Chapter Text
For Wise, the act of waking up and getting out of bed had always been one of the most difficult things to do. Not because he was lazy, but due to the meager hours of rest he allowed himself. His life was, in itself, an overwhelming whirlwind: nearly impossible commissions, a diet that was far from ideal for him and his sister, and constant dealings with the various types of Agents he had been privileged to work with over the last few months.
Who would have thought he would end up associating with high-profile figures in New Eridu? Hoshimi Miyabi and Section 6, Shifu Yixuan alongside her students, Astra Yao with her fearsome bodyguard Evelyn, among many other factions. Establishing a notorious friendship with all of them brought him closer and closer to his goal: finding his mentor, Carole Arna. However, unfortunately for him, his sister Belle—true to her playful and teasing nature—always warned him that he would end up dead or castrated if he didn't start considering the feelings of certain female Agents. Wise simply ignored her words, which caused her to call him a hopelessly "dense" idiot.
Yes, this was just any ordinary day in Wise's life, and it didn't seem like it was going to change anytime soon. Or was it?
A rusty sheet-metal ceiling was the first thing Wise saw when he managed to pry his eyelids open.
His head throbbed as if a giant Ethereal had stomped hard on his skull. He tried to sit up, but a sharp numbness shot through his entire body, causing a dry groan to escape his throat. He was lying on a rigid cot, wrapped in coarse sheets that smelled of cheap disinfectant and dry dirt.
This immediately unnerved him. The constant hum of engines and the neon lights of Sixth Street, to which he was so accustomed, had completely vanished. In their place, the only sound in the room was the monotonous screech of an old ceiling fan that barely managed to move the hot air.
"Well, you're finally awake," a raspy voice spoke from the shadows of the shack.
An older man, his hands stained with grease and a rudimentary optical visor prototype strapped to his forehead, approached while wiping his fingers with a dirty rag. The place looked like a cross between a mechanic's workshop and an emergency medical clinic. There were rusty oxygen tanks, exposed wires, and IV bottles hanging from makeshift hooks.
"Where...?" Wise rasped, his mouth feeling pasty and full of sand. "Where is Belle? Where is the HDD? The commission?"
The man let out a dry laugh, devoid of malice, but carrying a certain degree of empathy and understanding.
"I don't know what an HDD is, kid. And there's no Belle here. You're a long way from home. We found you half-buried in the desert dunes, pretty damn far from that giant wall they call New Eridu. You're lucky your head is still attached."
Wise reached up to the back of his neck, finding a tight bandage. His mind began racing at a thousand miles per hour, trying to process the absolute void in his chest. What on earth was he doing in the Outer Ring? Had a commission in that region gone horribly wrong? His thoughts were a complete jumble; he couldn't remember the mission or the clients who had requested his services as a Proxy.
With an effort, he forced himself to sit on the edge of the cot. The wooden floor creaked beneath his boots. He felt strangely light, and it took him a second to realize why: his usual jacket and trousers had been removed, leaving him just one step away from total nudity if not for his boxers. There was also no sign of his reliable backpack, the one where he kept the devices and records that were key components of his life as a Proxy
"Take it easy, boy," the old doctor said, tossing the dirty rag onto a table cluttered with rusty tools and used syringes. "It took you three weeks to shake off that coma, and your body still hasn't recovered from the surgeries I had to perform. By the way, the name's Ryan. I'm the doctor of this little settlement."
"Surgeries? ...Settlement? " Wise thought to himself. He decided to take a quick look at himself and noticed the bandages he had completely ignored when trying to stand up.
"That's right," Ryan continued, anticipating his thoughts. "You arrived here with a variety of wounds. To be specific, your torso has three deep gashes: one on your chest, another on your left shoulder, and the last one near your ribs on the same side."
Wise tried to articulate a question, but the doctor kept analyzing his injuries.
"The most critical one is the wound on your head. Getting struck by shrapnel in that spot is a death sentence for most folks around these parts."
Wise was stunned by the revelation and awkwardly repeated the doctor's words:
"Shrapnel wound?"
Ryan nodded gravely, picking up a pair of metal tweezers from the table. At the tip, he held a fragment of blackish metal, coated in a crystalline crust of a brilliant purple hue that Wise recognized instantly: fragments of stabilized etheric substance, used in certain Ether-based weaponry.
"It wasn't ordinary gunpowder and iron shrapnel, boy," the old doctor explained, bringing the fragment closer so Wise could get a good look. "The metal was contaminated with high-density Ether. When we found you, the wound on your head was starting to crystalize. You're lucky the radiation didn't eat your nervous system alive. I had to scrape the bone and clean out the etheric infection the old-fashioned way, without any of those fancy purifying serums they use inside New Eridu."
Wise felt a shiver that had nothing to do with the desert wind. He knew perfectly well what Ether did to unprotected people: mutations, loss of sanity, and eventually, corruption into an Ethereal.
"That means the job where I was injured is related to a Hollow," Wise murmured, forcing his Proxy mind to analyze the situation despite the piercing headache. "Who shot me? Or what attacked me?"
Ryan dropped the shrapnel into a glass jar, causing a dull clink.
"I was hoping you could tell me that. The scavengers found you lying around the 'Dead Zone,' right where the desert swallows up the remains of the old abandoned districts. Whoever did that to you didn't want you to survive. And the Ether was taking care of finishing the job."
"'Dead Zone'?" Wise asked, puzzled. He furrowed his brow, ignoring the prickle of pain in his temple for a moment. He had memorized hundreds of topographical maps and navigation records on the HDD. "I've never heard of that sector in the Outer Ring. The supply routes for the Sons of Calydon or the mining corporations don't register any quadrant by that name."
The doctor stopped what he was doing. He turned slowly toward Wise, and for the first time, an expression of deep seriousness eclipsed the ruggedness of his otherwise kind face.
"Sons of Calydon? Is that the name of a music band?" the doctor asked, bewildered, before clarifying the situation. "Boy, you have no idea where you're standing, do you?" Ryan let out a heavy sigh and set the tweezers back on the table. "You're not in the Outer Ring. That place is a lot more orderly and respectable compared to this."
Wise stared at him blankly, feeling a sudden emptiness in his stomach.
"What do you mean? If it's not the Outer Ring, then..."
"You're in a much more volatile area," the old man interrupted, crossing his arms. "Welcome to The Border. This is where New Eridu's jurisdiction ends, where radio signals die, and where the city Government dumps the waste it doesn't want anyone to see. You're in no man's land, son. A place where the law isn't dictated by government scum or inspectors, but by whoever has the strength and the cunning to seize power."
The revelation hit Wise like a bucket of ice water. If the Outer Ring was already considered dangerous and remote, this area called "The Border" was little more than an urban legend among the citizens of New Eridu; a hostile territory from which no one ever returned to tell the tale. He was trapped in a part of the map where only assumptions or theories existed to explain its reality.
"The Border?" Wise managed to articulate, feeling his pulse quicken. "That's impossible... If I'm in The Border, how far away is New Eridu? If I can find a road map, an all-terrain vehicle, or if I can just contact an acquaintance..."
Ryan cut him off mid-rant, and after a couple of seconds of silence, let out a soft, low chuckle. It wasn't a cruel mockery, but the laugh of someone who had seen too many dreamers die with the exact same fantasies.
"Whether it's a vehicle or contacts sending you a plane..." the old doctor said, shaking his head as he leaned against the edge of his workbench. "Ah, kid. Typical mentality of a citizen trapped behind the walls."
Wise frowned, slightly annoyed by the condescension, but Ryan pressed on before he could object:
"To get out of here, you're going to need a hell of a lot more than a simple car or a damn plane. New Eridu isn't just weeks of travel on foot through a sea of radioactive dunes where the ambient Ether would kill you in no time. It's cut off by the Great Rift Barrier, and the airspace is plagued by magnetic storms and Ether clouds so dense they'd rip the turbines of any aircraft to shreds in five minutes. And by land... well, you'd have to cross three Dead Acres infested with things that make a common Ethereal look like a house pet."
Ryan stepped closer and looked Wise dead in the eye.
"Nobody leaves The Border, kid. There are no roads back. The only way to return to your precious city is by surviving long enough to find a crack in the Rift, and to do that, you're first going to have to learn how to walk through this hell without getting a bullet in the back of your head."
Ryan's words pierced Wise's mind like needles of ice.
He sat completely motionless on the edge of the cot, his gaze fixed on the wooden floor. As a Proxy, he was used to calculating escape routes and processing data at high speeds, but in that instant, his mind went completely blank.
For the first time in a very long time, Wise felt a constriction in his chest that he had only experienced when being a close witness to one of humanity's darkest historical disasters. He understood that this wasn't a simple setback, nor a failed mission he could fix by improvising some wiring. This was different. He was in a situation as critical as the Fall of the Old Capital.
That past catastrophe had destroyed the world, leaving humanity on the brink of extinction and leading to the subsequent creation of New Eridu as the last bastion of civilization. And now, he was experiencing the exact same sensation he had when the Helios Academy vanished along with the Old Capital. Disconnected from basic technology and without the HDD to guide him, he was trapped in a wild territory where human progress was minimal.
"Hey, snap out of it," Ryan's voice pulled him back, breaking the heavy silence. "You went paler than usual. Don't go fainting on me again, I've already wasted enough bandages on you."
Wise took a deep breath, swallowing his panic. After a few long seconds of tension, he exhaled the air trapped in his lungs. He forced his mind to calm down, shutting off the fear instantly. Fear wouldn't solve the problem; analysis would. He had no technology, he was wounded, half-naked, and trapped in the most dangerous corner of the world, but he was still alive. His intellect remained intact.
He looked at his empty hands, then at the old doctor watching him with curiosity, and finally at the window overlooking the desolate settlement. A tired, almost imperceptible smile tugged at the corner of his mouth.
"What a shitty way to start the morning," Wise said softly, his tone laced with sarcasm.