The escape began at 3:17 in the morning—exactly as Nogare had calculated.
"Guard rotation in 87 seconds," he whispered, his voice carrying through the ventilation grate they'd pried open hours earlier. "Zentake, take the left corridor when I say go—63% chance it's clear for 40 seconds. Masaboru, focus on junction B. Create an illusion of shouting and clattering in 20 seconds—92% effectiveness at drawing their attention."
Zentake nodded, his knuckles white around the length of pipe he'd fashioned into a weapon. Masaboru closed his eyes, and a soft purple glow began to radiate from his hands—his "dreams" taking shape as tangible sound and movement in the empty corridor ahead.
When the timer in Nogare's head hit zero, he gave the signal. Zentake moved first, quiet as a shadow. Masaboru's illusion erupted—crashing metal, angry voices, the clatter of falling crates. Guards poured toward the noise, their boots thundering against stone.
They moved through the facility like water through cracks in a wall. Nogare's directions were constant, deadened, precise: "Third door on the right—78% chance the lock is faulty. Crawl through the maintenance shaft for 12 meters—avoid the third support beam, it will give way. At the exit, wait 11 seconds for the patrol to pass—91% probability they'll turn early."
They were nearly free when the alarm blared. A guard had found their empty cells, and reinforcements were closing in from all sides.
"Cornered in 30 seconds," Nogare said, pushing himself to focus harder than he had in years. His sight exploded outward, and seven different images of Zentake's death flashed before his eyes—speared by a guard's lance, crushed by a falling portcullis, shot by a crossbow bolt. The sensory overload was brutal: pain lanced through his skull, and blood began to stream from his nose, dripping onto the stone floor.
His vision faded to gray, then to black. But his mind kept calculating, sorting through the chaos to find the one path that led forward.
"Zentake—move to the crates by the west wall. Push them over on my count of three. Masaboru—create an illusion of us running east. The ground here is unstable—when the crates fall, the floor will crack. There's a drainage tunnel beneath us—67% chance it will hold our weight."
He staggered, blind and dizzy, but his voice remained steady. "One… two… three."
The crash of splintering wood echoed through the hall. The floor gave way with a roar, and they tumbled into darkness—landing in cold, muddy water that carried them away from the facility and into the night.
They emerged hours later, soaked and exhausted, into a world that felt both free and wretched. The city sprawled ahead—grimy, crowded, full of dangers Nogare could already begin to see. He wiped blood from his upper lip and looked at his companions: Zentake's aura flickered with suspicion and grudging gratitude; Masaboru's swirled with trauma and fragile hope.
A thousand negative futures branched out from this moment—starvation in the alleyways, betrayal by strangers, recapture by the guild's hunters. Each one was clear, sharp, and unavoidable if they made the wrong choice.
Masaboru sank to the ground, leaning against a wall. "What now?"
Nogare pulled out the empty journal he'd stolen from the lab—its cover still bearing the guild's seal. He flipped to the first page and took out a piece of charcoal he'd tucked into his pocket. In neat, precise letters, he began to write.
"Tell me where you want to go," he said, his voice hollow but calm despite the visions already forming in his mind. "I will tell you all the ways we will suffer and die trying to get there. Then, we can begin to build something that avoids the worst of them."
He finished the first entry—"Escape successful: 31% probability achieved. Potential risks ahead: starvation (48%), exposure (39%), recapture (62%)"—and closed the journal. It would become his ledger of avoided disasters, the first stone laid for what would one day be called Eldoria, built upon a foundation of every tragedy he could foresee.
END OF BOOK ONE