The man’s voice faded.

Not like sound disappearing, but like reality itself forgetting to continue him.

Everything froze.

No noise.

No wind.

No weight.

I didn’t feel fear.

I didn’t feel anything.

Thoughts stopped forming.

There was no darkness.

There was no light.

There was only presence.

Not something I could see.

Not something I could describe.

Trying to give it shape would already be wrong.

It simply was.

And I was… not separate from it.

Not connected either.

Just… allowed to exist near it.

Time did not move.

Then something spoke.

Not in sound.

Not in words.

But in meaning.

You are meant to be.

Another sequence followed.

Ancient.

Not a language.

More like reality correcting itself.

And then, one final statement formed inside existence itself:

You have been given the power to break reality.

Use it wisely.

No emotion came with it.

No excitement.

No fear.

Just information.

Then—

Everything snapped back.

The ruins returned.

The wind moved again.

The man stood in front of me, exactly where he was before.

He finished his sentence.

“…from the Land of Snakes.”

I blinked.

“What?” I said.

He looked at me. “That’s where I’m from.”

Something was wrong.

Not with him.

With me.

There was a gap.

A missing piece of time I couldn’t measure.

I stepped back.

“I can’t trust you,” I said.

He didn’t react.

“You knew,” I continued. “You knew more than you ever told me.”

He remained calm. Too calm.

“I never lied,” he replied. “I just didn’t explain.”

“That’s the same thing.”

Silence stretched between us.

I stopped following him.

For the first time since this journey began,

I chose not to move forward.

And for the first time—

The path ahead no longer belonged to him