"Originally, as I mentioned earlier, we all believed you were merely a lesser version of an Nmana, perhaps even a distant offshoot of that lineage. However, I stand corrected. You possess a connection to mana that defies our current understanding and challenges our established beliefs. This is particularly evident in your two primary abilities: Absolute Zero and Telekinesis. Remarkably, since the very first day you stepped foot in this house, I have harboured a doubt regarding the narrative of your abandonment.
Let me clarify things for you: yes, you were indeed abandoned—most likely, anyway—but the motivations behind it may not be as straightforward as the common conclusion we had all too quickly reached." Sia's voice was steady, her body language composed and calm despite the weight of the topic. It was as if she had anticipated this moment's arrival long before it unfolded and had prepared herself for it. The revelations she was about to share required careful articulation, which explained her unwavering demeanour; she seemed consumed by the recollection of details and clues that would support her forthcoming revelations.
"Do you know who else among us faced a similar fate of abandonment?" Her gaze travelled deliberately over to me, firm yet affectionate, as if she was extending a lifeline. The answer to her question was painfully clear, and I didn't need to ponder for long.
"Lav," I replied. The mere mention of my best friend in the context of such a devastating question pierced through my heart. I felt the heaviness settle in, forcing my eyes to shut tightly for a brief moment as I wrestled with the emotions that surged within me. After a few seconds, I reopened my eyes to see Sia nodding, her expression serious as she prepared to delve deeper into the matter.
"Correct. Both you and Lav were abandoned—one within the depths of the beast rim, and the other outside the gates of that orphanage, overseen by Elder Ninia, a respected Lord of Expert." I was well aware of Lav's ordeal. Unlike Sara, who had arrived at the orphanage with a group of children similar to her age, Lav had been cruelly discarded at the gates, a situation that was nothing short of inhumane.
"At first glance, it might appear that the individual who abandoned Lav exhibited a semblance of decency compared to the one who left you behind. But…" She paused, analysing my reaction with keen eyes. I understood the direction this conversation was taking, but the complete truth was still shrouded in mystery.
"Unlike your experience, Lav endured severe physical abuse. He was beaten and bullied harshly, left with bruises covering every inch of his body. He suffered from hunger and thirst, and the clothes he wore were not just old—they were shamefully inadequate for the winter, which had just begun to grasp the realm in its cold embrace. In fact, I believe he didn't even have a proper shirt on that fateful night." The gravity of her words struck me like a blow. My heart sank even further into an abyss of despair, and my vision blurred as unshed tears threatened to spill. I quickly blinked them away, forcing myself to regain composure.
"That was the grim state in which Ninia found Lav. It took an entire month for her to nurse him back to health, to restore not only his physical well-being but also his appearance. Those were merely the physical wounds; the mental scars were far worse and, frankly, might sound utterly ridiculous." Her tone remained calm, as though she were dissecting a complex puzzle, inviting me to decide whether I wanted her to continue delving into that dark territory. I raised my hand, signalling her to skip that part. Just imagining the torment that Lav had endured as a small child—barely eight or nine years old—was far too burdensome for my mind to handle.
"You, on the other hand, found yourself abandoned in the perilous beast rims, a desolate expanse teeming with mana beasts and corrupted creatures. Yet somehow, you navigated that terrifying ordeal with apparent ease, as if it were a walk in the park. You managed to journey toward us, avoiding any encounters with beasts, not a single small E or D-ranked creature along your path. You followed your instincts or gut feeling, whatever you choose to call it, guiding you to us and to me in just a matter of hours… What are the chances of such a miraculous outcome?"
I pondered this question, the likelihood sitting at an almost impossibly close to zero. The realisation struck me, and the answer was already forming on my lips, just waiting to escape.
"You had proper clothes," she started, voice low but sharp with precision, like she'd been rehearsing this confrontation in her head. "You weren't half-naked, you weren't bleeding or bruised. You were just tired—limbs sore from climbing up and down trees like some wild monkey for hours. That's all. So let me ask you—were you dehydrated? Were you starving?"
I shook my head slowly, sideways. A small motion. The kind that usually invites more questions, not less.
But she waited.
She wanted more than silence. More than a nod. She was expecting words—a voice, a reply, a resistance. Anything. But for some reason, I couldn't give it. The words were there, but they wouldn't leave my throat. Not yet.
Her eyes narrowed just slightly, not with anger, but calculation.
"You knew basic etiquette," she continued, like a blade working into soft flesh. "I saw it with my own eyes when you introduced yourself to Mercy. The way you carried yourself, the way you spoke—it wasn't wild or untrained. You didn't stutter, didn't cower. You answered properly. You knew how to stand in front of power without losing yourself."
"You insulted Rey. Both intentionally and unintentionally. You knew exactly which words to use to push him, to disarm him, to make those little old fuckers and the kids in that hospital feel like idiots. You weren't being cruel. You were just... good at it. A natural. You hold conversations like you're spinning webs. You decide who gets caught, who gets to walk away. You can talk for hours with people you choose to talk to. That's not normal for a starving, isolated orphan who grew up fighting for scraps in the Beast Rims."
She tilted her head. Her voice had softened, but her words cut deeper.
"You possess emotional intelligence. Basic intelligence. Both. In unparalleled amounts. And don't even get me started on your mana core."
At the mention of my controversial core, my breath caught just slightly, but she noticed.
"That core," she continued, now staring at me like she could see it pulsing in my chest, "was inactive. Dormant. Docile. When we first met, it felt like a dead star buried inside you. But I've witnessed enough cases to know the difference between a core that's undeveloped and a core that's been tampered with. Yours? Yours was hammered. Compressed. Damaged just enough for Absolute Zero to suppress it, it mana presence, you mana presence, which was basically your mana signature. But not break it. Just... enough that someone like me could pour their mana into it and wake it up again. Just enough."
She let the silence sit there for a heartbeat.
"Another coincidence, I suppose?"
I couldn't answer. I didn't know how to.
Then she shifted tracks.
"And Raga—I mean, Ragnar." She almost scoffed, the old name slipping back into place. "Do you remember that man? Of course, you do. Four massive holes in his chest. I measured them myself later—wide enough for your child's hands to pass through. Four. Straight through the torso. And somehow... somehow he stood up again. Somehow, that near-dead man pulled himself to his feet, faced down a Ghost Bear, and fought for another minute. Do you know how absurd that sounds? How impossible?"
She stared at me, daring me to call it heroic.
"Back then, I called it a miracle. A moment worth retelling. I was going to start with Adrianna—thought she'd be inspired by it. So I told her. Told her everything. And do you know what she said?"
I didn't reply. I already knew.
She answered for me anyway.
"She said it was impossible. Not improbable. Not miraculous. Impossible."
That statement made my heart sink a bit. Not because I doubted her, but because I couldn't.
"She wasn't being dramatic. That woman's a healer. One of the best I've ever known. Served as a front-line medic during the Winter War in the northern trenches. Held ranks during the Bloodfrost Rebellion. She's seen every kind of wound known to man and beast. She's stitched back flesh from corpses that everyone else had given up on. So when she says something's impossible, it's not an opinion. It's a law."
I swallowed hard.
"If she told me blood was white, not red, I'd believe her. That's the weight her words carry. Which means if she says Ragnar shouldn't have moved, shouldn't have breathed after those injuries, then that's exactly what it means. The man was supposed to die beside you, and you know it."
Her next words hit like a blade wrapped in calm:
"What would've happened if he had?"
"...You would've died too," I replied finally, quietly. This wasn't some riddle. It was simple. A fact. A truth we'd both carried in silence until now.
She nodded faintly, then tilted her head.
"Not me. I'm irrelevant in this context," she said. "I'll rephrase the question. What would've happened after my death*?"
That caught me off guard. Not the question, but the meaning behind it. The weight of it settled like frost on the back of my spine.
The answer dawned on me slowly, like a divine truth scrawled in the sky by a child's storybook god. If she had died, the Ghost Bear would've turned next to me. Not out of strategy, not out of hatred, but instinct. It had seen me. Marked me with its eyes. And once you're on a Ghost Bear's list, you're as good as dead.
"...Then I would've died too," I admitted, the weight of it crashing down like a final verdict. "Right after you. No one would've been left to stop it."
"Exactly," Sia said. "Ragnar woke up and rewrote his own death. That's not poetic. That's blasphemy against the natural laws of the world. Something made him choose to get up. Not a surge of adrenaline. Not an instinctive twitch. He shattered the ceiling of what his body should've been capable of. All because... if he hadn't, we would've followed him, you would've followed him, one after the other."
Her voice lowered again, like a whisper behind enemy lines.
"Somehow, that outcome was avoided. Not delayed. Erased."
She took a breath, and the room felt colder.
"And that's not even counting the Ghost Bear's tracking skills. You think just because you didn't have a mana signature, you were safe? Those monsters are ancient. They've adapted. Their noses alone can trace human scent from kilometres away. You were already on its radar, Lucius. You just didn't know it."
I closed my eyes, chest tight. She wasn't just lecturing me. She was walking me through a miracle, backwards—until it stopped being a miracle and started becoming a puzzle. One with missing pieces. One, I was terrified to finish.
"Enough with the evasive talk. Just tell me your theory, no matter how absurd it might sound. I'm ready to judge your conclusions," I urged, feeling a growing impatience. My ears strained to hear the actual opinion she had likely formed long ago but had kept to herself.
She took a deep breath before continuing, "You weren't abandoned in the traditional sense, at least not willingly. The entity or entities that left you there, in that desolate spot, likely had a hand in nurturing you. I would even go as far as to say they took very good care of you."
I remained silent, my mind racing to process her implications.
"Consider this," she pressed on, her voice steady. "When you were found, your tiny body was in remarkable condition. You weren't malnourished or dehydrated; your clothes were decent, clean, well-maintained, and you were, too. There was no hint of dirt or neglect. You had no foul odours lingering about you, and your teeth were clean and orderly."
Her words sank in as I felt a strange mix of confusion and curiosity. "You're proposing that the very entity responsible for leaving me behind cared for me instead? How does that even begin to make sense?"
It struck me that my mana, usually a reliable reflection of my emotional state, was surprisingly calm. Why wasn't I angry? Was the gravity of her words somehow dulling my usual response? It was disconcerting.
"Yes, that's the conclusion I firmly stand behind. There were no signs of abuse or neglect on your body. In fact, mentally, you exhibited a level of maturity far beyond what's typical for a child, perhaps even surpassing many adults. Such depth of understanding and clarity can only arise in a specific nurturing environment—an environment you may have forgotten, but that your subconscious mind has not."
I crossed my arms, scepticism brewing within me. "Okay, but what about my missing memories? And what's the deal with my core? Why mess with them?"
I could tell she sensed my frustration; I rarely spoke in such a demanding tone. Yet right now, I craved answers, prepared to challenge her.
"To protect you, perhaps?" she suggested thoughtfully, pausing as if considering her words carefully. "Your core? It seemed to have been altered just enough for someone like me to discern a fix—something we managed to accomplish rather effortlessly, if you reflect on it. As for your memories, I'm less certain. But I believe whatever changes were made were also to shield you—shield you from something or someone ominous."
I remembered how I had often struggled with my emotions regarding my past. 'But I can't even bring myself to hate my parents or the entity that left me, despite everything. What does that mean?'
She took a moment, gathering her thoughts, the weight of the situation evident in her expression. "You might have consciously forgotten about them, but your psyche hasn't—it can't. Erasing memories is potentially more complex than any of us could initially imagine. The key point is that there are things your body and your subconscious mind remember, even if you don't consciously recognise them. That could provide insight into some of your behaviours.
And, while we're discussing theories, what did your master, my cousin, Arvain, propose about you being a mere lab rat? That's nonsensical. In truth, I believe the entity behind this entire saga has done everything possible to safeguard you, to guide you in subtle ways that led you directly to our group. Consider how it orchestrated Ragnar's return to the fight and ensured you encountered no beasts along your journey to us. It almost sounds like you had a guardian angel, one working tirelessly to protect you for as long as it could."
She paused, her gaze piercing into mine, and continued, "Perhaps the gifts you possess, your unique abilities, are not what they seem. There may be much more to their nature than what is currently revealed."
I felt a flicker of intrigue amidst my confusion, realising this conversation was opening doors to mysteries I had yet to unravel, while simultaneously not answering the questions I was looking for, but answering the question that I deserved to know.