My footsteps rang too loudly.

Each step I took echoed through the glass cave, sharp and brittle, like I was walking through the inside of a crystal bell. The sound bounced off the walls and came back wrong, delayed, distorted, and sometimes overlapping itself. It felt as if the cave was listening, memorizing the rhythm of my movement, committing it to some vast, unseen ledger.

I slowed.

The echoes didn't stop; they continued and continued, the sound traveling far into the beyond through the cave.

They kept going, repeating my steps long after my foot had already settled. I clenched my jaw and continued forward anyway, forcing myself not to look too closely at the walls. They shimmered faintly, glass layered upon glass, polished smooth in some places and jagged in others, like frozen waves caught mid-crash.

The fog kept thickening.

At first it had only brushed my ankles, a low-lying haze that clung to the ground. Now it reached my knees.

Then my waist, the now white haze clear enough to see without much difficulty.

Then my chest. At this point, a normal, unawakened human wouldn't be able to see through the fog.

With every step, the world shrank, swallowed inch by inch until the cave existed only a few feet in front of me.

Eventually, I could no longer see the walls at all.

Just white.

Endless, suffocating white.

The air grew colder.

Not gradually.

Not gently. I

t dropped in brutal increments, as if the cave itself was testing how much I could endure before breaking. My breath fogged instantly, pluming in front of my face before being torn apart by unseen currents. My fingers went numb first, then my toes, then the creeping ache settled deep into my joints.

By the time my teeth started chattering uncontrollably, I knew this wasn't just cold.

This was will, someone or something was forcing their will into the cave and by extension into the fog that currently clung to my entire body.

My muscles trembled, small involuntary spasms rippling through my legs. Each step became harder than the last, my body protesting with sharp flashes of pain as if my bones themselves were vibrating.

I swore under my breath.

"Not like this," I muttered.

I reached inward, careful, precise.

I pulled on my mana, just a fraction of a fraction, small enough to be inconsequential in a real battle where my life was on the line.

Life mana responded immediately, warm and familiar, a quiet pulse that spread outward from my core. I let only a tiny amount escape, barely enough to coat my skin. White mana unfurled around me like a thin blanket, sinking into my muscles and bones, pushing back against the cold without flaring brightly enough to draw attention.

Warmth returned.

Not heat.

But comfort, the warm embrace of life wrapping me like a blanket in a snowstorm, undisturbed and constant

My trembling eased.

My breathing steadied.

The peace that followed was subtle but profound, like the relief of slipping into dry clothes after being soaked to the bone. For a moment, just the one, I allowed myself to feel it.

Then I shut that feeling down.

Peace, in places like this, was dangerous.

I walked on.

Time lost meaning quickly. The cave offered no markers, no sense of distance or progression. I could have been walking for minutes or hours. My footsteps were the only proof that I was still moving forward.

Then the fog began to thin.

Gradually, reluctantly, it pulled back, revealing shape and space once more. The glass walls returned, curving outward, widening into something like a chamber.

And at the center of it.

A divergence.

The path split cleanly in two.

I stopped; the landscape ahead of me required my full attention, a beautiful contrast between holy and unholy.

The cave fell silent, as if holding its breath.

Two roads stretched before me, impossibly distinct, so starkly opposed that it felt almost laughable in its symbolism. Subtlety had been abandoned entirely. Whatever intelligence governed this place wanted the choice to be obvious.

On the right.

Light.

The path glowed softly, bathed in warm, golden radiance. The walls were not glass but living things, white dandelions and delicate grasses growing impossibly from smooth surfaces, their seeds drifting lazily through the air like snow. The floor was wood, pale and polished, birch by the look of it, each plank radiating a warm and comfy feeling.

The air smelled clean.

Fresh.

Safe in a way unlike what you would expect on a dead planet.

A gentle energy radiated from the path, sinking into my skin the moment I stood near it. My shoulders loosened without my permission. My breathing slowed. The constant tension coiled in my chest unwound, replaced by a soothing calm that whispered wordlessly: You are safe here.

It reminded me of childhood stories.

Of happy endings.

Of places where nothing truly bad ever happened.

Unfortunately or maybe fortunately for me, there was no happy childhood for me, nor was I going to get a happy ending, people like me got what was not the left...

Fire.

The profane path was a jagged scar carved into the cave. The floor was shattered glass, half-melted and refrozen into cruel, uneven shapes that reflected hellish light.

Some pieces glowed faintly, as if still holding heat from whatever furnace had birthed them. The walls were blackened stone riddled with holes and burn marks, scorched and cracked, as if they had endured endless torment and refused to crumble out of spite.

Heat rolled from it in suffocating waves.

The air vibrated, humming with violence, with promise. Not peace. Not comfort.

Endurance.

Pain.

The certainty that every step forward would be paid for.

It smelled of ash and iron.

It smelled like blood.

I stood between the two paths for a long time.

Long enough that the calm from the angelic path began to seep deeper, urging me closer. My muscles ached from the cold. My mind was frayed from isolation. Part of me, an exhausted, very human part, wanted nothing more than to step onto the warm wooden floor and let the cave cradle me.

I imagined it.

Walking forward.

The fog lifting completely.

Rest.

Safety.

Maybe even a reunion.

After everything we'd been through, didn't I deserve something like that?

My gaze lingered on the right-hand path.

It was beautiful.

That, more than anything else, unsettled me.

Because beauty like that had always come at a cost.

I exhaled slowly and forced myself to really look.

The dandelions didn't move with any breeze I could feel. Their seeds drifted, but the air itself was still. Too still. The calming energy wasn't passive; it was active, persistent, pressing against my thoughts, dulling my instincts.

Encouraging surrender.

Encouraging trust.

And trust, I had learned, was the most efficient way to die.

I thought of gods.

Of angels.

Of all the stories that painted the divine as benevolent, merciful, and kind.

And I thought of all the times those same beings had demanded obedience, sacrifice, faith, never offering protection without a price. The divine didn't need to lie. They didn't need to threaten.

They simply convinced you that their way was the only correct one.

That disobedience was sin.

That suffering was deserved.

The profane path made no such promises.

It didn't pretend.

It didn't offer comfort or peace or absolution.

It told the truth, plainly and cruelly: This will hurt.

And somehow, that honesty mattered more to me than all the false serenity in the world.

What looks gentle is not always good.

What looks monstrous is not always evil.

I'd learned that lesson once before, in another life, in another world, long before gods and monsters and mana had ever entered the picture. I'd learned it watching systems that smiled while grinding people into dust. Watching authority wrap itself in righteousness while committing quiet atrocities.

The divine path wanted my submission.

The profane path wanted my resolve.

I let out a quiet laugh, humorless and tired.

"Figures," I murmured.

I turned left.

The moment my foot crossed the threshold, the heat slammed into me like a physical blow. The calm evaporated instantly, replaced by raw, unfiltered sensation. Pain flared up my leg as the broken glass bit into my boot, the sole sizzling faintly.

The cave seemed to… react.

The angelic path behind me dimmed, its light receding as if disappointed. The warmth vanished. The grasses wilted, their glow fading into dull white.

I didn't look back.

I walked forward, straight into the fire.

The air burned my lungs with every breath. My life mana flared instinctively, reinforcing my body, dulling the worst of the damage without eliminating it entirely. The ground shifted beneath my feet, glass cracking and reforming, never quite stable.

Each step hurt.

But each step was real.

The profane path didn't try to lull me.

It didn't try to trick me.

It demanded that I stay awake.

And as the heat wrapped around me and the cave swallowed me whole once more, one thought burned brighter than the rest:

Once more, this place was testing me.

And I would not fail by choosing comfort over truth.

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