A thin silver seam stitched itself into the fabric of Kethra’s domain, then split apart with a sound like parchment being delicately torn. From within stepped Jackal Quipshade, bushy tail swaying lazily behind him as he brushed invisible dust from his fur.

  Kethra’s divine realm was an endless black expanse that stretched in every direction, yet it was not empty. Lines of faint gray script drifted through the realm like falling snow—names, promises, bargains, whispered oaths. Each glowed faintly before dissolving away.

  Suspended platforms of dark stone hovered at varying heights, etched with glowing scripts the size of continents. Chains of ink bound some of them together. Others floated freely, script shifting on its own.

  At the center of it all stood a single towering desk carved from something darker than space itself.

  Behind it waited Kethra.

  Soot-dark robes pooled around their form, swallowing what little ambient glow the realm possessed. Their skin was blacker still—so devoid of reflection that even Jackal’s keen senses struggled to define their edges. In one hand they held a bound ledger secured with dark metal clasps. In the other, a sliver of charcoal.

  The charcoal paused mid-scratch as Jackal stepped fully through.

  “What are you doing here?” Kethra said evenly, their voice like dry, crumpled parchment.

  Jackal flashed a grin full of sharp white teeth. His large canine ears twitched with theatrical innocence.

  “Oh come now,” he said lightly. “Is that any way to greet an old friend?”

  Kethra closed the ledger with a firm snap.

  “What kind of friend forgets to pay their debts,” Kethra said. “I fully expected to never see you again.”

  Jackal placed a hand over his chest as if wounded. “Kethra, please,” he said smoothly. “When has a minor delay ever counted as true delinquency between esteemed friends and colleagues?”

  His ears flicked lazily. “Besides, I wouldn’t call it ‘owing.’ I prefer to think of it as a long-term investment in our continued relationship.”

  “You have been in my debt since before you clawed your way into godhood,” Kethra said coldly. “And you have been conspicuously absent ever since. Tell me, have you finally come to settle what is owed?”

  Jackal’s tail swished once.

  “Well,” he said smoothly, “what are a few billion years between gods?”

  Kethra did not respond and let the silence stretch.

  Jackal’s grin widened slightly.

  “You knew I’d settle up eventually,” he continued. “I always do. Might take a while. Might involve creative interpretation. But I always pay my debts.”

  “You have owed me,” Kethra replied, “for longer than the lifespan of entire universes.”

  Jackal coughed lightly. “Semantics.”

  He glanced around the floating ledgers, watching a string of glowing script curl up and vanish into Kethra’s charcoal.

  “So,” he said casually, rocking back on his heels. “Have you been keeping an eye on the 111th Integration?”

  Kethra opened the ledger and resumed their work.

  “No.”

  Jackal’s ears perked.

  “No?” he echoed.

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  “I am preparing my ascent into the third layer,” Kethra said. “Why would I possibly pay attention to such a minor occurrence?

  “The newly Integrated are amusing.” Jackal retorted.

  “But they rarely matter. They scramble, they claw, they burn bright for a moment—and then they collapse beneath challenges too vast for their immaturity.”

  Jackal laughed.

  “True enough. None of the Integrated from my universe made it. Every last one of them bit off something too big and they wound up choking.”

  Kethra inclined their head slightly.

  “It has been the same since my ascension in the 56th universe. The first generation of nearly every Integration is doomed. Even with the System’s indulgences—granting them Cores, accelerating their growth with Titles—it pales in comparison to being born within the System’s weave.”

  A faint ripple passed through the domain.

  “I will observe when the Integrated bear children,” Kethra added. “The second generation occasionally produces something… noteworthy.”

  Jackal’s grin sharpened.

  “Usually,” he agreed.

  There was something in his tone that lingered.

  Kethra’s charcoal stilled once more.

  “So why,” they asked, “have you disturbed my preparations?”

  Jackal clasped his hands behind his back and rocked forward slightly.

  “Oh,” he said lightly. “I came to settle my debt.”

  Even in the endless dark, Kethra’s stillness deepened.

  Jackal tilted his head, trying to read their expression but failed entirely.

  “I have information,” he continued smoothly. “Information valuable enough to cover what I owe you several times over.”

  The charcoal lowered slowly.

  “What information could possibly justify your presence in my domain?”

  Jackal’s grin grew even wider.

  “Oh, don’t look so suspicious,” he said. “I wouldn’t insult you with something trivial.”

  Kethra’s voice was flat. “You insult me simply by standing there. Get on with it.”

  Jackal’s tail flicked in amusement.

  “Fair,” he conceded. “I promise it’s worth my interruption of your oh so important preparations."

  He leaned forward slightly, voice barely above a whisper.

  “The 111th Integration has a System’s Chosen.”

  Silence flooded Kethra’s domain.

  Then—

  Kethra made a dry, rasping sound that might have been a laugh.

  “A poor joke,” they said. “There has not been a System’s Chosen marked during a Tutorial since the 33rd Era. The System does not act so prematurely.”

  Jackal gave no hints that he was joking.

  For the first time since entering the domain, his grin faded completely.

  “I’m serious.”

  The words fell cleanly between them.

  “And… I know which Tutorial the System’s chosen is in,” he continued. “I even know which god is at the helm of the Chosen’s Tutorial.”

  The charcoal slipped completely from Kethra’s fingers.

  “You are not playing at one of your games?” Kethra asked, voice thinning dangerously. “If you are lying within my domain—”

  “I’m not,” Jackal said calmly.

  The darkness around Kethra deepened, ink swirled through the air.

  “If the System has marked a Chosen during the Tutorial phase…” they murmured.

  “Everything shifts,” Jackal finished. “You know what that means.”

  The System’s Chosen were not merely powerful.

  Fate bent around the Chosen. Coincidence thickened around their steps. Paths that should take centuries were instead compressed into decades—sometimes even just years. Obstacles that would shatter others instead refined the Chosen. Enemies meant to cull them became stepping stones on the Chosen’s path to godhood.

  The System did not bestow the mark lightly. In most Integrations, it waited—observed generations, tested bloodlines, allowed countless prospects to fail before selecting a spearhead worthy of shaping a universe’s trajectory. If it chose one at all.

  To mark one during the Tutorial phase—before a world had even stabilized—was unheard of in recent eras.

  Kethra’s composure fractured.

  “Introduce me to the god overseeing that Tutorial,” they said immediately. “Do so, and your debt is erased.”

  Jackal’s ears twitched.

  “This information is worth quite a bit more than my meager debt. Clear what I owe and I’d like one small favor from you.”

  Kethra did not hesitate. “Fine,” they snapped. “One favor. Now take us to the god presiding over that Tutorial.”

  Jackal’s grin returned—brilliant and predatory.

  “Deal.”

  Before Kethra could refine the terms, Jackal reached into his fur and produced a gleaming silver zipper.

  He held it out into empty space and unzipped reality. The void parted and Jackal stepped through. Kethra followed close behind.

  The zipper snapped shut behind them, leaving only script drifting in their wake.