Born to break

Things That Shouldn't Exist

Floor Three was a city.

Not ruins. Not a broken imitation.

An actual living, breathing city…except it existed inside a cavern so vast that Julian couldn't see the ceiling. Where the sky should have been, there was only darkness, and suspended within that darkness drifted hundreds of pale orbs, floating lazily like oversized fireflies. They cast just enough light to leave everything bathed in a perpetual twilight.

The buildings were tall and narrow, constructed from black stone and something that looked like compressed smoke…solid enough to touch, yet with edges that shifted slightly whenever you stared too long.

Streets wound between them in patterns that didn't quite obey logic.

Julian watched one road curve upward at a forty-five-degree angle before continuing horizontally along a wall, as though gravity had simply forgotten it existed.

People moved through the streets.

Julian stopped.

Not monsters.

Not creatures.

People…or at least things convincingly shaped like people.

They came in different sizes and appearances, dressed in clothing pulled from a dozen cultures and time periods at once. A woman in what looked like a Victorian coat walked beside someone wearing a modern tracksuit. A man with unnaturally pale skin and solid black eyes haggled with a vendor over something Julian couldn't identify.

"They're players," Dara said quietly beside him. "At least some of them are."

SYSTEM: FLOOR THREE — THE HOLLOW MARKET.

NATURE: NEUTRAL ZONE. COMBAT RESTRICTED.

FUNCTION: TRADE. INFORMATION. ALLIANCE.

WARNING: NOT ALL RESIDENTS ARE PLAYERS.

Julian read the last line carefully.

"So some of them were placed here," he said. "By the Protocol."

"Yeah."

Dara's hand drifted toward her forearm, where her blade was stored.

"Which means some of them have jobs."

They stepped into the city.

…

The market was loud in a way that felt deliberately normal—as though the noise itself had been designed to put people at ease.

Stalls lined the main street, selling things Julian had no framework for.

Bottled sounds.

Shadows pressed flat between sheets of glass.

Small cages containing what appeared to be living numbers, constantly rearranging themselves.

A boy slammed into Julian from the side, bounced off him, and hit the ground hard.

He looked about sixteen.

Thin.

Dark circles beneath his eyes.

A hoodie three sizes too large with the words ALREADY DEAD scrawled across the front in marker.

He scrambled upright immediately, checked his pockets with practiced speed, then looked at Julian with the expression of someone fully prepared to be grabbed.

Julian didn't grab him.

"You're not going to yell at me?" the boy asked.

"Were you trying to pick my pocket?"

"...Maybe."

"Did you get anything?"

The boy checked his hand.

Empty.

He looked genuinely disappointed.

"No."

"Then we're fine."

The boy stared at him as though that were the strangest response imaginable.

Considering where they were, that was saying something.

"I'm Pip," he said at last.

"Julian. That's Dara."

Dara studied him.

"How long have you been here?"

"Eleven days."

He said it flatly, the way people say numbers after they've stopped feeling them.

Then, more quietly:

"I'm the only one left from my group."

No one spoke for a moment.

Julian looked at the boy properly.

The hoodie was too big because it wasn't his.

It had probably belonged to someone from that group.

He was keeping it.

Julian understood that without needing an explanation.

"Walk with us," he said.

Pip looked suspicious.

"Why?"

"Because you've survived eleven days, and you're still here. That means you know things we don't."

That landed differently than sympathy would have.

Pip straightened slightly.

Then he nodded.

Pip knew the Hollow Market far better than anyone who had only been there eleven days had any right to.

He guided them through the city like a tour guide who had learned every corner by nearly dying in it.

The residents who weren't players were called Fixtures…entities permanently installed by the Protocol.

Some were harmless.

Some were merchants willing to trade genuinely useful items for things Julian preferred not to think about surrendering.

Others dealt with information.

"That one," Pip said, nodding toward a stall operated by a figure wrapped in layered gray robes, its face completely hidden, "knows things about the upper floors. But she changes memories. Real ones. Gone forever."

"She takes memories?" Dara asked.

"Pays well, though."

Pip shrugged.

"A guy in my group traded three years of his childhood for a map of Floors Four through Seven."

He paused.

"Didn't help him survive Floor Four, but still."

Julian filed that information away and kept walking.

SYSTEM: PROTOCOL MAPPING ACTIVE.

HOLLOW MARKET LAYOUT — 34% DOCUMENTED.

PATTERN DETECTED: FIXTURES CLUSTER NEAR EXIT POINTS.

Julian slowed as they approached a junction where three Fixtures had positioned their stalls in a loose triangle.

Behind them stood a door.

It blended into the stone wall so perfectly that it was easy to overlook.

They're guarding the exit without appearing to.

"That's how we leave," Julian said quietly.

Pip looked at the junction.

Then back to Julian.

"I've walked past that spot for four days."

"You were looking for a door," Julian replied. "I was looking for a pattern."

Dara crossed her arms.

"So how do we get past three fixtures without triggering whatever they're supposed to trigger?"

Julian thought for a moment.

He pulled out the Clarity Vial, turned it once in his fingers, then slipped it back into his pocket.

SYSTEM: COUNTER-LOGIC ACTIVE.

ANALYZING FIXTURE POSITIONING...

EXPLOIT IDENTIFIED: FIXTURES RESPOND TO INTENTION, NOT MOVEMENT. APPROACH AS BROWSERS, NOT TRAVELERS.

"We shop," Julian said.

Dara looked at him.

"We shop."

"We walk up like we're interested in their stalls. No destination. No urgency. Just curious customers."

He turned to Pip.

"Do you have anything tradeable?"

Pip dug through his hoodie pocket and produced a small glowing marble.

"Dropped from something I killed on Day Two. Never figured out what it does."

"Perfect."

Julian nodded.

"Unknown value."

"Let me do the talking."

"Famous last words," Dara muttered.

"You say that every time."

"You give me a reason every time."

Pip looked back and forth between them.

For the first time since they'd met him, something small and fragile appeared on his face.

Relief.

Not because they had a plan.

Because there was a relief

Because for eleven days, he had been alone in a city designed to feel normal while being anything but.

And now someone stood beside him as though it were the most natural thing in the world.

Julian noticed the look.

He didn't comment on it.

Instead, he started walking toward the Fixtures.

"Stay close," he said.

"Both of you.”