The scream was not human.
It rolled through the forest of dead trees like a cannon blast made of shattered glass, shaking branches loose from their brittle perches. The earth quaked with such force that the grey blossoms collapsed inward, their petals decaying midair.
Saylor rose unsteadily from the cracked soil, his body trembling with raw feedback. His ears rang. The veins across his chest pulsed with a faint gold and purple hue, glowing with each heartbeat. He wiped dried blood from his nose and turned toward the sound.
A rift was tearing open in the sky above the canopy.
The Wheel was spinning again — violently.
This time, it wasn't just creaking. It was howling.
Players stumbled to their feet in the clearing. Brant and Lucia both snapped their heads toward the widening rift as pressure in the air thickened into something tangible — like drowning without water.
"Not again," Veyra whispered.
Lucia gritted her teeth, clutching her bloodchain.
The Broken Wheel released another divine shriek.
And from the void above, something began to descend:
A cloak.
Not worn — but alive.
It billowed across the sky like spilled ink on reality itself. Beneath it came an emaciated creature, head bowed, arms extended, countless needles floating around its skeletal form.
A porcelain mask covered its face — no mouth, no eyes, no holes.
GOD DESCENDING: QUIEL, THE NEEDLE VEIL.
RULE: "TRUTH MUST BE BLED."
The forest darkened.
---
The Field shifted.
The trees recoiled inward as if bowing, revealing a blood-stained chapel in the distance — malformed, its steeple bent sideways and pulsing like a tumor.
A new message blinked in every player's vision:
> OBJECTIVE: OFFER CONFESSION OR FACE NEEDLE BINDING.
"What the hell is that supposed to mean?" Marcus asked.
Without warning, a needle tore through the air and pinned his shoulder to the ground.
"AAAGHH—!"
Lucia moved to help, but more needles fell like rain, spearing the ground around them, spiraling toward each player.
"Move!" Brant barked.
The group scattered.
Saylor didn't run. He watched. His vision shimmered — and in the space between seconds, he saw them: invisible threads connecting each needle to the god above.
Each thread pulsed when someone lied. Or when they refused to speak.
"Truth must be bled," he repeated quietly. "It's not a metaphor."
One player, Tyne, fell to his knees, bleeding from dozens of punctures.
"I—I cheated on my wife!" he screamed. "I lied! I left them without saying goodbye!"
The needles hesitated. Froze. Then vanished from him.
Tyne collapsed, sobbing.
Another tried to run without confessing.
He didn't make it far.
Six needles skewered him mid-stride — into the ground, into the trees, and finally, through the throat.
> PLAYER ELIMINATED: 13 REMAIN.
---
Inside the Chapel
Saylor Rift-stepped into the chapel alone.
The stained-glass windows showed horrifying versions of saints: flayed, hollow-eyed, screaming behind translucent halos. The pews were filled with waxen effigies of former players — some whole, some mutilated, mouths sewn shut.
He approached the altar.
Another ticket floated down before him, already aflame.
He grabbed it.
> MIMETIC SPIN — TRUTH THREAD SYNCED
His vision flickered.
He could now see lies. Not hear them. Not sense them. See them — as red threads across mouths and hearts, pulsing like veins.
Behind him, the sound of wood cracking — Lucia had entered.
She looked at the altar, at him, her hand on her chain.
"You going to explain how you're still alive?"
Saylor looked at her, and saw her lie before she even spoke again.
She didn't trust him. She didn't want answers.
She was afraid of him.
"I don't know," he said. It was the truth.
The god outside began to descend upon the chapel. The roof evaporated in a cloud of dust. Quiel looked down, mask humming.
Its needles rose.
---
The Final Confrontation
"Confess, or be unmade," the voice thundered inside every skull.
Saylor stepped forward.
"I trusted people," he said aloud. "They destroyed my life. I still want to help them. And I don't know why."
Lucia stepped beside him.
"I wanted to kill my father," she said. "When he beat my mom. When I saw him choking her. I wanted to rip his throat out. I still do."
Brant stood in the doorway. "I watched someone drown once. Could've saved them. Didn't move. Said I couldn't swim. I lied. I just... froze."
The needles trembled, uncertain.
Saylor's voice cut through.
"You're not here to judge truth. You're feeding on it."
The threads shimmered.
And with the Truth Thread Synced, Saylor reached up — and cut them with a wave of his hand.
Reality snapped.
The needles fell. Harmless.
Quiel's mask cracked.
Lucia struck first — chain through the eye.
Brant struck next — kinetic uppercut that shattered the god's chest.
Saylor leapt above them, Rift-echoed behind the mask — and whispered:
"You've heard enough."
Then drove a stolen needle through the back of its skull.
---
GOD DEFEATED: QUIEL, THE VEILED.
A burning mask floated down, split in half.
> TICKET GRANTED: SHATTERED CONFESSOR
---
Aftermath
Lucia dropped to her knees, panting. "How many of these are there?"
Saylor looked up at the Wheel.
It was still spinning.
Still hungry.
And far above them, hidden in the distant void — a new figure watched.
Unseen. Unnamed.
Not a god.
Something worse.