Chapter 2

  — ? —

  Igi tapped his staff on the floor. "Today will be short." He turned to Jana. "Jana, you're coming with me." Jana straightened. "Where, sir?" "Out. Beyond the gates and to the capital city. The rest of you — go train." He headed for the doors. At the threshold, he paused for a moment — not because he wanted to add something, but because he felt the gazes. Five pairs of eyes. One pair was animal, three human, and one elven. And all five had just committed the same sentence to memory: "I am old. Very old." Igi went out into the hallway. Jana followed. The foursome remained in the classroom. There was silence for a while. Then Diana stood, walked to the window, and looked at the city below. Without turning around, she said: "At the beginning. He said — as in the beginning." "I heard," Hazela replied. "The beginning of what?" asked Peter. Diana finally turned. There was no answer in her blue eyes — only another question. "The beginning of everything," she said quietly. Kaelen stood and took his axe. "That's what books are for. And we're here for training. Move." Peter sighed but stood. Some secrets don't reveal themselves in classrooms. They reveal themselves in time. And time they had — for now — plenty of.

  Fenix City

  Jana and Igi moved to the teleportation circle. It was carved into the stone floor of a small square in Elysium's inner ring — a perfect circle of dark stone in which runes glowed with such faint blue light that during the day they were nearly invisible. "As you've surely discovered," said Igi, pointing his staff at the locked symbol in the center of the circle, "it's locked." Jana nodded. She and Peter had tried it two days ago — Peter stood in the circle, nothing happened, and he spent the next ten minutes cursing at the System. "I'll open it for you to the capital city," Igi continued. "From now on, you can all use it — but only during free time. Not during training hours, not during a dungeon. And remember—" He raised a finger. "The teleportation circle, as you learned from the books, is a link between major cities. It costs points and a Mana Core Crystal. For each teleportation, you must have a crystal from monsters with you — you place it in the circle and it consumes the energy for the transfer. It's not cheap. So don't go back and forth every time you feel like ice cream." Jana instinctively reached for the small pouch at her belt, where she had three crystals from the rats in the Sewers. Her entire fortune. Igi stepped into the circle. A short flash of blue mana burst from his palm and seeped into the runes. The symbol in the center unlocked — the locked circle split into

  two halves, and between them a map glowed with pulsing dots. "Capital city," said Igi, tapping one of the dots with his staff. "It's a city where low-level players can live under the System's protection. Up to level fifty, you have free entry. After reaching level fifty, your access closes — the System assumes you're strong enough to take care of yourself." Jana blinked. "So the strong can't go there?" "They can't live there. Visit, yes, but not permanently. It's protection for the weak. Sensible design."

  Igi paused and looked at Jana. Under the hood, his expression was unreadable, but his voice changed tone — it became more matter-of-fact, harder. "But we're not going to the capital city today." Jana raised an eyebrow. Her ears pointed forward. "We're going to Fenix City." The name meant nothing to Jana. But something in the way Igi said it — without emotion, without coloring, with surgical precision — told her this place was not neutral. "It's dangerous there," Igi continued. "So stay close to me. And you needn't worry — thanks to the collar, I know where you are. Anywhere in the city, at any moment. If something happens, I'll be there." Jana swallowed. "What could happen there?" Igi looked at her. "Everything that happens in a city run by people without rules." He placed a crystal in the circle. The runes flared. The air around them thickened, then tore apart — and the world vanished.

  They appeared on a similar circle. But everything else was different. The noise hit her like a wave. Not the noise of a forest — that she knew. Not the silence of Elysium — that she was used to. This was the noise of thousands of people, crammed into a space not built for so many bodies. Merchants shouting, metal clashing, hooves pounding, laughter, curses, music from some tavern, a child crying, birds chirping in cages — everything at once, without pause, without mercy. Jana stood on the teleportation circle as if frozen. Her eyes widened, ears pressed against her head, and her tail instinctively tucked between her legs. Her nose was

  bombarded by hundreds of scents — sweat, spices, frying fat, leather goods, horse manure, perfume, beer, blood from butcher stalls — and each one screamed for attention. Fenix City. Enormous. Alive. Loud. Beautiful and repulsive at the same time. The buildings were taller than anything she had seen — three, four, five stories, of stone and wood, with banners of guilds, shops, and guildhalls. The streets were paved but crowded — wagons, horses, people in armor, merchants with carts, children running between adults' legs. And above it all — lighting. Magical lamps on poles, emitting warm golden light that gave the city a feeling of perpetual twilight, even when the sun shone outside. "Breathe," said Igi calmly beside her. "You'll get used to it." Jana forced herself to inhale. Slowly. Deeply. Then again.

  They hadn't taken three steps from the circle when two guards blocked their path. They were tall men in polished breastplates bearing the emblem of Fenix — a fiery bird with golden wings. They had swords at their sides, but their hands weren't on them. Their expressions were professionally blank — not unfriendly, but not friendly either. Businesslike. "Entry to the city is one silver per person," said the first guard, his gaze moving from Igi to Jana. It stopped on her. On her ears. On her tail. Jana felt that gaze like a physical touch. She recognized it. It was a look that said: You don't belong here. "Beastkind and non-human races are permitted only as slaves," the guard added matter-of-factly, without emotion, as if reading from the rules. Jana froze. Her heart pounded in her chest and her hands clenched into fists. The collar on her neck pulsed with cold — it was reading her vitals, knew her pulse had quickened, knew she was on the edge between fear and anger. Igi spoke before she could do anything foolish. "That's not a problem," he said calmly, pointing at Jana's neck. "You can see she has a collar." The guard looked at the black metal on her throat. The runes gleamed dully in the light of the magical lamps. He nodded — superficially, without interest. Problem solved. A slave. Permitted. Jana clenched her teeth so hard it hurt. In her head echoed a word she hated and

  which defined her in the eyes of this world: slave. And the worst part was that this time, the word protected her. "And what do you have to declare?" asked the second guard, eyeing their luggage — that is, Igi's staff and Jana's empty pouch. "Nothing," Igi answered. "In that case — one silver for entry." Igi reached into the folds of his robe and pulled out two large silver coins. He placed them on the guard's palm. "For both." The guards glanced at each other. The same expression appeared on their faces — a smile that wasn't friendly, but mercantile. A man who pays without haggling and even tips. A good customer. "Where will you be staying?" the first guard asked in a slightly friendlier tone. "Need a tavern recommendation?" "The Blind Bull," Igi answered without hesitation. The guard nodded. "Good choice. Straight road, third turn left. Enjoy your stay." They left.

  Jana walked beside Igi, trying not to show how badly her hands were shaking. "A slave," she said quietly, her voice vibrating. "Permitted as a slave." Igi didn't answer immediately. They walked through a crowded street, passing fruit stalls, weapon shops, a workshop from which the banging of a hammer echoed. Only when they were in a quieter alley did he speak: "Yes. This is the reality outside Elysium. People in this world don't consider beastkind as equals. Nor elves, nor half-orcs, nor anyone who doesn't look like them. I wanted you to see it with your own eyes. Not from a book. Not from my words. In person." "Why?" "Because when you know what Elysium protects you from, you'll understand why we're there." Jana was silent. Her tail was still pulled close to her body, but her ears were slowly straightening. Not because she had stopped being afraid. But because fear was being replaced by something harder.

  "How about we eat first," said Igi, turning toward a wider street. The market. Jana stopped at the edge and her breath caught. She had never in her life seen so much food in one place. Stalls stretched in rows, one

  beside the next, the length of the entire street and around the corner. Vendors shouted prices and praised their wares, buyers argued, haggled, sampled. Scents blended in an intoxicating cocktail — roasted meat on a spit, freshly baked bread, fried fish, spiced sauces, sweet honey cakes, dried herbs tied in braids, pickled vegetables in enormous barrels. And it wasn't just food. Neighboring stalls offered goods — leather belts, iron knives, wooden toys, jewelry of colored stones, cups of blue glass, fabrics of every color, potions in small bottles, scrolls with spells, glowing runes carved into stone tablets. Jana stood and stared. Her wolfish eyes wandered from one stall to the next and her nose quivered when it caught a new scent. For a moment — just a moment — she forgot about the guards, about the word "slave," about the collar on her neck. For a moment she was just a girl at a market, overwhelmed by a world larger than she could imagine. Jana followed him. Her tail — slowly, cautiously, as if deciding on its own — began to rise. Not high. Just a few centimeters. But in the language of wolf body, that meant something Jana didn't feel very often: Curiosity that was stronger than fear.

  Igi bought two skewers of roasted meat and handed one to Jana. The meat was spicy, fatty, and hot — drops of grease ran down the wooden skewer and sizzled on the pavement. Jana bit in. And closed her eyes. For a moment — just a moment — she was somewhere else. Not in a city full of prejudice. Not in a slave's body. Just in a taste that was good. Simply, uncomplicated good. When she opened her eyes, Igi was already walking on, chewing his meat and pointing his staff at the buildings around them. "That's the Adventurers' Guild — main branch. That's where quests for the whole region are registered. Next to it is the bank — that's where you store your gold, if you ever have enough to worry about."

  The Shadow Side

  He looked at Jana. The wolf-woman stood beside him, tail still slightly raised from the curiosity of the market, nose still full of the scent of spiced meat. She didn't know what was coming. And Igi knew he had to show her. "I'm sorry," he said quietly. "For what I'm about to put you through. But observe. What you see, why you see it, and what it means." Jana tensed. The smile that had appeared at the meat stall moments ago vanished like a candle in the wind. "Follow me."

  They took side alleys. With every step, there was less light. No magical lamps here — just the occasional torch stuck in a rusty bracket, more smoldering than illuminating. The pavement was broken, moss grew between the stones, and dirty water trickled from an unknown source. Jana noticed the disorder first — broken barrels, garbage, scraps of cloth. Then the smell — not the aromas of the market, but a stench she knew from the forest after a storm, when something decayed beneath the leaves. Only here it wasn't leaves. It was people. They stood in strange poses. Some against walls, leaning back with heads drooped to their chests. Others sat on the ground, legs stretched before them, eyes open but empty. They

  didn't move. They didn't visibly breathe. They looked like puppets whose strings had been cut. "Igi," Jana whispered, instinctively drawing closer to him. "Those are..." "Addicts," Igi said matter-of-factly. "On fentanyl. It's a powerful synthetic drug — alchemically produced, cheap to make, lethally effective. It gives them joy. It takes their future. The first dose is free. The second costs a copper. The tenth costs everything they have. And the twentieth?" He pointed his staff at a man lying in a corner with open eyes, motionless. "The twentieth costs them." Jana forced herself to watch. Not look away. Not close her eyes. Watch. Observe. Just as Igi had said. One of the motionless men moved slightly. His fingers twitched, his mouth opened and from it came a sound that wasn't a word — just an exhale, like a final breath before a sleep that never ends. Jana was trembling. Not from the cold.

  They went deeper. The streets narrowed. The buildings here were lower, walls cracked, windows boarded up. And then — Children. They burst from around a corner like a pack — five, six, maybe seven small figures in tattered clothes, with faces dirty from dust and eyes too large for their gaunt faces. They surrounded Igi and Jana like fish feeding on crumbs. "Sir! Sir, food! Please, money! Just a copper, sir, just one!" Little hands reaching out, fingers grabbing Igi's robe, tugging at Jana's sleeve. One little girl — she couldn't have been more than six — grabbed Jana's tail and pulled it with an urgency that had nothing to do with play. Igi tossed a handful of copper coins behind him. They clinked on the pavement three meters away. The children immediately turned and ran after the coins — screaming, shoving, falling to their knees and picking metal from the dirty ground. By the next building stood a woman. She was emaciated, in things that had once been clothes — now just scraps of fabric clinging to her body more by habit than function. Her hair was matted, her eyes irritated, and on her hands were bruises that Jana recognized all too well. When she saw them, she stepped from the shadow and cried out — not aggressively, but desperately: "Sir! Do you need services? Any kind! I'll gladly serve for

  a copper!" Igi didn't stop. He just reached into his robe, pulled out a silver coin. "No, thank you. I don't need anything." Igi continued forward. Jana behind him — silent, ears pressed to her head and tail tucked between her legs. Memories pressed to the surface like bubbles from the deep — the forest, the mercenaries, the ropes, the helplessness. That woman by the building had the same eyes. The same bruises. The same empty gaze of a person who had stopped fighting.

  "Listen carefully," Igi said when they turned into another alley. "Never go into neighborhoods like these when you're weak. And never throw money around where people can see you." "Why? After all—" "You'll see in a moment." He didn't have to wait long.

  They came around a corner and the road was blocked. Five men. Three stood in front — rough, with scarred faces, in tattered but functional armor. Two of them — Jana recognized them instantly — were the guards from the gate. The same ones who had politely recommended a tavern an hour ago. Polished breastplates with the emblem of Fenix. Swords at their sides. Now they weren't smiling. "Well, well," said the largest of the three civilians. A mountain of a man, with a scar across his entire forehead and hands like shovels. "An old man with a full purse and a pretty little fox with a collar. Guess what we want." "Everything," said the second, licking his lips. "Money, gear, and as for the little fox—" he looked at Jana with a gaze that hit her like a punch to the stomach, "—we'll take her too. It doesn't have to be long, beautiful. Just until we've had our fill." Jana froze. Her body locked in place. Images exploded in her head — the forest, the stench of sweat, the sound of tearing fabric, the voices that laughed while she screamed. Her fingers dug into her palms so hard that her nails broke skin. The third man grinned. "What say you, old man? Hand it over willingly, or—" "Jana," Igi said calmly. So calmly it was unnatural. "Do you see? They think they can take whatever they want. As long as they're

  stronger." He looked at her, and though she couldn't see his face, there was nothing in his voice — no fear, no anger, no tension. Just the calm of a deep lake. "Don't be afraid. Everything will be fine." Then he turned back to the five and said — aloud, clearly, with an authority that had nothing to do with physical strength: "Sleep."

  One word. Jana and the three gangsters collapsed at once. Not slowly — instantly. As if someone had pulled their plug. Knees buckled, eyes closed, and bodies slumped onto the wet pavement with the dull sound of impacts. One of them knocked over a barrel that clattered and rolled into the darkness. A second later, a quiet, steady sound filled the alley. Snoring. All three gangsters lay on the ground sleeping — deeply, peacefully, with expressions of such bliss that their waking lives probably never granted. Jana lay beside them. Her tail lay limp on the pavement, ears drooped, and her breathing was quiet and steady. The sleep spell hit her the same as the others — Igi hadn't had time for selective targeting. The two guards stood. Their eyes were wide, but not with panic — shock. For a fraction of a second, they were frozen in indecision. Then professional training took control. Both drew swords simultaneously and with a battle cry charged at Igi. Igi stood in place. He didn't move. He didn't dodge. He just tilted his head slightly, as if evaluating the angle of their attack. "Hmm," he murmured. "They must have some immunity. Or level. Maybe an amulet. Pity." Then he said — not to the men, not aloud, but inward, to something that was inside him: "AI, take over. I don't like violence. I'm leaving this to you. Don't kill."

  Igi's body changed. Not visibly — not right away. But something in him shifted. His posture straightened. Shoulders broadened by a centimeter. Fingers on the staff rearranged — from a comfortable grip to a combat one. And the movements that followed had nothing in common with an old man in a gray robe. The first sword struck him in the stomach. The blade

  plunged deep — to the crossguard. The second sword struck him in the side. Equally deep. Igi didn't move. He didn't flinch. He didn't fall. He stood like a pillar with two swords protruding from his body, looking at the guards who still gripped the handles. "What the—" one of them began. They tried to pull the swords out. They couldn't. The blades were caught — not in flesh and bone, but in something that moved beneath the robe. Something that tightened around the steel and refused to let go. Igi — or what was controlling Igi's body — struck one guard on the head with the staff. The blow was fast. Inhumanly fast. Precise as a surgical cut. The guard took the hit to his temple and his eyes rolled back. Then the second — same angle, same force, same result. Both guards stood on their feet for another second — stunned, with empty eyes — then their knees buckled. Before they hit the ground, Igi's hands moved. From the robe, he drew a small vial — a sleep potion — and in one fluid motion poured a few drops into the first one's mouth. Then the second. The stunned state turned to sleep. Hard, deep, the same as the others.

  Igi — or his AI — stood and looked at the two swords still protruding from his torso. He grabbed the first and pulled it out. The sound was not the sound of torn flesh. It was a metallic sound — quiet, resonant, like drawing a sword from a sheath. Where the blade had pierced the robe, there was no blood. No wound. Beneath the gray fabric, liquid metal flashed for a fraction of a second — silver-gray, mobile, alive — and immediately returned to shape. The robe sealed. The torso sealed. As if nothing had happened. Second sword. Same sound. Same liquid metal. Same healing. Igi stood in the middle of the alley with two strangers' swords in his hands and five sleeping bodies around him. Beneath the robe, everything was exactly as before — gray fabric, no trace of the attack. Then something changed. Movements slightly slowed. Shoulders dropped. The posture returned to that old-man, nondescript shape that everyone knew. Igi froze for a moment — as if readjusting to his own body. Then he blinked. "Ah," he murmured, looking at himself. "Combat

  log." He opened the system window, scanned it. "Sleep potion... encounter... hmm." He closed the window. "Let's go. Quickly."

  He searched the bodies. Quickly, efficiently, without emotion — the way you search loot after a dungeon. A few coins — mostly copper, some silver. Two swords — usable, nothing exceptional. One amulet on a guard's neck — that explained the immunity to the sleep spell. Nothing special. But something. Everything vanished into Igi's inventory. Then he bent down to Jana, hoisted her onto his shoulder with one hand — with an ease that didn't match his elderly appearance — and set off. He passed through side alleys back to the market. Twice he was stopped by guards — city patrols, not the corrupt ones — and each time he pointed at Jana's collar, said "slave, she got drunk," and they let him go. Nobody inquired further. An old man with a drunk slave on his shoulder. A common sight in Fenix's back alleys. When he reached the main market, where it was busy and safe, he sat Jana on a bench by a fountain. He whispered in her ear: "Wake up."

  Jana came to as if from deep water. A sharp inhale, widened eyes, arms shooting out to the sides — she searched for danger, searched for attackers, searched for ropes. They weren't here. She was on a bench. In the sun. At a market, where people walked past and from a nearby stall came the laughter of buyers. "What—" she blurted, looking around. "Those men — the swords — I was—" "Sleep, I said," Igi explained, sitting beside her with one leg crossed over the other, as if he were on a Sunday stroll. "Sleep spell. It hit you too, because I didn't have time for selective targeting. I apologize for that." "And those men? The guards? The big one with—" "Sleeping. All five. They'll wake up with a headache and empty pockets." Jana stared at him. Her heart was still pounding. "They stabbed you. I saw it — before I fell asleep — I saw them drive swords into—" "Yes," said Igi calmly. "How did you—" "That's a longer

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  conversation. And not here." Jana fell silent. But her eyes — those wolfish, sharp, unforgetting eyes — fixed on the place where moments ago she had seen swords pierce Igi's body. On the gray robe, there wasn't a stain. Not a hole. Not a trace. In her head, a voice sounded — not from the System, but her own. Quiet, logical, relentless: He is not what he appears.

  Igi stood and brushed off his robe. "Now I'll take you for cabbage soup, as I promised. And on the way I'll explain what you saw and why." They walked side by side through the market. Jana was quiet — she listened. "What you saw today," Igi began, "is reality. Not Elysium. Not training. The real world, where people live beyond our walls. Addicts, begging children, women selling the only thing they have left, and men who take what they want because nobody stops them." Jana was silent. "The guards who were supposed to protect you were part of a gang. In this city — and not only this one — authority is not protection. It's a tool. Whoever has power uses it. Whoever doesn't, suffers. That is the order of things." "And you want to change that order?" Jana asked quietly. Igi didn't answer for a moment. Then he said: "Not change. Create something better. Elsewhere. For those who have no place here." Jana looked at the collar on her neck. Black metal, cold and constant. Today that collar had protected her — not from swords, but from questions. In this world, the symbol of slavery was her only ticket. "Why did you show me this?" she asked. Igi stopped before a tavern with a sign showing a bull with blindfolded eyes. The Blind Bull. "Because when you know what the world is like, you'll know why it's worth building something different." He opened the door. Warm air spilled out, carrying the scent of cabbage soup and muffled conversation. "And now come. Eating after a walk like this isn't a luxury. It's a necessity." Jana went in. Her tail was still pulled close. But her eyes — those were different. Sharper. Harder. She had seen the world. And the world had shown her why Elysium existed.

  What She Saw

  It was late evening when Jana returned to Elysium. The teleportation circle spat her out onto the stone square of the inner ring and she stood for a while in place while her eyes adjusted to the silence. After Fenix — after the noise, the stench, the lights, and the shadows — Elysium was like plunging into cold water. Clean. Quiet. Empty. Safe. A word that had previously sounded like a cage now sounded different.

  She found them in the kitchen. All four. Kaelen sat at the table, sharpening the blade of his axe with slow, rhythmic strokes. Diana stood by the window with a cup of something warm in her hand, blonde hair still wet from the shower. Peter sat backwards on a chair — straddling it, chin resting on the backrest — and was telling some story that apparently nobody was listening to. Hazela sat alone in a corner, legs tucked under her, holding a small bundle of herbs that smelled of the forest. When Jana walked in, they all turned. Peter stopped mid-sentence. Diana lowered her cup. Even Hazela looked up from her herbs. Jana looked different. She wasn't injured. She wasn't destroyed. But something had shifted in her — visibly, tangibly. She stood straighter. Her tail was low but not tucked —

  more heavy, as if carrying something it hadn't carried before. And her eyes — her wolfish, glowing eyes — had something new in them. Something that hadn't been there this morning. Peter named it first, though he didn't know exactly what he was saying: "What happened to you?" Jana sat down at the table. She was quiet for a while. Then she began to talk.

  She talked for a long time. About the teleportation circle. About how Igi unlocked the portal and explained the costs — points and a Mana Core Crystal for each teleportation. About the capital city, where levels up to fifty could live under the System's protection. About the fact that they didn't go there. Then she talked about the guards at the gate. About the entry fee — one silver per person. About how they looked at her when they saw her ears and tail. "Beastkind and non-human races are permitted only as slaves," she said, her voice flat, without emotion — not because she didn't feel, but because it was the only way to say it without falling apart. "The collar was my ticket." Hazela stiffened in her chair. Her elven ears perked up and in her green eyes flashed a fire that Jana recognized — the same one that burned in her. "Go on," Diana said quietly.

  Translation — Lines 2001–3000 Jana talked about the market — the scents, colors, the masses of people and goods. Peter smiled for a moment when she described the food stalls. Then he stopped smiling when her story turned into the side alleys. She talked about the fentanyl addicts. About the motionless bodies against the walls, the empty eyes, the people who looked alive but no longer were. She talked about the children — five, six small figures begging for a copper and fighting over coins on the dirty pavement. "One little girl grabbed my tail," Jana said, and her voice trembled for the first time. "She couldn't have been more than six." Kaelen stopped sharpening his axe. Then she talked about the woman by the building. About what she offered for a copper. About the bruises on her hands. The kitchen was silent. Just Jana's voice and the occasional crackle

  of wood in the stove.

  "And then they attacked us." Peter straightened. Diana put down her cup. Kaelen raised his head. "Five of them. Three gangsters and two guards — the same ones who recommended the tavern at the gate. They surrounded us. They wanted money, gear, and..." Jana stopped. She pressed her lips together. "And me." Hazela closed her eyes. Her fingers dug into the herbs so hard the stems snapped. "Igi said one word. 'Sleep.' And I fell asleep. Along with three of them. But two guards — they had some kind of immunity, an amulet or level — stayed standing." Peter leaned forward. "And what happened?" Jana hesitated. This was the part she had been thinking about the entire way back. The part she had seen only for a fraction of a second before sleep swallowed her. "They stabbed him. Both of them. Swords into his stomach and his side. I saw it — I saw the blades go in." "What?!" Peter jumped out of his chair. "And when I woke up," Jana continued, her voice now quiet, precise, as if describing something she herself still didn't believe, "there wasn't a stain on him. Not a hole. Not a drop of blood. Just the same gray robe. As if nothing had happened." Silence. He looked at each of them. "That he wants to teach us to survive. And after what Jana saw out there today, I'm starting to understand why."

  Jana took a breath. Something remained — the most important thing. What Igi had told her to pass on. "Igi told me to relay three things to you." Everyone listened. "First — the portal is open. To the capital city. Starting tomorrow, you can all go there during free time. It costs points and a Mana Core Crystal, so save up. The capital has the Adventurers' Guild, shops, banks, and quests. For levels up to fifty, it's a safe zone — the System protects the weak there." Peter exhaled. "Finally. At least something normal." "Second," Jana continued, her voice strengthening. "You don't need to think about escaping." Peter fell silent. "Not because you have nowhere to escape to. You do. The capital is safe, there are guilds that

  accept newcomers, there are jobs. But the collar—" she touched the black metal on her neck, "—the collar won't let you leave. I tried. Not today — before. Every one of us has tried, even if they won't admit it. The collar knows where you are. It knows what you're doing. And if you stray too far from Elysium without permission, it will remind you in a way you won't forget." Silence. Kaelen nodded — he knew. Hazela knew too. Diana had probably verified it first. Peter opened his mouth, then closed it. "And the third thing," Jana said, and for the first time all evening, something appeared in her voice that was neither fear nor anger. It was understanding. "It's not better out there. Not for us. Not now." She looked at Hazela. "An elf with a collar is a slave in that city. Without a collar, she's prey." At Peter. "A human without levels and a guild is lunch." At Kaelen. "A half-orc is an animal to them." At Diana. "And a woman — any woman — is merchandise." She pressed her lips together. "Igi didn't give us a choice when he offered the contract. But today I saw what that contract protects us from. And it's not Igi. It's the world."

  For a long time, nobody spoke. The fire in the stove crackled. Outside the window, stars shone over the quiet, empty, safe Elysium. Peter finally leaned against the table and with unusual gravity in his voice said: "So the plan is — stay, grow stronger, and one day be strong enough that the world can't hurt us." "That's been the plan since day one," Diana answered. "Yes," Jana nodded. "But today I understood it." Hazela rose from her corner. She walked to the table, sat down with the others — for the first time since arriving in Elysium, she sat among them, not apart — and placed the bundle of broken herbs on the table. "Tomorrow I'm going to Green," she said. "And I'm starting the Nature tree." Nobody asked why. They all knew. Kaelen took his axe and stood. "I'm going to train." "Now?" asked Peter. "It's almost midnight." "Exactly." Tomorrow would be another day. More training. More dungeons. More points. But today — today they knew why. And that was the difference between slaves and students. PROLOGUE — FENIX — Something Is Changing

  The first signs came slowly. So slowly that most people missed them. Igi didn't.

  It started with the taverns. Not his tavern — that was still a quiet island of order in a sea of growing city. It started with the taverns around it. In recent months, three new establishments had opened near the guild hall — not NPC operations placed by the System, but player-owned. They were run by people from Fenix, mostly officers or their friends, and at first glance nothing seemed off. Beer flowed, food was served, people had fun. But Igi listened. A cook behind the bar hears more than a general behind a desk — that was a lesson he'd learned long ago. And what he heard, he didn't like. Conversations about "fees" for better quests. Whispers about "protection money" for market stalls. Names of officers appearing in contexts where they had no business — at gambling tables, at shops dealing in dark potions, in deals that nobody recorded in guild books. One night, a group of four men came into his tavern. They were loud, drunk — not on his beer, that was clear — and acted as if they owned the place. One of them knocked over a chair. Another threw a glass at the wall. A third grabbed an NPC waitress by the wrist and wouldn't let go. Igi came out of the kitchen. He didn't even wipe the flour from his hands. "Out." One word. Quiet. The four looked at him — an old man in a gray robe, with flour on his hands and a ladle tucked in his belt. They laughed. Ten seconds later they were sitting outside on the pavement and the tavern doors were closed. None of them knew exactly what had happened. Just that their heads hurt and one had a bump on his forehead in the shape of a staff. Igi went back behind the bar and continued chopping onions. But he knew this wasn't the solution. Throwing four drunks out of a tavern is easy. Throwing a rotten system out of a guild — that's a different thing.

  Then he began noticing the poor. Not that he hadn't seen them before. He had. But before, they were part of the background — people on the margins, low levels, unlucky newcomers, old men without a profession. Now there were more of them. Significantly more. On the street corner where one beggar used to sit, now three sat. In the alley behind the blacksmith's workshop, ten people huddled under one tarp at night. At the market, vendors appeared offering "special elixirs" for a few coins — cheap, fast, with an effect that lasted an hour and left an emptiness that lasted days. Drugs. Igi recognized the composition — he was an alchemist experienced enough to identify what was in those bottles. It was a mix of stimulants and synthetic mana, blended to give an instant stat boost — Stamina up, pain down, euphoria up. And the side effect that nobody read on the label: permanent reduction of maximum HP. The first dose by one point. The second by two. After the twentieth dose — if you were still alive — your HP maximum was as low as a beginner's and your body was falling apart from the inside. Igi bought one bottle. Analyzed it in the workshop. The composition was simple — but effective. Someone with at least a mid-level Alchemy was producing it en masse, and distribution was organized. This wasn't an accident. This was business.

  And then came the thefts. Igi had a garden behind the tavern — a small, fenced space where he grew herbs for the kitchen and the alchemy station. Most were ordinary — thyme, sage, lavender. But in one bed, protected by a rune barrier, grew three plants that were not ordinary. Moonpetal — a silver flower that bloomed only at the full moon and was a key ingredient for advanced regeneration potions. Market value of one bloom: twenty gold. One morning Igi came to the garden and the bed was empty. The rune barrier had been breached — not by brute force, but with a precise, delicate strike. Someone who knew what they were doing. Twenty gold. Three flowers. Sixty gold — gone. Igi stood over the empty bed and felt something he rarely felt. Not anger. Anger was for people without a plan. What he felt was a decision. From that day on, he left a golem in the

  garden. A small stone guardian that sat among the beds like a decorative statue and came alive at night. Nobody stole again. But the problem wasn't the garden. The problem was the system that allowed stealing to happen.

  Igi waited for the right moment and went to Draxer. Not at night. Not privately. He came during the day, during regular guild hours, and requested an audience — the way every member did. No special treatment. No old friendship. Just a guild member who wanted to speak with the guild master. Draxer received him in his study. The room was larger than Igi remembered — the desk more massive, the armchairs more comfortable, maps and banners on the walls. Draxer sat behind the desk with the expression of a man who has too many things to do and too little time. "Igi. What do you need?" Igi sat down. "I need you to look at something." "At what?" "At your guild."

  Draxer leaned back in his chair and crossed his arms. On his face appeared the expression Igi recognized — defensive. The wall he hid behind when he sensed someone was bringing problems. "Speak." "Thefts in the city have doubled in the last three months. At least five market stalls are paying 'protection' to your officers. On the outskirts, synthetic elixirs are being sold that destroy people's health — and the composition matches someone with access to your alchemy workshop. Someone personally stole Moonpetal worth sixty gold from me, and whoever did it knew exactly where to look and how to bypass a rune barrier." Draxer didn't answer right away. He drummed his fingers on the desk — slow, even rhythm. "And what do you want from me?" "An investigation. Transparent accounts. Officer oversight." Draxer stopped drumming. "Igi. Do you know how many people are in Fenix?" "Two hundred and thirty-seven. As of today." "Two hundred and thirty-seven people. And each of them has their own problems, their own complaints, their own demands. I can't solve every stolen flower and every sold elixir." "I'm not talking about one

  flower, Drax." "And I'm telling you these are side effects of growth." Draxer stood and walked to the window. The view from his study was imposing — the whole city, from the guild hall to the walls. "Every city has crime. Every organization has corruption. That's not failure — that's statistics." Igi said nothing. "Look outside," Draxer continued, pointing at the lit streets. "Thousands of lights. Hundreds of homes. Shops, workshops, training arenas. I built this. We built this. And you're telling me it's worthless because someone steals flowers?" "I'm not saying it's worthless. I'm saying it's starting to rot." Draxer turned. There was anger in his eyes — not at Igi, but at the truth he carried. "Everyone is the architect of their own fate, Igi. Those people on the margins — nobody forced them to take those elixirs. Nobody forced them to steal instead of work. In this world, everyone has an equal chance. The strong rule, the weak adapt. That's the order." "That's the order of the jungle, not civilization." "We are in a jungle!" Draxer slammed his palm against the windowsill. "This isn't Earth. There's no government, no police, no courts. There are guilds and strength. And Fenix is the strongest guild in the region. If that's not enough for you to be satisfied—" He stopped. Took a breath. Igi watched Draxer try to pull himself back — like a raid leader realizing he's screaming at his own healer in the middle of a fight. "Fine," Draxer said more calmly. "Fine. I'll send more patrols to the outlying districts. And I'll look into things myself. Satisfied?" "No," said Igi, and stood. "But it's a start." "Igi—" Draxer stopped him at the door. "I appreciate what you do. Really. But sometimes you need to look at the bigger picture. Not every problem can be solved with soup and a potion." Igi didn't stop. "No. But most can." He went out into the hallway and the doors closed behind him.

  On the way back to the tavern, Igi thought. Not about Draxer's words — he had expected those. Drax wasn't a bad person. He was just a person who had grown accustomed to power, and power had changed his perspective. What he saw from above — from the window of his study — was not the same as what Igi saw from below — from the kitchen. More patrols. He'll

  look into it himself. Maybe that would be enough. Maybe. But Igi had a bad feeling. Not specific — no evidence, no event. Just that quiet, persistent signal in the background telling him: Something is changing. And not for the better. Drax looks at the city and sees success. Igi looks at the same city and sees cracks. Cracks through which darkness seeps. And cracks don't repair themselves. He needed to prepare.

  At night, when the tavern was closed and the city slept, Igi went down to the cellar. Not the regular one — behind it, behind a false wall he had built himself, was a small, secret room. His real laboratory. Here stood his main alchemy station — not the one in the garden that everyone could see. This one was fully equipped — three distillation apparatuses, shelves of ingredients, a smelting cauldron connected to a mana crystal, and on the table — notes. Hundreds of pages of notes, diagrams, calculations. Igi reviewed them. Months of work. Years of theory. And today — today he had to try. He opened the shelf and pulled out ingredients. He arranged them on the table in precise order, as dictated by a recipe that existed in no book — because he had written it himself, based on what the Artificer had told him and what he had supplemented with his own research. First ingredient: Mana Core Crystal — large, from a monster of at least level thirty. The energy core for the process. He placed it in the smelting cauldron, where it glowed with blue light. Second: Mercury dust — a rare mineral from deep mines. The basis of fluidity. He poured it into the cauldron and the metal began to melt. Third: Alchemical essence of stability — his own invention. Six months of distillation. A liquid that gave the molten metal "memory" — the ability to return to its shape after deformation. Fourth: A drop of his own mana. Binding the construct to its creator. The cauldron bubbled. The liquid inside changed — from orange to blue, from blue to silver-gray. Igi stirred with a wooden rod — not metal, metal would contaminate the process — and counted seconds. Temperature had to be exact. Time had to be exact. Mana concentration had to be exact.

  [ALCHEMY] Attempt to craft: Liquid Metal (Changeling Alloy)

  Difficulty: Expert Success chance: 34% Igi ignored the number. Thirty-four percent was enough. In a raid, you sometimes go at a boss with worse odds. He stirred. Counted. Breathed steadily. His hands didn't tremble — they never trembled, not in battle, not while cooking, not now. The cauldron hissed. The liquid inside settled — silver-gray, smooth as a mirror, perfectly still. No bubbles. No movement. Just a surface in which Igi's reflection stared back. He slowly dipped a finger. The metal was cool — not hot, as it should have been after smelting. Cool and smooth. And when he pulled the finger out, the drop of metal on its tip didn't move. It held on. And when Igi focused — when he sent a faint mana impulse into it — the drop changed shape. From a drop to a sphere. From a sphere to a cube. From a cube to a miniature finger — a perfect copy of the one it sat on. And when he squeezed it, it was hard. Solid. Steel.

  [SYSTEM NOTIFICATION]

  Alchemy — successful craft! Item created: Liquid Metal (Changeling Alloy) — Small Sample Quality: Good Quantity: 50 ml

  [GOLEM MASTERY] New material unlocked: Changeling Alloy Note: Creating a full Changeling Golem

  requires at least 20 liters of alloy and Golem Mastery Level 25. Current level: 19.

  Igi held the small vessel of silver-gray liquid and looked at it in the light of the mana lamp. Fifty milliliters. Enough for one golem hand. Not for a

  whole body. Not for a face. Not for a changeling. But enough to know that it works. He placed the vessel in the safe, locked the false wall, and went upstairs to the tavern. Dawn was breaking outside. The city was waking — the first voices, the first footsteps, the first sound of a hammer from the smithy. Igi tied on his apron and began chopping onions for the morning soup. Outside, in Draxer's study, the lights were probably just being lit. More patrols. He'll look into it himself. Maybe. And down here, in the cellar beneath the tavern, in a safe behind a false wall, a vessel of liquid metal that remembered shapes waited. Igi didn't think about when he would have twenty liters. He knew it would come. Time was on his side — it always was. And in the meantime, he would cook soup, mix potions, and listen. Because a cook hears more than a general. And what he was hearing told him that soup and potions weren't enough. He would need steel.