Episode 55. The Line That Only Those Carrying Truth Could Hold
# Episode 55. The Line That Only Those Carrying Truth Could Hold
The moment they slid down the dead slope as though falling, even the sound the craft made changed.
Above, sounds that still resembled an arena remained. Bursting heat, cracking glass layers, belated screams from the crowd, voices counting who had failed. But down here it was different. From here, this was not a board shown to spectators—it was a line ridden only by those who truly needed to get out alive.
Jiwoo did not force the skiff upright. Rather, she kept the half-falling angle and let the hull flow in the direction the dead slope pushed it. The right hover plate was nearly dead, and the underside kept grinding, but right now this craft was surviving not by holding on but by sliding.
Sion wrapped the ember deeper in his hand.
The real ember was still quiet. It did not flash inside his hand like a fake. It did not try to startle the one holding it. But it stayed alive. Its quiet was what made it more certain. If it survived even while dropping down this slope, it was real.
"Bend ahead."
Sion said low.
Jiwoo answered shortly.
"I know."
The bottom of the slope did not look like a path. Broken outer frames, half-sunken vitrified layers, and metal debris driven into the sand tangled together so that at a glance, everything looked like a dead end. But Sion was beginning to understand how real paths formed in places like this. Not clean lines, but dirty gaps that appeared briefly beside structures that had just died. Living paths never looked good.
"Not right. Down left."
He said at once.
"Inside the broken frame."
Jiwoo tilted the skiff's nose.
Beneath the hull, the sound of metal grinding tore long. Sion nearly pitched forward, but Jiwoo did not let go. Changing direction beneath a dead slope was closer to instinct than steering. Not opening a visible path, but sliding and confirming one by one with the body which surfaces had not yet died.
From above and behind, the dark-red glider was descending again.
Experienced.
Even after hesitating briefly, they had not given up. But they could no longer use the bottleneck-herding method from before. Down here, bottlenecks themselves did not last long. So that team now closed more openly. Instead of blocking ahead, they angled to scrape alongside when the skiff changed direction and knock the ember loose.
"This time it's the seizure angle."
Sion said shortly.
Jiwoo did not smile at that.
"Then it's easier."
Sion understood immediately.
A herding hand was complex. But a seizing hand ultimately had to close in. The moment it closed in, a pilot like Jiwoo could read it more easily.
On the north wide detour line, Kael and Sern's glider was genuinely merging downward.
It was a far more precarious line than it had looked from above. In some ways, only a blunt glider could manage it. A thin fast craft would have had its side panel ripped off long ago, but Kael's craft, heavy and blunt as it was, bounced less on a dead slope like this.
"I see ahead."
Kael said low.
Sern was watching simultaneously: the dirty gap Jiwoo's team was riding, the angle of the dark-red glider trailing behind, and the two shadows moving along the outer edge.
"Close in now and we all get tangled."
He said.
"Drop one more level, then take the side line when they bend."
Kael asked shortly.
"We're not racing anymore either, right?"
Sern answered very briefly.
"The side carrying the real thing out is the rule."
That was coldly precise.
Above the stands, the sounds calling the race's name were now smaller than the sounds asking who had grabbed the real thing. Luhai clung to the railing's edge, sweeping nearly the entire escape line with his eyes. Seorin was already reading not hands but the flow of people. Who was descending below using the race collapse as cover, who was still watching and waiting from above.
"Two coming down."
Seorin said very low.
Ater asked immediately.
"Harun's side?"
"Don't know yet."
Seorin answered.
"But if the ember dropped below, everyone will catch the scent down there soon."
Ater extended his gaze farther.
That was correct. The moment the real thing broke away from the race rules, the hand holding it was pushed outside the market rules too. From here on, the hands that closed in would not be race participants but hands hunting the real thing.
Nasim was still calculating. Zahir had not moved to the end.
But not moving and not watching were different things. Ater could not discard the possibility that the silence was not mere observation but the silence of a man who had not yet decided at which line to intervene.
The slope beneath Sion's side shook hard once more.
This time not the left but the front. The floor inside the broken frame slid downward, and the metal debris stacked on it poured at once. Jiwoo did not even curse—she twisted the steering bar. The skiff, nearly lying on its side, grazed past the debris flow, and Sion clenched his entire arm to keep the ember from slipping.
Right behind, the dark-red glider took the same debris flow.
The experienced pilot righted the hull immediately, but the rear rider shook hard once. The angle reaching to grab the skiff's side collapsed, and the glider's nose pushed outward for an instant.
Jiwoo would not miss that gap.
He pushed the skiff not further inside but beneath a broken frame below.
Sion knew almost by instinct.
That line looked dead going down, but if it held once, there was a hole breaking out to the outer edge on the opposite side.
"Does that go through?"
He asked shortly.
Jiwoo said without smiling.
"If it doesn't, I'm opening it now."
The skiff drove straight beneath the dark frame.
Metal struck metal, scraping his ears. For one instant the view died completely, and the red glow of the heat layer was pushed behind. Sion held his breath and gripped the ember harder.
And the next moment, light leaked through the outside of the dark frame.
Alive.
For now.
At the same time, from the wide detour line above, Kael and Sern's glider began aligning alongside that lower exit.
Sern saw it first.
"Now."
He said low.
Kael let the glider's full weight carry it down beneath the dead frame on the outer side. Not exactly the same line, but once they cleared the exit, the angle would merge them onto the same outer line as Jiwoo's team.
Behind, the dark-red glider was biting a line again. But the ease from the start was gone. One had vanished beneath the dark frame. The other was descending from above and merging. By now, even deciding who to block first had to be done fast.
Sion felt it and drew a short breath.
Finally, the two were joining.
Jiwoo and Sion. Kael and Sern.
The two teams called separately before this race had begun were now gathering on the same direction, carrying the real thing, on an escape line outside the game.
And from that moment, the board surrounding the ember would grow larger still.