"What the fu—"
I cut myself off, leaning closer to the water. My reflection stared back with wide, disbelieving eyes.
My hair—my normal black hair with those few annoying premature silver streaks—had transformed. Now, nearly half of it blazed white creating a bizarre two-toned effect that practically glowed in the moonlight. The division wasn't clean either, more like someone had taken a paintbrush and haphazardly streaked the white through the black.
But that wasn't the worst part.
At the center of my forehead, a small golden circle gleamed—perfectly round, about the size of a coin. I pressed my fingers against it, expecting to feel raised skin or some kind of physical mark. Instead, it felt completely smooth, as though the golden circle was embedded beneath my skin rather than drawn upon it.
"No, no, no," I hissed, splashing water on my face as if I could wash it away. The mark remained, glowing faintly.
I knew exactly what this was: an Aspect Mark. The living sigil that appeared when someone completed their Domain Trial and became Awakened.
Except I hadn't completed shit. The Trial was still ongoing. And worse—the mark was right in the middle of my fucking forehead.
Back in New Vein, Aspect Marks typically appeared on places that could be concealed—forearms, shoulders, back, chest. Places where the Awakened could choose when to reveal their power. Only idiots and celebrities kept their marks visible all the time. The rest of us—especially those from the Depths—knew better than to broadcast our abilities.
A mark on the forehead was worse than useless—it was dangerous. Might as well paint a target on my face.
"Isaiah?" Laina called from the campfire. "Everything alright?"
I straightened up, yanking my hood forward to cover the mark. "Fine," I called back. "Just washing up."
I needed to think. Needed to figure out what this meant and how to hide it.
Back at camp, I rummaged through my pack until I found a strip of fabric I'd packed as a potential bandage. It would have to do. I wrapped it around my forehead, tying it at the back of my head.
When I returned to the fire, Joran glanced up from where he was cleaning his knives. "Hurt yourself?"
"Headache," I lied, settling down across from him. "The cold."
Laina passed me a steaming cup of pine needle tea. "This might help."
I accepted it with a nod, grateful for the distraction. The headwrap felt conspicuous, but neither of them seemed particularly concerned. People got headaches, after all. Nothing unusual there.
As they returned to their conversation about tomorrow's route, I closed my eyes and concentrated.
Status.
IDENTITY
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
NAME: ISAIAH ANGELO
CLASS: [LOCKED]
TITLE: [LOCKED]
TIER: [LOCKED]
ATTRIBUTES
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
STRENGTH: F [0]
□□□□□□□□□□□□□□□□□□□□
INTELLIGENCE: F [0]
□□□□□□□□□□□□□□□□□□□□
AGILITY: F [0]
□□□□□□□□□□□□□□□□□□□□
VITALITY: F [0]
□□□□□□□□□□□□□□□□□□□□
PERCEPTION: F [0]
□□□□□□□□□□□□□□□□□□□□
ACTIVE ABILITIES
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
① [LOCKED]
② [LOCKED]
③ [LOCKED]
PASSIVE ABILITIES
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
① [LOCKED]
② [LOCKED]
③ [LOCKED]
ARTIFACTS
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
① FROSTBITE
② HEARTSEEKER
Everything was still locked—exactly as it had been before. Except now the daggers were listed under "Artifacts." That had to be significant.
I reached back, feeling the twin hilts protruding over my shoulders. If they were artifacts, then perhaps...
Focusing on the daggers, I mentally commanded them to return to me—to become part of me again.
For a moment, nothing happened. Then I felt a strange tingling sensation across my back. The weight of the daggers vanished. When I reached back, my fingers found only empty sheaths.
What the hell?
I concentrated again, this time visualizing my status screen. The daggers were still listed under artifacts. They hadn't disappeared—they'd just changed form somehow.
At that moment, I felt a warm pulse from beneath my headwrap. The mark on my forehead grew hot for an instant, then cooled. Somehow, I knew the daggers had merged with it, becoming part of the Aspect Mark itself.
Well, that's handy.
I could feel them there, not physically present but somehow accessible. With a thought, I could probably bring them back.
"That headwrap suits you," Laina said, interrupting my thoughts. "Makes you look like one of the Whisper Monks."
I raised an eyebrow. "The what?"
"Hermits who live deep in the forest," Joran explained, sliding his knives back into their sheaths. "They claim to hear the voices of the ancient trees. Mark their foreheads with similar bands to show devotion."
"Great," I muttered. "Just what I was going for."
Laina laughed. "It's not an insult. The monks are respected. People say they can predict storms and calm wild beasts."
"Superstition," Joran said, though there was no derision in his voice. "But useful superstition. Travelers leave them offerings for safe passage through the forest."
I touched the fabric covering my mark. "I'm not looking for offerings. Just trying to stop my brain from pounding out of my skull."
"We should sleep," Joran said, rising to his feet. "Early start tomorrow. I'll take first watch."
Laina nodded. "Wake me for second."
"I can take a shift," I offered.
They exchanged a glance that lasted a fraction too long.
"You need rest," Laina said finally. "You're still adjusting to the cold."
Translation: they didn't trust me to stay awake or alert enough to spot danger.
"Fine," I said, not bothering to argue. "Wake me if something tries to eat us."
I retreated to my tent, a simple shelter barely large enough to lie down in. Inside, I removed my outer layers but kept the headwrap on. Even alone, I wasn't ready to look at that mark again.
Lying on my bedroll, I stared at the canvas above me and considered my situation.
The mark's appearance meant something had changed—some threshold had been crossed. But what? I hadn't completed the Trial. The Heart of Winter was still waiting at the Temple of Echoes, and I had sixteen days left to reach it.
The daggers were the key. They'd responded to me, integrated with the mark. Were they what had triggered it?
And what would happen when I got back to New Vein? An Aspect Mark on the forehead wasn't just inconvenient—it was dangerous. In the Depths, visible marks made you a target for gangs looking to recruit Awakened muscle. In the higher districts, they made you subject to immediate registration and classification by authorities.
Either way, it meant losing freedom. Losing anonymity. Losing the ability to choose when and how to reveal my power.
If I even have any power.
Everything in my status was still locked. If this was an Awakening, it was the most useless one I'd ever heard of.
I closed my eyes, exhaustion finally overtaking my racing thoughts. The last thing I remembered before sleep claimed me was the faint warmth pulsing from the mark on my forehead, like a second heartbeat.
***
Morning came with frost coating the inside of my tent. I woke stiff and cold, my breath visible in the pale light filtering through the canvas. For a moment, I lay still, listening to the sounds of the camp—the soft nickering of horses, the crackle of a fresh fire, the murmur of voices.
I sat up, immediately checking that my headwrap was still in place. It had shifted slightly in my sleep, but the mark remained covered. I adjusted it, tying it more securely this time.
Outside, Laina was already packed and ready, checking the horses while Joran tended the small fire where a pot of something steamed.
"Morning," Joran said without looking up. "Sleep well?"
"Like the dead," I replied, moving to warm my hands by the fire. "Any trouble during the night?"
"Nothing worth mentioning," Laina said, joining us. "Heard wolves howling, but far off. The river keeps most predators at a distance."
Joran handed me a tin cup filled with a thick, gray porridge. "Eat. We need to cover good ground today."
I took a spoonful and nearly gagged. "What is this?"
"Oats, dried berries, and rendered fat," he replied, already halfway through his own portion. "It'll keep you warm."
I forced myself to swallow. "Delicious."
"Survival isn't about taste."
"Clearly."
We ate in silence, the forest waking around us. Birds called from the trees—fewer than I'd expect in a normal forest, but still present. The river gurgled steadily, steam rising from its surface where it broke through the ice.
"Your hair looks different," Laina said suddenly, studying me over her cup.
I tensed. "What?"
"Lighter," she said, gesturing vaguely. "At the edges. Must be the sunlight."
I relaxed slightly. She'd noticed the change but attributed it to a trick of the light. Good enough for now.
"We should move," Joran said, dumping the last of his porridge into the snow and packing his cup away. "Daylight's valuable."
We broke camp efficiently, loading the horses and dousing the fire. As I struggled to mount my horse—still an ungraceful process—I felt the weight of the twin daggers across my back again. They had reappeared in their sheaths sometime during the night.
Interesting. I'd need to experiment with that.
Once mounted, I pulled my hood up over my headwrap, further concealing the mark. The less attention drawn to it, the better.
"The forest gets thicker from here," Joran said as we set off. "Stay close. It's easy to get separated."
I nudged my horse to follow, still uncomfortable in the saddle but marginally better than yesterday. As we rode deeper into the Whispering Forest, the trees closed in around us, their ice-laden branches creating a crystalline canopy that filtered the sunlight into strange, shifting patterns.
Despite everything—the cold, the danger, the mysterious mark on my forehead—I found myself oddly at peace. There was simplicity here that New Vein lacked. No gates, no cores, no complex social hierarchies based on Awakened status.
Just survival. Just the next step forward.
And maybe, just maybe, a path to power that didn't require playing by someone else's rules.
I touched my headwrap, feeling the faint warmth of the mark beneath. Whatever this was, whatever it meant, I would turn it to my advantage. I always did.
Sixteen days left. One mysterious mark. Two strange daggers.
And a whole lot of questions with no answers in sight.