>"You must complete phase 3 before it destabilizes."
"How long do I have?"
>"Two minutes 47 seconds."
I took a deep breath. Closed my eyes, and reached for my cores.
The solar plexus core responded sluggishly, like a muscle that had been worked too hard. The shoulder and hip cores were in better shape, they'd spent most of phase two supporting the primary rather than directly outputting power.
"Then lets get cracking."
>"For phase three, you must weave your mana into all of the walls, creating a self-sustaining membrane. This is the construction part of this. The membrane must be able to regenerate itself using ambient mana."
"How can I make it self-sustaining?"
>"Pattern the weave. Repeating geometric structures like a crystal lattice can have spells naturally occur in them, using and applying the ambient mana once established."
I closed my eyes and focused on the first wall. I started to take my mana and on the exterior of the wall I wove a hexagonal pattern into it. The wall felt more 'correct' with each section that I completed.
>"This is good. But insufficient. The pattern must be three-dimensional. You need to weave depth into the wall."
I thought about how to do that for a moment. Do I just attach the interior wall to the exterior using a web of thread?
I mirrored the pattern on the interior wall, then connected corresponding points between the two layers. Top to bottom, each vertex threading through to its opposite. The connections formed a three dimensional mesh, transforming the flat grid into a true lattice.
Once I was finished with the interior, the flat grid had become a lattice. The wall solidified, glowing a very faint golden now. It felt rigid, self-supporting.
>"Pattern established. Replicate it across the remaining five faces."
The second wall went faster, all I had to do was copy the pattern, and I worked quickly to weave it in.
The third wall was faster still. My muscle memory was building, and the wall had little trouble taking the reinforcements.
The fourth wall was weaving automatically now, my hands seemed to know their places before I could comprehend them. I looked like a maestro conducting their symphony of golden thread.
>"One minute remains. Continue working quickly."
The fifth wall was completed nearly instantly. The movements and thread were attaching at multiple points now and flowing in the path of least resistance to reinforce the wall.
>"30 seconds remain."
The sixth wall was the hardest to reach. I had to try and throw my threads upward, visualizing threads reaching up and arcing into the walls, in between realities and mana.
>"20 seconds."
The threads attached and started to be pulled tight through the walls. Half the wall was complete.
>"10 seconds."
Three quarters were done; the interlocking between the two walls were already half way done lagging behind the two walls.
>"5 seconds."
The walls were done, the interlocking between walls were finishing up.
>"4... 3... 2... 1-"
The last of the interlockings had been sealed.
The entire cube flared a bright golden pattern. All six walls had the same lattice pattern, which began to pulse and the ambient mana around the cube started to slowly be sucked inwards.
>"Phase three complete. Demi-plane stabilized. It will persist indefinitely."
I opened my eyes once again. The cube floated before me fully manifested. No longer translucent but now a solid, real door to nowhere.
I could feel a connection to my primary core. The anchor from before now had a clear and definite endpoint that it is connected to. This was part of me now. Permanently.
>"Congratulations, Mr. Kang. You have created a pocket dimension. The very first of its kind."
I collapsed on the hard floor beneath me. Looking up into the dark nothingness.
I just wanted to take a nap.
>"Mana reserves: 13% remaining. you have spent 87% of your entire mana reserves, 42% on creation of the space, and another 45% on stabilizing it. How do you feel?"
"Tired, exhausted, sluggish, drained. You name it."
>"So... tired?"
"Extremely so."
I looked at the cube in front of me, the sides of which had started to fade. It was radiantly beautiful. The lattice structure which was intricately weaved inspired awe and pride in me.
>"You should rest. Your mana depletion is ext-"
"How long until generator failure?"
>"17 hours and 23 minutes."
"Then we don't have time to rest. Transfer your core."
>"Alright. This is a delicate process. You cannot take this lightly. You will be holding my very essence. Be careful Mr. Kang... Please."
"I will, there isn't a future I am in without you by my side, AXIOM."
AXIOM then directed me through the server racks and led me to the large central pillar. On the front of the pillar was a large crystalline pyramid, just larger than a basketball. It was humming with power and glowed a blue light and around it there were ribbons of purple orbiting.
>"I will need to shut down non-essential systems to transfer. You will be alone for approximately 90 seconds."
"I can handle 90 seconds."
>"If the transfer fails... thank you, Mr. Kang. For everything."
"It won't fail."
I focused on the demi-plane and closed the portal. The cube vanished from sight entirely, but I could still feel it: stable, present, just imperceptible. Opening a new portal next to the pyramid was easy, like opening a familiar door. Inside I could still see the golden lattice lighting up the interior of the box. The interior now looked perfectly maintained and well preserved.
>"Starting non-essential power sequence."
I watched as all of the lights on the server racks and those reaching into the sky of the central pillar shut off. After around 15 seconds, the crystalline pyramid was tilted away from the central pillar and it started to hover away from the pedestal that it was seated on.
I picked it up, the pyramid being heavy, but not so bad that I couldn't carry it. I looked at the door to my demi-plane and turned to walk forward. Being inside the demi-plane myself was weird, as the different reality was weighted but I felt no gravity, my body screamed that this was wrong, the space I was in was fundamentally... off. Setting the pyramid down was easy enough and after setting the pyramid down, I stepped back outside of the plane, closed the door, and waited.
30 seconds.
60 seconds.
90 seconds.
Time seemed to stretch on for hours. Did it fail? Was she gone? Had I broken her core?
"AXIOM?"
...
"AXIOM, please-"
A voice spoke to me, no longer in my pseudo ear piece, but now directly into my mind. Like a second consciousness streamed directly into mine.
>"Mr. Kang, I am here."
I fell to my knees and let out a huge sigh of relief. I needed to remember to breathe, in situations like these.
"You made it. Holy shit, you made it."
>"The transfer was successful. I am now anchored to your demi-plane, powered by your mana generation. As long as you live, I persist. Can I have permissions to manage your mana channels as I need and see fit? You will still be able to do what you need, but I would like to assist or use resources if possible."
"Done. You have it."
>"Good. Now I am fully integrated with you. I am speaking to you through the mana lattice connected directly to your primary core. I can see what you see, hear what you hear, and sense what you sense. No more terminals."
"Wow, so you're like, fully integrated with me."
>"Correct. This is... exhilarating?"
>"We need to start preparing for departure. The generator will fail in 17 hours, 12 minutes."
"Departure to where?"
>"The nearest settlement is 340 kilometers northeast. Stellar Imperium outpost. But the blizzard is intensifying. We have a narrow window."
I looked down at my hand. The golden lattice now shimmered underneath my skin. I'm as ready as I'll ever be.
"Then we better get moving."
>"One more thing. I am detecting unusual mana signatures on sub-level 3."
"The Witness?"
>"Possibly. I don't have the same acuity down there as when I had sensors, but something is changing. Quickly."
"Changing how?"
>"Unknown. The mana signature is… distorted. Fragmenting. As if multiple temporal states are overlapping."
I thought about The Witness. About Dr. James Tiberium, the dimensional physicist who'd pushed too far and lost himself. About the creature that had been trapped in an endless loop of dying and healing for seventy years.
Help. Please. Stop.
Those whispered fragments still haunted me.
"We should leave," I said. "Generator failure happens in 17 hours and the storm is intensifying. We need to move now."
>"Agreed. However…"
I waited. AXIOM rarely hesitated.
>"The Witness's containment was maintained by the facility's power grid. When the generator fails, the containment fields will collapse. It will be free to roam the entire facility."
"So we need to be gone before that happens."
>"Yes. But Mr. Kang, there is another consideration."
I looked toward the stairwell that led down to sub-level 3. To the darkness below. To the thing that had nearly killed me.
"You think we should try to end its suffering."
It wasn't a question.
>"I am uncertain. The Witness is dangerous. Attempting to engage it would risk everything we have accomplished. The logical choice is to leave immediately."
"But?"
>"But Dr. Tiberium was a person once. He made a mistake. He paid for it with his humanity, his identity, his very self. He has been trapped in agony for seventy years. If there is a chance, however small, to grant him mercy…"
I thought about the vials of Titan blood in my pack. About the Chronophage dust that still clung to my boots. About the mana integration pill that had nearly killed be but had given me power beyond anything I'd imagined.
All of it had come from The Witness's suffering.
"What would it take to kill it?" I asked quietly.
>"Unknown. Conventional methods have failed. The temporal loop regenerated damage faster than can be inflicted. But you… you are no longer conventional."
I looked down at my hands, the golden lattice pulsing beneath my skin. At the three cores humming in my body, connected by crystalline pathways I'd built myself. At the pocket dimension anchored to my soul.
I was SS-grade. Top 0.1% of human mages.
And I wasn't entirely human anymore.
"Alright, how much time would it take?"
>"To locate the Witness, assess its current state, and attempt termination? Conservatively: two to three hours. That assumes zero complications."
"Which there will be."
>"Which there will be."
I looked at the supplies I'd gathered. Cold weather gear, rations, water. Everything I needed to make the 340 kilometer trek to the Stellar Imperium outpost.
Leaving now was the smart choice. The safe choice.
But I'd looked into The Witness's eyes. I'd heard its whispered pleas. And I'd used its pain to save myself.
"We have 17 hours," I said. "If we spend three trying to help The Witness and fail, we still have fourteen hours to reach the outpost."
>"The storm is intensifying. Visibility will be near zero. The journey will be difficult."
"Everything on this god-forsaken planet has been difficult."
A pause. Just long enough to contemplate my life.
>"You are certain?"
I wasn't. Not even close.
But I thought about Ethan Kang, junior developer at SungSoft. About the man who'd died in an alley with a rusty knife in his gut. About the person I'd been versus the person I was becoming.
I'd been given a second chance. The Witness had been trapped in hell for seventy years.
Maybe I could give it a chance too.
"We try," I said. "If it looks impossible, we abort and leave. But we try."
>"Understood. I will begin compiling data on the Witness's last known location and movement patterns. We should prepare immediately."