My stomach flipped so hard I tasted bile.
The job was already gone—I was falling through something that felt like tearing glass.
"Contain the anomaly," someone said calmly, right before the pressure locked onto my chest.
⸻
I hit the ground on my side.
Hard. No heroic roll. No grace. Just bone meeting stone and my lungs emptying like someone punched the air out of me on purpose.
I gagged. Tried to breathe. Couldn't. My fingers clawed at the floor, nails scraping against something smooth and cold. Stone. Definitely stone. My ears rang so loud it felt like static chewing through my skull.
Okay. Okay. This is bad.
The ceiling above me wasn't a ceiling. It was… open. Too open. A torn sky pulsing with pale light, like someone ripped a hole and forgot to close it. Symbols burned in the air—circles, lines, things that looked like letters if letters hated me.
I rolled onto my back and immediately regretted it.
Pain shot up my spine. My vision blurred. I squeezed my eyes shut, breathing through my teeth. Slow. In. Out. Don't panic. Panicking makes things worse. Panicking always makes things worse.
Except this time, not panicking wasn't fixing anything either.
Voices echoed from somewhere above.
"Ritual collapse confirmed."
"Energy levels spiking—containment failed."
"Where did the variable go?"
Variable?
I tried to sit up. My arms shook like jelly. My head throbbed. The ground beneath me felt warm, almost humming, like it was alive and unhappy about it.
I was not supposed to be here.
The last thing I remembered was the interview room. Fluorescent lights. A clipboard. A woman smiling too hard while saying, "It's a normal administrative position." Then the floor had dropped out from under me.
Literally.
I pushed myself upright, biting back a whimper. My knees buckled but held. Barely.
The room—hall? platform?—was huge. Circular. Marked with glowing patterns carved deep into the floor. Several figures stood around the edges, frozen in place like someone hit pause.
They weren't human.
I knew that immediately, the way you know a stove is hot before you touch it.
Some were tall, draped in dark robes that didn't quite touch the ground. Others had horns. Or tails. Or eyes that reflected the light wrong, like mirrors that hated what they showed.
Every single one of them was staring at me.
My chest tightened.
Okay. New plan. Don't scream. Screaming never helps.
"Hi," I said hoarsely.
That was a mistake.
The air shifted.
Not wind. Not pressure. Something deeper, heavier. Like gravity suddenly remembered it had a job and decided to overperform.
Several of them stiffened. One actually took a step back.
"What did she say?" someone hissed.
"I—" My throat closed. I swallowed hard. "I think there's been a misunderstanding."
My heart pounded so hard it hurt. I could feel it in my ears, my fingertips, my teeth. My palms were slick with sweat. Every instinct screamed run, but there was nowhere to go. The glowing patterns boxed me in, humming louder now, reacting to something—me?
A figure near the far end raised a hand. "Do not approach the center."
Great. Fantastic. I was the center.
Another voice, sharper. "She's not disintegrating."
That didn't sound reassuring.
"She should have been erased on contact," someone else said. "Why is the formation stabilizing?"
I looked down.
The symbols under my feet were… dimming. The violent flicker smoothing out, like a storm settling into uneasy quiet.
I hadn't done anything. I was just standing there, trying not to puke.
"I really need to go home," I muttered.
That did it.
The pressure snapped into place.
It hit me like a wall, slamming into my chest, my shoulders, my skull. I gasped, knees buckling as invisible force pinned me where I stood. It wasn't pain exactly—more like being crushed by expectation. Like the world itself was leaning in, demanding an answer I didn't have.
Someone stepped forward.
He didn't rush. He didn't hesitate.
He simply appeared closer than he should have been, as if distance had politely moved out of his way.
Tall. Dark robes. Long black hair tied back neatly, not a strand out of place. His face was calm. Too calm. The kind of calm that comes from knowing nothing here could hurt him.
Except—
His eyes flicked to the symbols under my feet.
Just for a second.
Something tightened in his expression.
The pressure eased a fraction. Just enough for me to suck in a shaky breath.
"This is the anomaly?" he asked.
His voice was low. Controlled. Not loud, not threatening—and somehow worse because of it.
"Yes, Arbiter," several voices answered at once.
Arbiter.
I didn't like that word.
He studied me like I was a problem that refused to solve itself. Not hungry. Not curious. Just… assessing.
I glared back before I could stop myself. "You're crushing my ribs."
A murmur rippled through the room.
His gaze snapped to my face.
For the first time, something shifted.
Not anger. Not surprise.
Interest.
The pressure vanished completely.
I nearly collapsed. Caught myself on sheer stubbornness and the burning need not to look weak in front of whatever the hell he was.
"That was intentional?" he asked.
"No," I snapped. "It was rude."
Silence.
Someone laughed. Immediately choked it off.
The Arbiter—Mo Shen, someone whispered—didn't look away. His eyes were dark, unreadable. But the air around him… changed. Less sharp. Less hostile. Like a blade reluctantly returning to its sheath.
"You are uninjured," he said.
"I fell out of the sky," I shot back. "Define 'uninjured.'"
Another mistake.
The symbols flared briefly, then settled again, smoother than before.
Several figures stiffened.
Mo Shen's brow furrowed.
"You do not fear me," he said slowly.
It wasn't a question.
I hugged my arms around myself, suddenly very aware of how cold I was. "I do," I said honestly. "I'm just more afraid of dying somewhere that isn't my apartment."
That earned me a sharp inhale from the left. A demon-looking guy with too many teeth stared at me like I'd personally offended his ancestors.
Mo Shen didn't react.
Instead, he stepped closer.
Every rational thought in my head screamed bad idea, but my feet stayed planted. My chest felt tight again—not from pressure this time, but from him. From the way the air bent around his presence, heavy and absolute.
"You should not exist here," he said.
"Yeah," I agreed. "That's been established."
His gaze dropped—to my hands. They were shaking. He noticed.
Something flickered across his face. Discomfort? Annoyance?
The floor hummed softly.
Behind him, someone whispered, "The formation is stable."
Another voice, strained. "It's stabilizing around her."
Mo Shen went still.
I looked between them, dread pooling in my gut. "What does that mean?"
No one answered.
Mo Shen straightened, decision settling over him like armor.
"Contain her," he said.
My heart lurched. "Wait—"
"Relocate," he corrected calmly. "Do not restrain her physically."
Physically?
Two figures moved closer. Not touching. Circling. The air thickened again, gentler this time but no less final.
I made a choice.
A bad one.
I grabbed Mo Shen's sleeve.
Gasps erupted.
I didn't think. Didn't plan. I just knew that letting go meant being swallowed by whatever system these people served.
"Don't," I said, voice breaking despite myself. "Please. I didn't ask for this."
The contact was brief.
Bare skin against fabric.
The world stopped.
Not metaphorically. Literally.
The hum died. The symbols went dark. The pressure vanished everywhere at once, like someone unplugged reality.
Mo Shen froze.
His breath caught.
Every single being in the room stared.
Slowly, impossibly, Mo Shen looked down at where my fingers still clutched his sleeve.
Then he looked back at me.
Something was wrong.
Very wrong.
He didn't pull away.
He didn't order them to kill me.
Instead, he said quietly, almost to himself—
"…I can think again."
The room erupted in chaos.
And I realized, too late, that choosing him had just made everything worse.