Sitting in the corner, Claude studied the crying boy through half-lidded eyes, irritation prickling under his skin. Every sniffle, every shuddering breath grated on his nerves like rusted metal.
'Dammit… He's really irritating!'
His fingers twitched toward a nearby rat, entertaining the fleeting urge to shove it into the boy's mouth just to silence him. But exhaustion weighed too heavily—his own despair smothering even his annoyance.
Then his stomach growled, loud and insistent.
'Man… i'm so hungry'
The boy's crying hitched. A pause. Then, tentatively:
"I-is someone there?"
Claude's head snapped up…
'H-huh…? He didn't notice me?'
The absurdity of it prickled his temper. "You didn't notice me?" he demanded, voice dripping with skepticism.
The boy flinched. "I-I couldn't sense you…"
Claude's frown deepened. 'What the hell is this idiot babbling about?'
"A-are y-you… dead?" the boy stammered.
"What are you talking about? I'm as alive as one could be."
Claude raised a brow; he was still doubtful of this lunatic.
The boy wiped his nose, confusion overtaking fear. "I-I'm sorry, I just… I couldn't sense your Aether. I thought-"
"Aether?" Claude cut in. "I'm not Awakened. I don't have Aether."
"E-everyone has Aether," the boy insisted, voice wavering but firm. "Even non-Awakened. It's just that Awakened have a lot more."
Claude's patience frayed. "Then why can't you sense mine?"
The boy shrunk under his glare. "I… I don't know."
A beat of silence. Claude's mind raced—then stalled.
"Wait." He leaned forward. "How the hell can you sense Aether? We're the same age. Nobody Awakens before—"
"Y-you can," the boy interrupted, then immediately recoiled, as if surprised by his own boldness. "U-under certain conditions. Like… strong emotions."
Claude's pulse quickened. His knowledge of Aetheris was threadbare, scraped together from outskirts rumors and half-heard tavern talk. But this? This was new.
"So you have Awakened early?"
The boy hesitantly nodded
"Then what's your ability?"
The boy stiffened. "I-I don't want to tell you."
Claude's fingers curled into fists. 'Rat. Throat. Now.' He forced a breath. "Why? I won't tell anyone."
"I d-don't know you," the boy whispered. "I can't… trust you."
Claude gritted his teeth. The logic was sound, but that didn't dull the urge to throttle him.
"Fine," he bit out. "At least tell me how you found out about your Aetheris."
Despite Claude's usual indifference, he really liked learning more about Aetheris and its uses, but of course, living in the outskirts left him unable to.
"A year ago… when my sister died." His voice frayed at the edges. "There was a-a voice in my head. Then this… window appeared. Transparent. It showed me my abilities, how to use them…" He swallowed. "My mother taught me more after, like How to sense Aether."
Claude's exhaustion momentarily forgotten, his mind ignited with possibilities. But before he could pry further, a sharp pain lanced through his skull
Flash. Edwin's corpse, blood pooling.
Flash. Two knives glinting on dirt.
Flash. Edgar's lifeless eyes.
And laughter. Twisted. Hysterical.
He choked back a groan, shaking his head to clear the visions. Desperate to redirect his thoughts, he seized on the first question he could muster:
"You never told me your name."
The boy fidgeted. "M-my name is Elyes. Elyes Eversley."
Claude went very still.
'Eversley. The Barony this region answers to.'
A minute crawled by in silence. Claude weighed the risks, then let it drop. Names meant little in the pits.
"Claude," he offered curtly.
Elyes nodded at the floor. "Nice to meet you, Claude." A pause. Then, with sudden, awkward
earnestness: "D-do you know what your name means?"
Claude blinked. "Does it matter?"
Elyes gaped at him. "O-of course it does!"
Claude couldn't help it, he barked a laugh. "Then enlighten me."
Elyes' lips twitched. "Claude means… Lame."
The laughter died. Claude's hand shot toward the nearest rat.
"I don't give a damn what it means," he snarled. "Keep talking about Aetheris."
------------------
A couple of days later.
The cell hadn't changed—same rotting bricks, same rusted door, same suffocating stench of damp and decay. The only difference?
Was Elyes, he was reading a book under the light of a lantern, he got both from one of the Bandits. It irritated Claude… the favoritism was as evident as it gets. While Elyes gets a book to pass the time, Claude gets to either spend his time with one of the rats in the cell or just be alone with his thoughts.
'Of course they favor the noble boy.'
But still he got something out of having the timid boy as a cellmate. He learned a lot about Aetheris!
From what Elyas told him, there are three main types of Aetheris; Elementlist, Spirit weavers, and finally Special.
Elementalist was the most common type but the easiest to work around, while the Special type was both the rarest and hardest to understand. Spiritweaver fell in the middle, neither the simplest nor the most difficult.
As the name suggests, Elementalists can control specific elements they have an affinity for. Spiritweavers, on the other hand, can form contracts with spirits and command them. Lastly, Special is… well, special. Those with a Special Aetheris can wield unique abilities, as Elyes put it, powers like super strength, super speed, invisibility, and the like.
Claude also learned the different mental commands used to open the Soul mirror which Claude assumed is the translucent window that appeared during Elyes' awakening.
And when Claude issued the mental command…
Name: [Claude?]
Aetheris Type: [Special]
Aetheris Rank: [X]
Aetheris Step: I
Aetheris: [Soulless]
Aetheris Flaw: [???]
Body condition: …
Aetheris Traits: [Nothing, Forever], [Empty Vessel]
Aetheris Abilities: [Faceless]
'What the hell…?'
Claude reached out to touch the Soul Mirror... only to accidentally expand one of the descriptions instead.
[Soulless: Your soul is an endless void, hungering for something it will never possess.]
'What does that even mean?!'
He attempted to expand the Flaw description, only to be met with a wall of question marks...
'Does that mean I don't have a flaw?'
Claude tapped at the question marks, hoping to refresh them, but nothing changed. With a frustrated sigh, he finally gave up and scrolled down to his traits instead.
'Nothing, Forever? It sounds creepy.'
[Nothing, Forever: Like a name on the tip of the tongue, they are always almost remembered, yet never truly seen.]
'Seriously? This just keeps getting weirder. So now I'll be forgotten? No wonder Elyes couldn't sense me. What the hell is going on?'
[Empty Vessel: Your body rejects possession, curses, and soul-based attacks as there is nothing inside to corrupt.]
'This is… Great! Amazing even! Possession and curses are always unexpected! Same goes for soul-based attacks! But still… What the hell is up with these descriptions?! "There's nothing inside to corrupt" or "Your soul is an endless void", how can someone exist without a soul?!'
Claude lingered on the thought for a moment before remembering, there was still one more thing he needed to check.
[Faceless: You were never meant to be remembered… only to become.]
'The same thing… What does this even mean?! Am I not allowed to be myself or what?!'
Five agonizing minutes of puzzling over the description got Claude nowhere. With a grunt of frustration, he abandoned the effort and began methodically inspecting the Soul Mirror from the top.
Name: [Claude?]
'Why the question mark? Is this thing doubting my name?'
Aetheris Type: [Special]
Aetheris Rank: [X]
Aetheris Step: I
'Rank? Does that mean I can move up ten steps? Or does it mean something else? Guess I'll have to ask Elyes later.'
And…
[Body condition: Your Lungs are suffering slightly due to polluted air; You have many broken bones; ???.]
'The question marks again…'
Those persistent question marks weren't just gaps in information - they felt like personal insults. Claude caught himself glaring at the Soul Mirror, his jaw clenched tight.
'What a load of bullshit.'
Claude decided to stop obsessing over the question marks and focus on something more important—figuring out what his ability actually did.
First, he considered experimenting with [Nothing, Forever], but after some thought, he dismissed the idea. It seemed to work passively, after all. That didn't mean he couldn't analyze it, though. So, he combed through his memories since waking up here.
His conversation with the first bandit came to mind, but he quickly skipped over it. Other than noticing him a bit late, the bandit hadn't acted unusually.
Then he recalled Elyes' reaction a few days prior. The boy hadn't sensed him at all as if Claude were invisible. But the first bandit had noticed him eventually, just… delayed.
Next, he thought about the bandits who came to check on Elyes. They always focused solely on the noble boy, barely acknowledging Claude, if at all. Even the one who brought food usually carried only one plate, for Elyes. And when Claude pointed it out, they'd freeze, looking bewildered, as if they'd forgotten something important.
He'd assumed it was just favoritism. Now? Now it felt off.
'Does this mean if someone isn't actively looking for me… they won't notice me at all?'
He turned the theory over in his mind, testing it. Finally, he settled on a conclusion:
[Nothing, Forever] let him blend into the background perfectly. He could stand right in front of someone or behind them and they wouldn't register his presence. Unless they were specifically searching for him.
Of course, he hadn't tested it yet. The full extent of the ability was still unclear.
He summoned the Soul Mirror again and froze.
[Faceless] was glowing.
A deep, unsettling red.
And then...
"You seem to have gotten a cellmate? And a noble, no less! What luck you have, dear brother."