There was no up.
No down.
Just a flicker of space between things, and Lucen stuck inside it.
He didn't move.
He wasn't allowed to.
His body sat mid-fall, weightless. Pulse suspended. Mana in his chest like a knot that had just remembered how to breathe. And behind his eyes, the system was… struggling.
[CLASS-RANK: SSS — SPELLCRAFT SOVEREIGN]
[THRESHOLD: LEVEL 20 REACHED]
[ANALYZING PATTERNS…]
[ERROR: No Guild Template Available]
[ERROR: No Archive Guidance Available]
[INTERFACE OVERRIDE — MANUAL INTERPRETATION MODE]
[STAND BY]
Lucen wanted to speak. He couldn't.
He wanted to blink. He couldn't.
He could only watch as the interface pulled itself open like someone tearing paper off a burning book. Glyphs bled in reverse. Strings of spellcode folded, then reversed again, like trying to write backwards in a language the system didn't fully understand.
And then came the second pulse.
Not a tone.
A command.