A week passed.
Or something like a week. Time moved differently in the sky.
Tarn had trained until his bones cracked and healed wrong.Then cracked again. He didn't stop. Couldn't.
He needed control.
Because soon—he'd leave this floating cage.
The platform arrived at dawn.
A flat disc of glass and light, silent as sleep.
Tarn stepped on. Alone.
The woman—his handler—watched from the bridge.
"Your first mission," she said."Observation only."
Tarn didn't respond.
"Do not interfere."
Still silent.
She sighed.
"You're not ready."
He gave her a glare that burned brighter than the rising sun.
The platform descended.
Through cloud. Through storms.Through layers of floating rings and ruins.Until the world below returned.
Green. Broken. Familiar.
But not his island.
Not Kashira.
This was a different land.Dry. Cracked. Once a forest—now a graveyard.
And in the center—
A pit.
Hundreds of feet deep. Surrounded by god-constructs.Machines that glowed with Vanyrian glyphs.Floating spears. Towers made of cloudstone.Watching. Buzzing. Judging.
And inside the pit?
People.
Not Vanyrians.
Humans.
Tarn's breath caught.
He stared, eyes wide.
Tribe people. Maybe not Ishvalans, but close.Same rough cloth. Same feathers. Same fire in their blood.
But their backs were branded.
Each of them.
Glowing marks that pulsed whenever they disobeyed.
Tarn watched as one man—barely older than a boy—fell to his knees.
He couldn't get up.
A glowing spear fired from the tower.Pierced him through the shoulder.No warning. No voice.
The boy screamed.
No one looked.
They couldn't. Or they'd be next.
Tarn's hands shook.
The red glow started.
His veins lit like magma veins.
The platform tried to keep going. He jumped off.
He landed hard—dust flying everywhere.
Guards turned. Floating constructs activated.
Tarn walked through them.
"You are not authorized—"
He raised a hand.
Boom.
Red energy burst out—vaporizing the machine.
The others opened fire.
He didn't stop moving.
Explosions. Smoke. Screams.
Every step he took cracked the ground.
"What… are you?" a guard stuttered.
Tarn grabbed him by the face.
"Your reckoning."
He dropped into the pit.
People backed away, confused, afraid.
He scanned their faces.
Not one of them looked like his tribe.
But they were his people.
People like his.
People the gods had turned into tools.
Slaves.
"Who did this?" Tarn asked.
Silence.
One woman raised her hand, trembling.
"The Vanyrians… They call this place 'Trial Pit 7.' We're tested here. Broken. If we survive, we're branded useful."
"And if you fail?"
"You die."
Tarn's hands clenched.
The red light spread around him. The very air warped.
He looked up.
"Trial Pit 7… huh."
He smiled.
But it wasn't kind.
"Let's rename it."
Above, alarms blared.
The sky shook.
Tarn had only just begun.
And the gods were watching.