Kaya allowed herself the ghost of a smile.

"I’ve been told that before," she said. "So... can I ask you about the story?"

The old man looked at her for one more long moment—then sighed again, deeper this time, like a man about to open a door he’d kept locked for far too long.

"Fine," he said quietly. "But don’t interrupt me. And don’t ask me to repeat myself."

He looked at Kaya, his expression hard.

"Girl," he said quietly, "you shouldn’t know about things you don’t need to know."

"But I ’want’ to know," Kaya replied.

The old man shook his head.

"Some things are good when they stay hidden."

"But sometimes," Kaya said, leaning forward slightly, "I want to know them anyway. I want the truth."

The old man’s eyes narrowed.

"You really are an idiot child."

Kaya nodded without hesitation.

"So... will you tell the story to this idiot child?"

He sighed, long and helpless, like a man defeated by sheer stubborn will.

"Fine," he muttered. "It’s not some grand tale or anything. Everyone knows the story—but different versions depending on what their ancestors told them."

Kaya frowned.

"Ancestors... meaning?"

He looked at her carefully.

"You might have heard that the beast god has a daughter he caught from the mortal world," he said. "But it’s said that the one who betrayed her also twisted the story. Every tribe tells it differently. Some say she fell to lust and lost herself. Some say she became weak and useless. Others say she died protecting her people, or that she was killed in battle. There are hundreds of different stories, depending on the tribe." He paused. "But there is only ’one’ truth."

Kaya’s gaze sharpened.

"Do you know that truth?"

The old man smiled faintly.

"I might." He tilted his head. "So... what story do ’you’ know?"

Kaya thought for a moment.

"I know three or four versions," she said. "In some, she died in a war. In others, she was killed by her father’s hand. Or by her fellow disciples. There are many." She met his eyes. "But I want to know which one is true."

The old man leaned back and crossed his arms.

"None of them."

Kaya blinked.

He smiled, just barely.

"Do you know that the daughter they say came from the mortal world... was one of the chosen disciples of the beast god?"

Kaya nodded slowly. She’d heard that part before.

"But," he continued, "do you know that the idea of being ’chosen’ is itself a lie?"

Her brow furrowed.

"What do you mean?"

The old man’s voice dropped, taking on the weight of something ancient.

"It’s said that when the beast god was cultivating in the mortal world, a small fragment of his power—a piece of his very essence—fell into an unknown place. He searched for years, but he couldn’t find it. And without that power, he was incomplete." He paused. "He couldn’t ascend to heaven."

Kaya raised a hand, cutting him off.

"Wait, wait, wait." She frowned. "If he was already a ’god’, why would he need to ascend to heaven? Wouldn’t he have already ascended?"

The old man looked at her with a scowl that could have curdled milk.

"Did you..." he said slowly, "...were you ’born’ in some fantasy world?"

Kaya stared back at him, expressionless.[1]

The old man sighed deeply, rubbing his temple like she’d just asked him to explain the shape of water.

"Every god, every mortal," he said patiently, "has only one wish—to ascend to heaven. But ’heaven’ is different for everyone. For a mortal, becoming immortal is the greatest blessing. For an immortal, becoming a demigod is a dream. For a demigod, becoming a god. And for a god..." He paused. "...becoming the Heavenly Emperor."

Kaya listened, silent now.

"The beast god, as we know him today, was once a small demigod given the charge to control this world. To become the Heavenly Emperor, he cultivated for countless years. But first, he had to become a ’true’ god. And while he was practicing, he lost the only source of his completion—a small bead-like gem, half of his power sealed inside it. It fell into the mortal world."

The old man’s voice grew quieter.

"He spent years—’centuries’—searching for it. And after all that time... he finally found it."

Kaya’s breath hitched.

"He found a girl," the old man said. "A human girl. And she had his power inside her."

Kaya’s eyes went wide.

"Human?"

The old man smiled—slow, knowing, and just a little sad.

"’H-U-M-A-N,’" he said, spelling it out like a curse or a prayer.

Kaya was beyond shocked. For a moment, her mind went completely blank, the old man’s last word echoing in her skull like a struck bell.

The old man watched her with a faint, almost amused smile.

"What?" he said. "Did you think I wouldn’t know? Girl, from the moment you stepped into my tribe, of course I knew."

Kaya forced her throat to work. "...How did you know?" Her voice came out a little too tight, a little too controlled.

He let out a quiet sigh, then pushed himself up from the chair and walked over to the open window. Moonlight poured in, tracing the lines of his worn face as he looked up at the sky.

"Just like you said," he began, "we live quite a long time. And in all those years, you see things normal people never do. Creatures that don’t belong here. Signs that don’t match this world."

He glanced back at her.

"You’re not the first person to come here asking about the beast god, or his daughter, or ’other worlds.’ Before you, there were two more who came to this tribe for the same reason." His gaze drifted back to the moon.

"I spoke with one of them. He also claimed he came from a different world than ours. At first, we thought he was a fool, talking nonsense. But later, we found records from our ancestors—stories of meeting people like you, many times over."

He turned fully then, eyes steady on Kaya.

"And their questions," he said quietly, "were always the same. Who is the beast god? Who is his daughter? What did they do? How do we go back to our world? Why are we here? The faces change. The worlds change. But the questions... never do."

Kaya sat frozen, her hands gripping the edge of the wooden chair. The old man’s words hung in the air like smoke—heavy, impossible to ignore.

"Others..." she whispered. "There were others like me?"

The old man nodded slowly, turning back from the window.

"Two that we know of," he said. "One died trying to cross the Death Valley, thinking it would take him home. The other..." He paused, his expression darkening. "The other stayed. Built a life here. Took mates. Had children." His eyes met hers. "And eventually forgot he ever came from anywhere else."

Kaya’s chest tightened. Forgot. The word sat wrong in her mouth, bitter and cold.

"What happened to the girl?" she asked, her voice barely above a breath. "The beast god’s daughter. The human one."

The old man returned to his chair and sat down heavily, like the weight of the story itself was pressing on his bones.