A low groan echoed in the silence.
Niko's eyes blinked open slowly, hazy and stinging. The cold stone beneath him bit into his back, and the heavy air carried an eerie stillness. He winced as he tried to move—just raising his arm sent sparks of pain flaring down his side. His muscles felt torn, trembling, like his body had been dragged through war and fire.
"…What…?"
His breath caught as his eyes drifted down to his hands.
They were soaked in blood—his fingertips stained deep red, the streaks dried and cracked over his knuckles. His heart skipped. A pulse of memory slammed into his skull.
The silence.
The rush of motion.
The strikes.
Her scream.
His fingers twitched. The sensation of her body breaking beneath his blows returned like a phantom pain in his knuckles.
He recoiled, trying to scramble back, but his limbs betrayed him. Soreness shot through every joint, every tendon, until he collapsed again with a sharp gasp.
"Dammit…"
He sat there, hunched, trembling, teeth gritted as the adrenaline faded and the weight of everything crashed in. His breathing was shallow. He could still feel the energy in him—lurking just under the skin like a wild animal. It had moved his body in ways he didn't even recognize. He hadn't been thinking. It had taken over.
His power… no, whatever it was inside him—it was too much for him.
"I'm not ready…" he muttered under his breath, bitterly.
Finally steadying himself, Niko forced his head to lift. He scanned the chamber around him—dim and cracked, stone bent and broken from the battle that had passed.
But her body was gone.
No blood trail.
No remnants.
Nothing.
His brow furrowed. He pushed himself up to one knee, pain lacing his every movement. The woman he fought—whatever her name had been—was simply gone. Not a trace remained.
"…She couldn't have walked away from that," he murmured, his voice dry and low.
A grim realization settled into his chest like ice.
The House had taken her.
It consumes the dead.
No fanfare. No body left to bury. Just… gone.
He lowered his gaze. The silence felt heavier now. Not peaceful—but haunted.
Whatever this place was, it wasn't just a prison.
It was a graveyard that erased its dead.
And he had just added to it.
Niko stayed there for a long moment, the cold floor pressing into his skin, blood drying on his fingertips.
His thoughts drifted—not to the fight, not to the horror of what he'd done—but to a voice that had spoken to him before all of this.
"Stop trying to force it. Feel it. Your energy isn't something you control… it's something you listen to."
Vex's words echoed in his head, clear even now.
At the time, he'd brushed them off—another cryptic lecture from someone who knew too much. But now, after what had happened… how his body had moved without him, how the power had surged so violently through every limb—maybe Vex was right.
He hadn't been using the power. The power had been using him.
And yet… it was still his.
Still inside him.
Niko's breathing slowed. He shut his eyes, letting the pain rise and sit within him. He didn't fight it—he let it exist. His shoulders sagged, and for the first time since he woke up, he wasn't just surviving.
He was feeling.
And beneath the pain, deeper than the throb in his chest or the tearing of his muscles, he sensed it—quiet, but alive. Like a river running just beneath the skin. His energy. Chaotic… volatile… but present.
Niko reached inward.
No flashy move. No command. Just attention. Like breathing in reverse.
And slowly… a faint warmth sparked in his chest.
It moved outward—tingling down his arms, washing through his sore legs like wind over open wounds. It wasn't instant. It wasn't dramatic. But the aching dulled. The stiffness in his joints loosened. Cuts he hadn't even noticed closed, leaving only faint scars behind.
His eyes fluttered open. The blood was still on his hands, but the pain had eased—like a storm pulling back from shore.
He exhaled, deeply, shakily.
"…So I can use it like that, too," he murmured. "Not just for destruction…"
A long pause followed.
He sat there in silence, the hum of his energy still whispering through his bones.
He took a deep breath, then got up, and bowed—quietly, respectfully. A tribute to Vex. The one person who had told him to listen. To feel. And maybe… the only reason he was still alive.
As he straightened, his gaze turned forward.
The room was silent now, but something about it felt final—like a sealed crypt. He noticed the walls around him were jagged, scorched from the earlier battle, and the only path forward was a curved wall of heavy stone.
His fingers brushed against it. Solid. Cold. No door.
But then his mind sparked—he remembered the movement, the speed, the force he used against that woman. That… Blitz. The raw burst that had sent his arm flying into that woman.
He narrowed his eyes.
"Blitz…" he murmured, under his breath.
He didn't know how to do it. But he remembered how it felt.
Niko stepped back, planted his feet. Focused.
Not forced. Just listened.
And with a breath—
A flicker of energy surged, and BOOM—his body shot forward with a crack of air and a burst of light. The wall exploded outward in an eruption of shattered stone and dust, the shockwave echoing down into the hollow dark beyond.
Chunks of rubble clattered to the ground as the air cleared, revealing a hallway stretched out in front of him. Except this one was… massive.
Endless.
He took a step forward, shielding his face from the dust, then walked out carefully—his arms close to his sides, cautious not to graze against the splintered wood and shattered edges of the archway.
The corridor ahead stretched infinitely far in both directions, but it wasn't narrow or simple like the others. No, this hallway was huge—its ceiling arched impossibly high, pillars running alongside its edges like the bones of some ancient cathedral.
It felt… like a city.
A ruined, hollowed-out city buried beneath the house.
He took a slow step forward, then another. His boot scraped against the dust-covered floor. The wind howled quietly through the cracks in the walls like distant voices whispering nonsense.
Niko glanced down at himself—his cloak torn in several places, shredded around the shoulders, his pants ripped at the knees, blood crusted onto the fabric. He looked like a wreck.
"If only there was a shop here…" he muttered, half-joking, half-hoping.
He let out a dry chuckle at the absurdity of it—thinking, yeah right, a shop in this deathtrap?
And then—
"🎵—Gold for the bold, silver for the sly, if you've got coin or charm, come and buy!—🎵"
A sing-song voice rang out.
Niko stopped dead.
Down the hall, a cart rolled into view—its wheels creaking slightly as it turned a corner. Hanging from its sides were strange glowing baubles, bottles of strange liquid, cloaks of shimmering fabric, blades wrapped in black cloth, and even a steaming cup of something… possibly tea.
Behind it, pushing the cart while whistling an odd tune, was a man.
No, not a man—a merchant.
He wore an over-the-top coat stitched with countless patches, one eye covered with a gold-rimmed monocle, and a grin that stretched too wide to be trusted.
He looked like someone who belonged nowhere.
And yet… here he was.
The merchant came to a smooth stop, leaned lazily on the cart's handle, and looked directly at Niko.
"Well now," he said, his voice playful but somehow ancient. "You look like you've seen better days, traveler. Care to browse?"
Niko stood frozen for a second.
Then took a step forward, slow… cautious… eyes locked on the grinning stranger.
"…You're real?"
The merchant chuckled. "Real enough to sell you socks. Maybe even something a little stronger, if you've got the means."
Niko stepped closer, boots echoing softly in the vast hallway. His eyes darted over the merchant's bizarre display—shimmering cloaks, belts with moving buckles, gloves that sparked faintly with blue electricity. It was like a fantasy bazaar squeezed into a death labyrinth.
"…What even is currency here?" Niko finally asked, genuinely puzzled. "This place doesn't seem big on… economy."
The merchant's grin only widened, his monocle glinting with amusement. "Oh, here in the House?" He tapped his cart affectionately. "Anything is currency, my friend. Gold, stories, blood, buttons—value's in the giving, not the thing itself."
Niko blinked, then glanced down.
He bent over, unstrapped his worn, dust-covered boots, and held them out.
"They're… all I've got."
The merchant took one look at them, then at Niko, and raised a brow. His grin faltered—not in annoyance, but in disbelief.
"That's it?" he asked, mildly incredulous. "Nothing in your pockets? No charm? No shiny rock from a cursed ceiling?"
Niko shook his head. "I arrived here not even an hour ago."
That stopped the merchant.
He blinked, then slowly—slowly—his eyes widened.
"…You mean you're fresh?"
Niko nodded.
The merchant stared at him for a beat longer, then chuckled softly to himself as he reached beneath the cart. "New guy… but he's this strong already. Tch. Should've known. They've been dropping in better stock lately."
Niko furrowed his brow, but said nothing as the merchant pulled out a neatly folded set of clothes. A deep gray cloak with crimson trim, light but sturdy pants, and a black shirt woven from a fabric that shimmered faintly with unseen threads.
"Here," the merchant said, tossing the bundle into Niko's arms. "You get one freebie. Boots included."
Niko caught it, looked it over—then paused, debating. Finally, he asked the question that had been burning in his chest since he laid eyes on the cart.
"…Where do you get all this?"
The merchant didn't even look up as he began humming again, wiping a glass orb with a stained cloth.
He answered with a wink and a crooked grin:
"Let's just say it's my ability."
As Niko pulled the cloak over his shoulders, the fabric settling comfortably against his skin, something still itched at the back of his mind.
He turned back toward the merchant, eyes narrowing slightly.
"…Got any weapons?"
The merchant, still humming his odd little tune, paused mid-polish. His head tilted, and he squinted at Niko with a curious sort of grin, like a tailor sizing up a child asking for armor.
"Hmmm…" He leaned in slightly. "You don't look like you can even lift one."
Niko frowned. "So there's a requirement?"
The merchant threw his head back in laughter. "No! No, no, no. This isn't some game with strength stats and item locks. You can pick up whatever you're brave—or dumb—enough to try."
He spun around, rustling through the strange, creaking wood of his cart until he pulled free a sheathed blade longer than Niko's arm. He unsheathed it with a sharp shhhk, revealing a knight's weapon—sleek and slender, forged of silver so pure it caught every flicker of the House's light and seemed to drink it in. The edge whispered menace. Even the hilt looked aged with purpose.
"This…" the merchant said with a grin, "is Blanchcairn. Found it three floors up, in the hands of a knight who didn't make it past the singing stairs."
He offered it to Niko.
Niko stared at the blade, then back at his own hands. They weren't shaking anymore, but they were still healing. He had nothing to trade. No more boots. No treasures. Nothing.
"…I can offer a favor," he said quietly. "It's all I have left."
The merchant paused. For a heartbeat, the mischief faded from his face. He stared at Niko—truly stared—like he was trying to see through skin, past muscle, into something deeper.
Then, slowly, he nodded.
He handed Niko the blade without another word.
As Niko took it in both hands, the weight surprised him—not just the metal, but the feel of it. The balance. The purpose.
The merchant grinned again, more crooked this time, like a fox who'd just sealed a deal with a wolf.
"I'll be expectin' it," he said, voice low and playful. "That favor. Don't make me come collecting."
Niko gave a faint nod, tightening his grip on the hilt.
"I won't."
The merchant winked, turning away again as if the conversation was already old history. "Try not to die with that thing in your hand. Would be a shame to have to clean it again."
Niko gave the merchant a subtle nod and turned, the silver blade now strapped to his back and his new clothes rustling lightly with each step. The hallway ahead remained vast—an endless corridor of ancient beams and shifting walls that seemed to breathe with the House itself.
He walked in silence, each footfall echoing lightly against the wooden floor, the air cool but watchful. Five minutes passed. Ten. He felt like he was walking in circles until—
His eyes caught something ahead.
A ladder.
It stretched upward into darkness, vanishing into a ceiling so far above it could've been the sky.
He stared.
"…Well, nothing else to do," he muttered, placing his hands on the rungs.
As he climbed, rung after rung, the stillness around him grew heavier. The air thinned. Time felt slow. He chuckled dryly to himself.
"If this leads to heaven, I hope they've got chairs up there…"
Minutes passed—maybe hours, he couldn't tell. Just as the ache in his arms began to burn again, he finally reached the top. With a grunt, he pulled himself over the final ledge—
And froze.
He stood in a massive chamber, unlike anything he had yet seen in the House.
It was almost like a sealed-off world, a forgotten attic of reality. Light shimmered through cracks above, casting long shadows across mounds of discarded things: swords, bows, robes, armor, cracked mirrors, shattered wands, cloaks, boots, trinkets, glowing books, shattered hourglasses, and stranger objects beyond naming. Everything lay scattered as if left behind in a great hurry.
Niko stepped cautiously forward, eyes narrowed.
"…Why would anyone leave all this?"
It felt sacred. Or cursed. Or both.
He kept his hand on the hilt of his blade, every nerve on edge. His footsteps crunched over glass and ash. The stillness here wasn't like before—it was waiting. Watching.
Then something flickered near the center of the room.
A cube, hovering inches off the ground. Made of stone, glowing faintly at its seams with etched, ancient inscriptions crawling over its sides like roots. The air around it pulsed faintly.
Niko approached slowly.
As he neared, one inscription shifted—moved—and turned toward him, as if aware of his presence.
"No Moving."
That was all it said. So simple, so blunt, it made Niko tilt his head in disbelief.
"…You're kidding."
He stared at it.
He could move. But something about the rune made his skin crawl. The weight of its command wasn't in its logic—it was in its truth. It wasn't a suggestion. It was law. He could feel it in his bones. If he moved carelessly now, something terrible might happen.
Just then, from the western shadows of the chamber, a shape stirred.
Soft footsteps over broken things.
A girl emerged.
She stepped into the hazy light like a figure from a dream—long gray hair falling past her back in waves, eyes a misty pale blue that seemed to glow faintly, and honey-brown skin glowing like polished gold in the filtered light. She was calm, deliberate, and barefoot.
Her gaze landed on Niko.
She didn't smile.
Didn't speak.
Just watched.
Niko tensed, still as the inscription demanded.
"…You live here?" he asked softly, voice low, trying not to break the unspoken rules of the space.
The girl tilted her head slightly. Her expression unreadable.
The rune pulsed again, brighter.
Niko exhaled through his nose, locking his body in place.
No moving.
He swallowed.
"…Alright," he muttered under his breath, glancing at her, then the cube, then back.
"Now what?"