Derreck walked back to the store amidst the carnage of the parking lot battlefield, his breath ragged, his heart pounding in his chest as he bled from several minor wounds. The bodies of the orc horde lay sprawled at his feet, their lifeless eyes staring into the sky, blood pooling beneath them. His war clubs still in Derreck’s hands was slick with orc blood. He hadn’t meant to kill with such ferocity, but desperation and instinct had taken over. The orcs would have slaughtered them all, and now, with their champion slain and their warlord gone, the rest of the horde had fled back to the mountains to perhaps find a new tribe or maybe this was only the beginning he didn’t exactly know. A crowd of people now gathered outside to witness the aftermath of Derreck’s savagery huddled by their lanterns and flash lights.

  Lady Amelia, still weak from her ordeal, tried to walk toward him under her own power, her healer Lady Ashley close at hand. The lady’s gaze was fixed on Derreck, her expression a mixture of awe and gratitude. She painfully knelt in front of him, lowering her head in a deep bow.

  "You are truly a knight without peerage," she said, her voice steady but soft. "To slay an orc warlord and conquer a horde alone... You have the eternal thanks of the royale order of the rose. And I owe you my life."

  Derreck, still panting from the exertion, shook his head. "It wasn’t that impressive. I got lucky at best."

  Lady Amelia glanced out across the field of death in front of her. No sir knight, Your quick thinking to make such a weapon and your courage against impossible odds has saved everyone here."

  She hesitated for a moment, then, with a determined expression, she declared, "On the honor of the Royal Knight Order of the Rose, I again pledge myself to you, I am yours in body and soul and all that I am and all that I possess is yours. My sword, and those of my comrades, are yours to wield as you see fit."

  Derreck’s face darkened at her words. This was the last thing he wanted.

  "No," he said, his voice firm. "I told you before I won’t accept that."

  Lady Amelia blinked, clearly taken aback. "But... why? I have only offered you what you have earned by all rights and you throw it away, and quite rudely as well. Have I offended you in some way?"

  Paul, who had watched the battle in stunned silence from the relative safety of the entrance, stepped forward. "Derreck, think about it. We’re in a completely different place and most of us have no clue what’s going on, and we need defenders. If the orcs come back, we won’t stand a chance without these knights, like you said you got lucky."

  Derreck turned to Paul, his eyes blazing. "I said no” he growled “Not her."

  The sharpness in his voice made everyone freeze. Lady Amelia’s face was a mix of confusion and hurt, as if she couldn’t comprehend why he would single her out.

  Before anyone could say anything more, a strange, cold laugh echoed around them. It was a sound unlike any they had ever heard, neither human nor beast. Everyone turned, eyes scanning the battlefield for the source. Then, from the shadows of a nearby tree, a figure stepped forward.

  A large black cat, standing on its hind legs, walked toward them. It was about four feet tall, with sleek fur and eyes that gleamed with unnatural intelligence in the dim torch light. Its mouth was twisted into a grin that came close but didn’t quite reach its eyes.

  "But it must be her, it has to be, isn’t she the most important piece in this puzzle to come, regressor?" the cat said, its voice echoed unnaturally in a smooth and mocking tone.

  The knights immediately dropped to their knees, bowing their heads in reverence. Derreck’s coworkers, however, just stared in shock, too bewildered to react.

  Derreck’s grip on his makeshift weapon tightened, his knuckles white. "What the hell do you want, Cat Sith?" he spat, his voice filled with venom.

  Henrick looked up in horror. "My lord, the Cat Sith are messengers of the gods! You cannot speak to it so disrespectfully!"

  But the Cat Sith merely chuckled, its grin widening. "Such formalities are unnecessary. I’ve been called worse, and I assure you, I’ve heard far more creative rudeness."

  It turned its glowing eyes toward Derreck. "Greetings, regressor. I’m sure you have many questions, but most of what you need to know should already be clear to you. After all, you’ve experienced this before, in a sense."

  Derreck’s anger boiled over. "None of this is real. It can’t be, not at all. Not you, not her," he gestured to Lady Amelia, "none of this! What the hell is going on?"

  The knights remained bowed, their heads lowered as if they feared to look at the creature. But the Cat Sith seemed unbothered by Derreck’s outburst. It sauntered closer, its movements fluid and graceful, as though it had all the time in the world.

  "Oh, it’s very real," the Cat Sith purred. "As real as the blood that stains the ground beneath your feet. As real as the mountains in the distance, or the wyverns you saw earlier when you first arrived. This is no dream, regressor. You know it’s not. This world, these people—it’s all real."

  Derreck’s voice trembled with frustration. "It can’t be dammit. It’s some stupid fantasy. A novel I wrote when I was a young man. I was angry at the world after my father died, and I couldn’t save him. I wrote about this world to escape, it was vivid and vibrant in my mind. That’s all it is, just a story!"

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  The Cat Sith’s grin faded, and its eyes glinted with something more serious. It stepped closer, its voice soft but echoed with insistence. "Ah, yes. In your pain. You channeled it into a tale—an epic, one might say. But did you ever wonder why the world you created was so detailed? So vivid? And why of course did you never write another tale not even years later, not even once. Maybe because only one world has ever resonated with your soul. Almost as if it existed long before you put pen to paper. Because of course it did and somewhere in the back of your mind you always knew."

  Derreck was silent, his mind racing. He had always wondered why the world of his novel had come to him so easily, why the characters felt so real. Places so well thought out. Even the languages he came up with were so complete. But he had always dismissed it as coincidence, a product of his imagination, even though he could never write anything anywhere near as good so he never finished anything else he ever wrote.

  The Cat Sith’s smile returned, though now it was more subdued as Derreck shouted back " but if it was all real then why call me your regressor, you don't need me you need Darien Kane he is your regressor. He’s the one who must have done this before."

  The Cat Sith’s grin widened again, but this time it felt more sinister. "Ah, yes. Darien Kane, your brave protagonist. But here’s the thing, regressor—Darien Kane doesn’t exist. He never did. He is a figment of your imagination. A character born from your pain, your anger, your desire for control. But the world you wrote about? The events you described. And the timeline of what is to come, those are very real."

  Derreck’s heart skipped a beat. The weight of the creature’s words settled heavily on him. He had created Darien Kane to be the hero of his story, the one who could fix everything, the one who could defeat the empire of Zion, the antagonists in his story and save the world. But if Darien wasn’t real...

  "You," the Cat Sith continued, "are the regressor. You are the one who resonates with this world at this nexus in space and time. The one who has already seen the future play out in your mind. The one who knows what is to come."

  The knights remained bowed, too terrified to speak. The Walmart employees were frozen in place, unsure whether to believe what they were hearing. But Derreck wasn’t ready to accept any of it.

  "Then why this whole place?"

  Derreck demanded, his voice filled with anger and frustration.

  "Why bring us all here to die? Why not just me like Darien’s crossing."

  The Cat Sith’s eyes glimmered with something almost like sympathy, though its smile never wavered.

  "Because regressor, Darien Kane is a fantasy. But you—you are real. You are the key to everything and we had to be certain we had you even if all of this came with you."

  The crowd was silent, too overwhelmed to process what they were hearing. But Derreck wasn’t done. He wasn’t ready to believe that he was the answer to all of this.

  "Your too late Cat Sith, about six months too late for me to give a shit enough to want to save anything, now I’m just ready to let it burn just like the end of the novel. I’m no hero!" he shouted. "It’s just what’s left of me here. I’m not some stoic warrior from some past era. And I sure as fuck don’t give a shit about this place or these people so you chose wrong!"

  The Cat Sith’s grin faded, and for a moment, it seemed unsure of how to respond. But then, with a soft, almost regretful voice, it spoke again.

  "Then why did you stay, you chose to save these people. The knights from the raiding party, all of these people from the horde. Why? You knew what path to take, had your escape planned, you were ready to leave at a moment’s notice but refused when they needed you. You may not be Darien Kane, but you are not ready to forsake them yet. You also know well there will be nowhere to escape to. The gods have seen every possible future across the multitude of multitudes. In every one, the empire of Zion rises, and this world falls and if this world falls it will unravel all worlds until the very fabric of time and space comes undone"

  there was a hush from the crowd as no one knew just what to say to all of it until one employee said

  " so what the hell, why don't the gods just kill this Zion"

  it seemed logical to everyone but the Cat Sith continued

  "such should be simple but if we kill the leader of their faith this world will still fall, if we kill all their generals this the world will still fall as to many fates are intertwined at this nexus point in time and space as the Regressor knows well and in all of them Zion will rise and this world will fall—except in the one you wrote. In your novel, Zion was defeated not once, but thrice. The gods, even those of your world, agree. You are the only hope for us all."

  The words hung in the air, and the crowd looked on in shock. Derreck, however, was seething with anger. He knew he wasn’t a hero, after his marriage crumbled and his life broke to pieces he knew he didn’t have any control over his fate and certainly not any more than a god so he wasn’t about to let one of their puppets tell him otherwise.

  Without warning, Derreck swung his war club, at the Cat Sith with a burst of fury. The knights screamed for him to stop, but he didn’t listen. In one swift motion, he brought the club across the creature’s neck, lopping off its head sending it flying to the ground.

  The Cat Sith’s body lay still. The knights recoiled in horror, certain that the gods would strike them all down for the insult. But nothing happened. The air remained calm, eerily so.

  Then, a soft, radiant light filled the parking lot. A figure materialized before them, her form ethereal and glowing with divine power but still of flesh and blood. She was beautiful beyond words, her presence calming yet overwhelming at the same time.

  It was Elsbeth, the goddess of mercy.

  "I expected this reaction, regressor," she said softly, her voice like the wind. " But to appear in the mortal flesh is difficult for us gods to do and uses up a great deal of power just for you to be able to see us so I will keep this brief, you must understand, I know your hurting inside still and feel the world has already fallen away from you so you should have nothing else to lose but we have really placed everything in you. You are our last hope."

  Derreck stared at her, his anger slowly fading, replaced by a mixture of fear and resignation. He had always felt a connection to Elsbeth when writing his novel. Her story, like his, was one of pain and loss she also risked her very godhood to rescue Darien Kane from a tragic fate making him a regressor so he could have a chance to stop the war, but she was also the one Darien cursed the most at the end of the novel for letting him regress in the first place and think there was hope to change his fate.

  "You are not Darien Kane," she continued, her voice filled with kindness. "and you cannot change the fate the gods of your world have already placed on you. But you do have the power to change this fate, and save this world, these people, and of course there is her fate as well. And that is worth fighting for."

  She said as she glanced a lady Amelia then with a gentle touch, she leaned down and kissed him softly on the lips. and, as quickly as she had appeared, she vanished, leaving the crowd stunned and silent.

  Derreck’s heart raced as he stared at the spot where Elsbeth had stood. He wasn’t a hero. But none of that mattered anymore. Whether he liked it or not, the fate of this world, all worlds really rested on his shoulders.