The path was narrow, flanked by tall, ancient trees — like silent sentinels.
The ground, clean and firm, showed no signs of recent passage. Everything there seemed in order — untouched.
It was the kind of place only great losses or great loves could justify preserving: discreet, empty, protected, impeccable.
Damián and Mason rode in silence, their horses' hooves muffled by the short, well-kept grass. Ahead, a hill rose gently. There were no signs, no fences, no cameras. That part of the estate was treated as if it were sacred.
At the top of the hill, the air changed.
There rested the grave of Damián's omega father. Around it, other headstones — ancestors of the Williams family. Everything was simple, yet carefully tended. No overgrown weeds. No flower out of place.
There was silence, but not abandonment—preservation, not neglect.
It was a place where time seemed to ask permission before passing.
Damián dismounted first. Mason followed in silence.
The wind moved gently through the trees. The leaves swayed slowly. It was the only sound.
Damián looked at his bracelet. Mason did the same.
Neither of them spoke. They just activated it.
Reality vanished.
Nothing exploded. Nothing glowed. It simply... ceased to be.
Now, they were in an infinite white room.
A space without a ceiling, without a floor, without time.
All white. All suspended.
And yet, the ground beneath their feet felt real.
They breathed. They were there. But not really there.
Mason looked at his hands. Then at Damián.
His bracelet was still flashing red:
"Mercenary Josh Smith—accepted."
Mason's voice echoed — soft, yet clear:
— Do you use your bracelet a lot, Damián?
Damián raised his wrist with disdain.
In one swift motion, he tore the device off and let it go.
It floated for a second, then dissolved like smoke.
— I don't need it, he said, calmly.
Mason frowned, confused:
— How did you do that? The bracelet... it listens to you? Are you fused with it?
I'm a genius, and I can't even come close.
The silence that followed seemed to gain weight.
Then, the floor began to change.
Lines appeared, sliding on their own.
They weren't drawings. They were equations. Alive.
Self-generating.
Mason tried to understand. None of it was familiar.
— This is... impossible, he whispered.
Damián started to walk. Unafraid.
As if that place had always belonged to him.
He stopped. Turned.
His eyes glowed. Not reflecting light.
Emitting it.
Mason swallowed hard.
He felt something shift inside his body. Like something had come undone.
— We're... something I don't understand, he murmured. Souls with divine particles...
Damián pointed at the equations — now curves, cycles, symbols pulsing with energy:
— We're grand codes of the Universe.
But sometimes, souls are born with a spark.
Capable of rewriting the rules.
Mason dropped to his knees.
The equations clustered together.
And then, they formed something new — a golden spiral. Pulsing. Alive.
Damián continued:
— I don't use the bracelet because I don't need to steal or acquire abilities.
I don't create them. They've always been inside me.
Mason reached out. He touched the spiral.
His hand trembled.
A voice rose in his mind.
It wasn't sound. It was understanding — something he had already suspected.
"Damián wasn't like him. He was... an event."
Mason froze.
The fear was real. Cold. Sweat ran down his back.
The white room began to fragment.
Like pixels dissolving.
The original world returned.
But the sky was different.
More stars. More layers.
As if the universe had stretched open a little more.
Mason looked up, stunned:
— What did you do?
Damián, serious, yet curious:
— I didn't do anything.
On the horizon, a single black bird crossed the sky.
Its cry sounded like a forgotten prayer.
Mason knew, in that instant, that nothing would ever be the same.
— What are you doing? he asked.
— I don't know, Damián replied.
Then the remaining white ground cracked open.
Golden dust flooded the space.
Within it — sounds: screams, explosions, metal tearing.
The dust began to condense.
Forming... images.
A Dimensional War unfolded before them.
Soldiers wrapped in armor of light fought against creatures made of pure shadow — as if light and darkness had become physical matter.
In the sky, ships collided and shattered like glass, revealing the star-speckled void behind them — vast, cold, merciless.
Amid the chaos, a child stood crying — alone, at the center of a devastated field.
Clutched in their hand was a bracelet identical to theirs.
Damián froze.
There was something about the child — in the eyes, the haircut, the way they held the bracelet — that made him step back.
Younger.
More vulnerable.
It was him — or rather, who he had once been: Josh Smith. Before he became Damián.
He stepped forward instinctively, trying to embrace the child.
His arms passed straight through —
as if the boy were a memory's echo or a shadow cast from another world.
The smell of burning wire filled his nose. Sharp, metallic, impossible to ignore.
The stench of a universe tearing itself apart.
Mason shouted over the distant rumble of explosions:
— It's a portal! These are... past wars — or future ones!
Damián tried to close the interfaces with a quick motion — he wanted to reach that child in front of him.
But something exploded in red light, spraying brilliance like digital blood.
The scene fragmented again.
Now, before them stretched the realm of shadows —
an absolute void, without light, without horizon.
Only floating portals in the dark, each revealing a different apocalyptic scenario:
– A castle being devoured by black roots, pulsing like living arteries.
– A fleet of ghost ships disintegrating in a sea of molten lava.
– An entire city crystallizing, its inhabitants freezing in time — transformed into statues of ice.
Mason's bracelet flared suddenly, emitting a distorted message, stuttering like a dying machine:
**"ALERT: INEVITABLE EVENT DETECTED. SURVIVAL PROBABILITY: 0.0001%"**
Without hesitation, Damián grabbed Mason's arm.
— We're leaving. Now.
He struck the ground — a sharp, powerful blow, not driven by the bracelet. But by something older. More primal.
The world around them shattered like fine glass, breaking into a thousand fragments of light. And then they fell—back onto the silent hillside.
The landing was hard. The sky remained above them, but the horses neighed, restless, sensing something the eyes couldn't see.
Mason trembled. He clutched the bracelet as if trying to throw it away—but it was dead, lifeless, as though it had never worked.
"What was that, Damián?" he asked, his voice cracked and barely a whisper. "I almost died… just from watching?"
Damián didn't answer immediately. He looked down at his hands. A golden shimmer still glowed faintly beneath his skin, but it was already fading—as if something had been triggered… or awakened.
"I don't know," he said at last. "But you felt it too, didn't you?"
Mason didn't reply. The scent of burning wire still lingered in the air, like the signature of something that should not exist. And Damián knew—without understanding how—that something, somewhere, was burning. And that somehow, he was part of it.
Mason dropped to his knees, his entire body trembling as though every muscle had been drained. His breathing was shallow, his eyes unfocused.
"This world... it wasn't my own," he realized, moments before his body gave way and he collapsed.
He felt emptied, as if some cosmic vampire had drained him to the core.
Damián caught him before his head struck the stone. "Stay here. I'll be back," he said, gently resting Mason against the grave of his omega father.
Mason reached for his wrist with what little strength remained. His voice came out as a scrape. "Don't… don't go back there…"
His eyes rolled back. He lost consciousness.
Damián adjusted his position, pulled off his own coat, and folded it into a pillow under Mason's head. Then he looked down at the dead bracelet on Mason's wrist—and activated his own.
Reality tore apart.
The white room appeared once again. But something was wrong now. Deeply wrong.
Floating windows hovered all around him, like suspended screens in a void. Each one displayed a fragment of horror. Everything was being crushed beneath a creature made of pure shadow.
Damián clenched his fists. "None of these is the answer," he murmured.
He closed his eyes and focused on the system. "He gave up on the truth."
The ground began to tremble. Code started forming beneath his feet, branching out like roots of raw data.
In front of him appeared a tree of avatars—faces suspended in time like hanging fruit. Some were familiar. Others, not. But all had one thing in common: the spark.
And then he saw it. His own face.
Josh Smith.
The bracelet emitted a sharp, metallic shriek. "Unauthorized access detected. Level: Mercenary."
"Before he could react, something primal surged through him—an instinct beyond thought—jolting the avatar awake. Their connection wasn't just neural; it was a collision of spectrums, a violent merging of energy and intent. The world blurred into streaks of light, and for a heartbeat, he couldn't tell where his own pulse ended and the avatar's began."
"A blinding flash of light overwhelmed him—he couldn't tell whether it came from within or from outside, but it was absolute..."
Damián—no, Josh—fell to his knees, now inside a different body. Taller. Heavier. Older.
Ahead of him, he saw Damián Williams—his body lying motionless in the white room. Pale as a corpse.
"No…" Josh whispered, rushing over to him. He grabbed his face, searched for a pulse.
Nothing...
The system echoed in a cold, mechanical voice:
"Time remaining: 3 minutes until system reset."
Without thinking, he slammed the bracelet and shouted, desperate:
"REVERT! REVERT! REVERT!"
The world spun.
Back on the hill.
Mason woke up with a scream, his body jolting with adrenaline.
Someone was approaching—it wasn't Damián.
It was a giant of a man, nearly two meters tall. Eyes cold as steel.
Josh Smith.
The king of the underworld. The face Mason had seen on the day of the accident. The face he would never forget.
He struggled, panic choking him.
"How did you do this?! TURN BACK NOW! You can't… you can't be him—damn it, Damián, come back!"
Josh held him firmly. His voice was low, rusted.
"One more minute. It'll go back to normal."
He turned the bracelet, so Mason could see it.
The countdown displayed:
00:00:59… 00:00:58…
"You can't stay like this!" Mason shouted, his voice tearing out of his throat. Desperate. Unmoored. If Damián took him to another world now… he would die.
Panicked and fearing for his life, he began to spill words, grasping for meaning. "Do you even know what you're doing?! I'm not going to survive this!—" his eyes brimming, his face trembling.
Josh gave a short, joyless smile.
"I know."
The counter hit zero.
And then, like a nightmare dissolving, the giant vanished.
The body beside him—Damián's body—sucked in air.
He woke like a drowning man breaking the surface. Gasping. Coughing. As if his soul had just been shoved back into a half-rebuilt shell.
Mason was pale. His fingers dug into the grass like he was trying to hold on to reality before it slipped away again.
"What… what was that?" he whispered.
Damián looked at his hands—small again, familiar.
Then at his bracelet.
The screen blinked:
"Access revoked. Welcome back to Last ABO Mission."
The sunset spilled its last light over the graves when Mason, still pale but with a firm voice, finally spoke:
"What was that, Damián? We're not supposed to see other worlds. In the movies, in the books, in the shows… it always ends badly."
Damián stayed silent, eyes fixed on the horizon.
Only after a long pause, he answered:
"I won't do it again."
Mason grabbed his arm, his fingers still trembling.
"Promise me. For everything that matters, promise me. Never go back there again."
Damián turned to him slowly. When he spoke, his voice sounded like it came from another lifetime.
"Do you remember the story of Achilles? In the Iliad?"
Mason frowned, but nodded.
"Before the Trojan War, Achilles went to his mother, Thetis. She was a goddess of the sea. Agamemnon wanted Achilles to fight by his side—even though Achilles despised him."
The wind blew through the graves, lifting dry leaves. It was as if the dead were listening.
"Thetis gave him a choice," Damián continued.
"If he stayed in Phthia, he would live a long and peaceful life.
Family. Love. He would be remembered by his children and grandchildren.
But if he went to Troy..."
His voice dropped.
"He would be remembered forever.
Immortalized.
And he would die young. But remembered for a million years."
Damián looked down at his hands, as if he saw something in them that Mason couldn't.
"Men want to be like gods…
But they forget the gods already live within us.
In the spark. In the divine particle."
An owl cried in the trees — a sharp sound in the dusk.
"I don't want to be remembered for thousands of years," Damián whispered.
"I just want to settle the debts that matter now."
Mason looked at him.
And for the first time, he didn't see a hero or a mercenary.
He saw a man exhausted by impossible choices.
"Then stop playing with things you don't even understand," he said, rising to his feet with effort.
"Because I'm not Thetis. And I won't save you from Troy."
Damián gave a small smile — one that never reached his eyes.
"Fair."
They left the cemetery in silence, as the first stars appeared in the sky — silent witnesses to promises that, like all those made at the foot of a grave, were born already fragile.
The sun was setting when the Williams estate plunged into silent chaos.
The housekeeper was tapping her foot in the main hall, a sound that cut through frequencies. Her hands were clasped, trembling. She knew — something was wrong. Damián and Mason had gone out early, and no one had seen them since breakfast. No lunch. No afternoon tea. And now, it was nearly dinner.
"We've searched the stables, the winter garden, even the old library," said one of the staff, breathless.
The housekeeper didn't reply. Her eyes were fixed on the window, as if she could summon them back through sheer will.
That's when Benjamin arrived.
Straight from a meeting. Posture rigid, suit flawless — but his face already betrayed concern the moment he saw the tension in the air.
"What's going on?"
"They're missing, sir," said the housekeeper, her voice rougher than usual. "No one knows where they are."
Benjamin didn't hesitate. He summoned Andrews, activated the security teams, ordered a full sweep of the estate. Even had the horses saddled, ready to search the forest perimeter.
"Call General Hunter."
And then, amid the nearly electric tension, a guard's voice crackled over the radio:
"They're coming. On foot. South path!"
Benjamin and Andrews were already in the courtyard when Mason and Damián emerged from the shadows between the trees.
The housekeeper nearly collapsed with relief. But Benjamin — composed as ever — couldn't hide the fire in his eyes.
"Where were you?!" — his voice cracked like dry thunder across the open air.
Mason, pale and visibly drained, could barely stay on his feet. Before Damián could speak, Mason stepped forward. His voice came out rough and low:
"I'm sorry. It was my fault."
A heavy silence fell over the group.
"Damián took me to the grave… where his father is buried. We stayed there for a while. We didn't notice how late it got. And… I talk a lot. Maybe I distracted him. I think we got lost on the way back."
Every word seemed to drag weight through his chest.
Benjamin froze. His anger evaporated, replaced by something denser. He looked at Damián, who only lowered his head.
"I'm sorry. I didn't think…" Damián murmured.
Beside Benjamin, Andrews placed a firm hand on his brother's shoulder — a gesture sincere and instinctive. The kind that holds someone just about to collapse — not out of weakness, but out of a worry held too long.
The housekeeper was the next to act. She gave Mason a maternal look — the kind given by someone who has raised other people's children. Then she spoke softly:
"Come. You both need to eat."
Benjamin said nothing else. He just nodded, his shoulders lowering slightly — the quiet relief finally settling.
As the two disappeared into the house, Benjamin's gaze lingered on the horizon, fixed on something only he could see beyond the trees.
Andrews stood still at his side, unmoving.
There was a strange discomfort tightening in his chest.
Seeing Mason like that — pale, his eyes distant — stirred an unease he didn't want to name.
Mason had been so full of energy that morning.
Yes, he had been restless. His brother was home, and that had been his greatest dream fulfilled.
"Maybe it was the way his younger brother reminded him of a caged wild animal—barely restrained, all coiled instinct. It left him unsettled, as if the world itself had tilted slightly off-axis. He didn't want to judge; he just needed to understand."
He had imagined a gentle, delicate brother.
It was clear they had gone out and gotten lost somewhere on the estate. Andrews wouldn't say anything—Damián's intent had been valid.
But seeing Mason and his younger brother exhausted, pale, their eyes distant, stirred an unease he didn't want to name.
Mason had been so excited that morning.
Yes, he had been restless—his brother was home, and that was the great dream of his life come true.
Perhaps the fact that his brother seemed like a barely-contained wild creature made it all feel strange.
Two days later...
The sun broke over the Twin Mountains, gilding the fortress walls that stood watch over the valley like ancestral sentinels.
To the left stood Phillips Castle — austere, razor-sharp, its towers slicing the sky like claws poised for attack.
To the right, Campbell Castle — majestic in its golden nobility, its stained-glass windows glowing like carved embers in the morning light.
Stretching between the two fortresses was the Golden Leaf Bridge — vast, adorned with leaves carved from aged gold, as if nature itself had been forged into noble metal.
An ancient bridge, wide enough for entire battalions, built with the precision of a temple.
It was the only path uniting both domains.
And it was there that everything would begin.
The caravans arrived like a rising tide.
The arrival of the families came in lines, one after the other.
Armored limousines, purebred horses, silver crests, ancestral banners.
The sound of boots, the scent of alphas in the air.
Some greeted each other with formal nods, others with veiled rivalry.
The entrance grounds resembled less a sporting event and more an ancient game of chess.
Here, nothing happened by chance.
And amid this meticulously choreographed stage,
Entire families crossed the gates in silent parades of power.
Two hundred primary houses.
One hundred and fifty of secondary rank.
Over two thousand bodies, each carrying the weight of lineage like invisible heraldry.
Alphas with lifted chins and heavy steps.
Betas with razor-sharp gazes.
Omegas with subtle presences — yet pulsing beneath the surface, like slow poison or lethal perfume.
There, no technology existed.
No screens. No implants.
This tournament was body, instinct, and pheromone.
And everyone knew:
The games hadn't even begun — and war was already in the air.
The Nevarro family's carriage was discreet but elegant.
No extravagant crests, no noisy entourage.
Just what was necessary: two mounted guards at the front, a dark vehicle gleaming in the morning light, and the certainty that anyone who knew what to look for would recognize its weight—ancient, political, dangerous.
Pippen Nevarro sat on the left, her posture straight, her gaze distant.
Beside her, her younger sister Eliza took in everything with hungry eyes, too young to hide her ambition.
In front sat Uncle Cedrik, his fingers tapping lightly on his cane — a war heirloom, or perhaps theatrical; no one knew anymore.
He was the kind of man people called a "counselor," and no one dared to contradict.
"The Wilsons must already be across the bridge," Eliza murmured.
"Good," Pippen replied, without turning her head.
But her eyes were fixed on the nothingness beyond the window.
It wasn't the landscape occupying her thoughts — it was Zeki.
She remembered the conversation.
Brief. Cold. Like almost everything involving Can-Bey's younger brother.
"I don't care about weak omegas, Pippen. Especially those who sell their own bodies. That's not love. That's misery in disguise."
He had said it with the calm of someone delivering a sentence.
And she had known then that the Mason situation had to be handled like a distraction — addressed when no one else was truly watching.
That's why she chose the tournament.
There, among two hundred families and a thousand agendas, Can-Bey would have other wars to fight, alliances to reaffirm, pressures to absorb.
If Mason were mentioned at all, he would be nothing more than a footnote on a day of glory and strategy. Nothing more.