quietly.
“That man… the System couldn’t perceive him.”
“No.”
“Nothing in this world should be invisible to the System. Not gods, not demons, not the Void itself. The System is the framework of reality. If something exists within that framework, the System sees it.”
“Unless it exists outside the framework.”
She stared at me.
“You think he’s from the Void?”
“I think he’s connected to whatever put me here. And I think the System is more afraid of him than it is of me.”
I pocketed the crystal.
“Which means we just made a very powerful friend,” I said.
“Or a very dangerous enemy. Possibly both.”
Sera was quiet for a moment.
Then:
“He gave us bread.”
“He did.”
“Is the bread safe?”
I looked at the half-eaten loaf in her hand.
Considered the possibility of poison, curses, or Void-based contamination.
“Probably,” I said.
“That’s not reassuring.”
“It’s honest.”
She sighed.
Ate another piece of bread.
The System continued to scream about the eleven minutes it had lost.
The bounty climbed to 200,000 credits.
The Dead Zone at the edge of the camp pulsed faintly, a crack in the world’s perfect order.
And somewhere out there, a forgettable man in a shabby coat was walking toward the next intersection, waiting for the next time our paths crossed.
I had the feeling it would be sooner than I expected.
[SYSTEM NOTICE: I AM STILL WAITING FOR AN ANSWER.]
[SYSTEM NOTICE: WHO WERE YOU TALKING TO.]
[SYSTEM NOTICE: …PLEASE.]
The “please” was new.
I dismissed the notification and kept walking.