Atlas ignored him.
His guide—his damn favorite guide—stood there again. Not physically, not quite. But his presence slithered through the cracks of reality like smoke from a fla long thought extinguished.
Oh, how good it felt seeing him again, Atlas thought bitterly. The sarcasm in that thought dripped like venom, acidic and real. If even he had returned...then Atlas was doing sothing right. Or sothing terribly wrong.
He kept his eyes pinned to the book, refusing to et the guide’s invisible gaze. It was a monstrous to of blackened parchnt, its spine stitched with sothing disturbingly like tendon. His fingers ran across the cover, already worn down from obsessive use. The text inside shimred faintly, pulsing between languages, none of them welcoming. A low, wet sound hissed from the pages as if the ink were alive and whispering.
He read anyway.
The whispers of Hell curled into his ears like smoke trailing through the cracks of a closed door. They licked at his mind. Sultry, violent, seductive. A chorus of voices, dozens—no, hundreds—chanted old sins in tongues only his soul rembered.
Aurora had warned him. Ignore them, she’d said. Easy for her to say. She was blessed. She had rlin’s reachings in her veins—she could tune out chaos like it was background noise.
For most, the whispers were fatal. They didn’t just whisper; they pulled. They dragged your thoughts into shadows. Rage, lust, envy—all rising like a flood. The heart quickened. Pupils dilated. Morality bled away until all that was left was want.
But for Atlas... it barely tickled.
A little lust, sure. But that was just... Tuesday. That wasn’t the book’s fault. That was just being young. Being him.
He flipped another page, the parchnt rough under his fingertips, the scent of sulfur curling into his nose.
{{{You’re ignoring ....}}}
The voice slid into his head like a blade through silk.
Atlas kept reading.
"Ignore you?" he muttered aloud. "You’d like that."
The presence hovered, silent, gauging him.
{{{...You’re actually going crazy, aren’t you.}}}
He didn’t reply. Not imdiately. There was a weight behind that voice—not just arrogance, but pain. Old, ancient disappointnt. A whisper of legacy pressing down like the hand of a dead god on his shoulder.
{{{...Is my legacy too much of a burden, my avatar?}}}
Atlas flinched at that. Not outwardly, not enough for soone to notice. But inside, sothing shivered. His hands paused, mid-turn of a page.
It wasn’t the question. It was the tone. Not disappointnt—hurt. That brittle tremor of being forgotten by the very soul you helped mold.
He clenched his jaw, staring harder at the book as though its words could shield him.
’He only cos when I die...’ Atlas thought. ’Why now? I’m alive. I’m fine. So what changed?’
{{{....You beca strong... That’s the fucking difference.}}}
A pause.
Then a whisper of anger.
’Uh huh.....You’re salty because I’m not replying.’
{{{...Maybe.}}}
Atlas rolled his neck, the vertebrae cracking. His patience was fraying like twine dragged across glass.
’What do you want?’ he asked, softly. ’You know your advice... I take it. I do. But I don’t use it.’
He stood, book still open in one hand, eyes shadowed by the flickering fla beside him.
"In the end... it’s my decision. My ego. My fire. I say what I think. I do what I say... and you know that."
Silence.
But a charged silence. The kind that ca before lightning struck.
Atlas turned another page. The ink shimred again—this ti forming not words, but symbols. Runes of binding, of summoning. Old, forbidden nas hissed across his mind.
Then he found it.
His path. A line buried deep between taphor and madness.
His route to the key.
But before the key... he had to et ONE of them.
’...Loki,’ he whispered, in remberance.
"...You know him ...right?"
{{{Of course. One of HIS seeds.}}}
"His... you an the sun god, right?"
Silence again.
Atlas’s chest grew tight.
"...Right?"
{{{Hahahahahaha...}}}
The laugh cracked through his mind like thunder, bouncing off the walls of his skull. It wasn’t amusent—it was madness, cruelty, and pity all wrapped in one jagged sound.
{{{You don’t know... do you?}}}
"Don’t know what?.... Tell !" Atlas barked, voice suddenly rising.
But the presence vanished like smoke sucked out a window.
He was alone again.
With his rage.
He slamd his hand against the table.
Bang!
The echo rang like a bell in the dead room.
"...Forget him," he growled through clenched teeth. "I need to know how to contact the gods... make a deal..."
He didn’t finish.
Knock. Knock.
"Your highness... are you there?"
The voice cut through the room like a bell through mist.
Atlas’s spine stiffened. That voice—gentle, careful. Too careful. He knew it.
Qin.
The healer.
A flutter of anxiety brushed against his chest. Not because of her, but because of what she would beco. The future was already written in fragnts, in broken visions and divine threats. The Unholy Saintess. But that was not now. Not yet.
He swallowed that thought and let his voice steady. "Co in."
The door creaked open, and she entered—a white-robed silhouette frad in the candlelight. Her robes were simple, but the black stiping across the fabric curled like vines around bone. She looked pale, eyes wide with sothing more than fear.
Sothing hollow.
Atlas stood, motioning for her to sit. "What happened?"
She didn’t answer imdiately. Her gaze road the floor as though the words themselves were trapped there.
"I... I didn’t know who else to go to," she said finally. Her voice was softer than usual. Frayed. "I was going to go to the Pope, but... this is a matter of Berkimhum. So... I ca here."
She sat down as though her knees had barely obeyed her. Atlas moved closer.
"What happened, Qin?" he asked, gentler now.
She looked up, and her eyes... they weren’t crying, but they ached.
"Her lady... Claire. She’s... possessed."
Silence.
Atlas blinked.
’Her form... is she talking about that?’ he wondered. Claire hadn’t looked possessed last ti he saw her. She looked... different. Better, even. Like she had found a new kind of truth. That dark halo around her head had glowed like a crown forged in the void. But he hadn’t seen possession.
He’d seen power.
"There were horns," Qin whispered, and her voice cracked like glass.
"Horns?"
Qin nodded. "Her eyes turned red. Demon-like. I—I’ve only seen sothing like that in old texts. And then... then she sprouted wings. Not angelic. Bat-like. And she... she flew away."
Atlas’s heart sank.
"Where?"
"I don’t know... but she passed through your window. From your room."
That sentence hit him like ice water down the spine.
His window?
His room?
She had been there. Claire. In his space. In his—
’Did she find out?’ The thought burned through his chest like a falling ember.
He felt a tremor of sothing dangerously close to guilt.
Or fear.
He exhaled, long and slow, dragging a hand through his hair. One problem at a ti, he reminded himself. His pulse thudded behind his eyes.
He looked at Qin—saw the way her hands trembled slightly in her lap.
He reached out and clasped them. Warm. Small. So fragile.
"Calm down, Qin," he said, voice low. "Tell everything. Start from the beginning. Leave nothing out."
Her eyes searched his face, and sothing in her steadied. Not trust, not yet. But need. A need to be heard.
She began to speak.
********
Be TWENTY chaps ahead
Unlock the next Chapters in Privilege to uncover the mont everything begins to unravel — power, betrayal, and a truth that could change the war or...end it.
They’re not just playing the ga. They’re rewriting it.
🤫
➤ Read ahead now in Privilege.
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