The first thing I noticed was the silence.

Not the cave's silence—the oppressive, watchful quiet it always carried—but the absence of resistance inside my own body. For the first time since awakening, nothing pushed back when I reached inward. No friction. No bottleneck. No invisible ceiling pressing down on my thoughts and power.

It felt wrong.

And intoxicating.

I stood alone in a vast chamber of the cave, the crystal walls faintly illuminated by veins of pale light that pulsed like a living thing. The air trembled around me, reacting to something it could not understand yet. Reacting to me.

I inhaled slowly.

The breath went deeper than my lungs.

Energy moved.

Not mana. Not just life. Not just death.

Dualflow.

It coiled around my core like two serpents entwined, one warm and radiant, the other cold and absolute. They did not fight each other. They didn't even oppose one another. They agreed. They existed simultaneously, flowing in opposite directions while somehow strengthening the same center.

I laughed quietly, the sound sharp and almost hysterical in the stillness.

"So this is it," I murmured. "This is what everyone was afraid of."

I raised my hand.

Just a hand. No incantation. No complex thought. I didn't even push particularly hard.

I allowed the power to move.

The air detonated.

A concussive wave tore outward from my palm, slamming into the cave wall across the chamber. Crystal screamed. Stone didn't crack—it ceased. A hole the size of a carriage exploded into existence, edges glowing faintly green as fragments vaporized rather than fell.

I stared.

Slowly, I lowered my hand.

"…That wasn't even an attack."

The realization sent a shiver down my spine.

Before, every spell, every technique, every strike had been an act of forcing. Compressing mana. Refining intent. Fighting against limits that screamed this is enough even when it clearly wasn't.

Now?

Now the power moved faster than thought.

I clenched my fist.

The cave responded like prey sensing a predator.

I stepped forward and drew my blade—not Glassblade, not yet, just a simple construct of death-aspected energy shaped into a rough edge. I swung casually, almost lazily, not even bothering to aim.

The arc of darkness didn't cut the wall.

It erased it.

A crescent-shaped void carved itself into the crystal, so clean and absolute that the edges didn't crumble. They simply… ended. The tunnel beyond was visible, stretching into darkness, the remains of the caves' ancient structure laid bare like exposed bone.

Hundreds of times stronger.

That wasn't exaggeration. It was conservative.

My heart pounded—not with fear, but with something dangerously close to awe.

I exhaled slowly, grounding myself. If I let this spiral, I'd lose control. Power like this didn't forgive arrogance. It devoured it.

"Test properly," I told myself. "Don't get stupid."

I shifted my stance and focused inward, separating the flows—not disconnecting them, but emphasizing one over the other.

Death surged.

The temperature dropped instantly. Frost crept along the floor beneath my boots, not from cold, but from entropy. From endings. From inevitability.

I looked down at my left arm.

No hesitation.

I brought the edge of death across it.

There was no pain.

Just absence.

One moment my arm existed. The next, it didn't.

No blood sprayed. No gore. The cut was too clean, too final for something so crude. The severed limb dissolved into black motes before it even hit the ground, reclaimed by the same affinity that had undone it.

I stood there, unbalanced for half a heartbeat, my body reacting purely out of habit.

Then I laughed again, breathless and sharp.

"Alright," I said softly. "Let's see the other half."

I shifted the flow.

Life answered.

Warmth flooded my chest, my spine, my very soul. It wasn't gentle. It wasn't soft. It was overwhelming, a roaring current of growth, renewal, and defiant continuation.

I directed it to the empty space where my arm should have been.

The sensation was indescribable.

Not pain. Not pleasure.

Information.

Cells dividing faster than thought. Structure assembling itself from nothing. Bone knitting. Muscle weaving. Nerves igniting like threads of lightning.

I watched, transfixed, as pale light condensed into form.

One second.

Two.

By the third, my hand flexed.

Whole.

Perfect.

I rotated my shoulder experimentally, clenching and unclenching my fingers. No stiffness. No weakness. If anything, it felt better than before, as if the limb had been reforged rather than restored.

"…Three seconds," I whispered.

I let my arm drop to my side and stood there, breathing hard now, not from exertion but from the sheer weight of what I had just proven.

Death could erase me.

Life could bring me back.

And with dualflow?

There was no delay. No recovery time. No exhaustion.

This wasn't healing.

This was authority.

A dangerous thought crept in.

If I can do this to myself…

I shook my head sharply, cutting it off before it could root.

"No," I muttered. "That's how monsters are born."

The cave groaned around me, cracks spreading further as residual energy bled from my body whether I wanted it to or not. I reined it in with effort, compressing the flow, forcing discipline back into place.

Still, even restrained, the world felt… thinner.

Fragile.

Like everything around me existed on borrowed time.

I pressed a hand to my chest and closed my eyes.

Belle's face surfaced unbidden in my mind.

The curse.

The slow, merciless countdown etched into her existence.

My hands trembled.

"This changes everything," I said quietly.

Before, healing her had been a hope. A distant, uncertain goal that required time, rank, and miracles stacked on miracles.

Now?

Now I had proof.

Life and death weren't opposites anymore. They were tools. Two sides of the same mechanism.

If the curse was death pretending to be permanence…

Then life, properly applied, could overwrite it.

I opened my eyes, gaze hardening.

"I'm coming," I whispered, not sure whether I meant Belle, the trials ahead, or the world itself.

Behind me, the cavern wall finally gave up and collapsed inward, the structure unable to withstand the lingering pressure of my presence.

I didn't look back.

I stepped forward, power humming beneath my skin, no longer just surviving the cave—

But outgrowing it.

The cave answered my resolve.

Not with words, not with another trial or threat, but with movement.

The shattered crystal wall ahead of me didn't finish collapsing. Instead, the debris froze mid-fall, suspended as if caught in invisible amber. Fractured shards trembled, then slowly drew apart, sliding sideways with a sound like glass being dragged across silk.

A pathway opened.

It wasn't natural. It wasn't even pretending to be.

The floor smoothed itself into a long, narrow stretch of pale stone veined with faint green light, the same murky hue that clung to dualflow when it leaked into the world. The walls on either side pulled back, forming a corridor that hadn't existed a moment ago. Where the cave ended, something else began—an in-between space, neither trial nor trap.

An exit.

Or an invitation.

I stood still for several seconds, watching the path stabilize, feeling the cave's attention withdraw from me like a disappointed predator realizing its prey had grown teeth.

"So that's it," I murmured. "You're done with me."

The cave didn't argue.

I rolled my shoulders once more, grounding myself, making sure my power stayed coiled and contained. As much as I wanted to test the limits again, this wasn't the time. My companions were still inside. Still fighting. Still bleeding—physically or otherwise.

I stepped forward.

The moment my boot crossed the threshold, the temperature shifted. The oppressive cold and pressure of the trials faded, replaced by something neutral. Empty. The hum of danger dulled, though it didn't vanish entirely. This place still existed under the cave's rules—it just wasn't actively trying to break me anymore.

Good.

As I walked, the corridor stretched ahead endlessly, then subtly shortened with each step, folding space in on itself the way only this cursed place seemed capable of doing. With every pace, I felt faint echoes—residual impressions left behind by others.

Kent's frantic energy, sharp and jittery, like laughter covering panic.

Nora's presence was colder, denser, like a star held together by sheer force of will.

Annalise's mind felt like a web—quiet, calculating, already dissecting whatever pain the cave threw at her.

Xavier…

I slowed for half a heartbeat.

His echo was turbulent. Violent surges of emotion colliding with ironclad discipline. Jealousy, fear, resolve, all grinding against each other like fault lines.

He's still fighting, I thought. And not just the cave.

The corridor curved gently, and the green veins along the walls brightened as if responding to my awareness. I reached out—not with mana, not even consciously—but with dualflow itself, letting a controlled pulse ripple outward.

The path reacted immediately.

New branches flared briefly into existence to my left and right, ghostly outlines of potential routes, each resonating with a different signature. I didn't need to think long to know what they represented.

Choices.

People.

I exhaled through my nose.

"So you're still testing me," I said softly. "Even now."

I angled myself toward the strongest cluster of familiar echoes—the place where multiple presences overlapped, tangled together in conflict and revelation.

Toward them.

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