Light took them again.

  Not violently. Not gently.

  It wrapped around their bodies like a slow tide, lifting them off the ground and pulling them forward. For a heartbeat there was nothing. No sound, no weight, no direction, only the sensation of being carried somewhere that did not care whether they were ready.

  Then the world returned.

  Sora stumbled as his boots hit the ground.

  Heat met him immediately.

  Not the damp warmth of World Three's plains, not the cold bite of World Two's forests, but a dry, persistent pressure that sat against his skin like a weight he could not shrug off.

  He inhaled.

  Dust. Dried stone. Sand

  The sky above was wide. Almost too wide, washed in pale gold. Clouds were thin streaks on the horizon, barely more than scratches in the light.

  Behind them, the portal still shimmered.

  Ahead of them however...

  Nothing.

  No walls.

  No gates.

  No towers.

  No tavern.

  No market.

  No city.

  Just land.

  A broken mixture of tall, brittle grasses, scattered acacia-like trees, and stretches of bare earth already surrendering to sand.

  For a moment, no one moved.

  Then confusion rippled outward.

  Players turned in slow circles. Some laughed nervously. Others frowned, scanning the horizon for a settlement.

  "Where's... the city?" someone asked.

  Another player opened their interface, then cursed under their breath.

  A murmur spread through the crowd.

  This was not how a new world was supposed to start.

  On previous floors, arrival had meant infrastructure:

  Safety zones.

  Vendors.

  Repair stations.

  Clear roads.

  A place to regroup.

  Here, there was only open ground and heat.

  A few players whispered the same word.

  "Bug."

  "Glitch."

  "System error."

  Then someone ran to the portal.

  Not cautiously. Not to inspect it.

  To leave.

  Because leaving had always been possible.

  Not into the real world.

  But retreat.

  Back to a world with walls. Back to a city.

  The first player stepped into the shimmer without hesitation.

  Nothing happened.

  He blinked, confused, and took another step forward as if the portal had simply failed to register him.

  Still nothing.

  The light didn't fold around him. It didn't pull. It didn't reject him violently either.

  It just stayed there, humming softly, indifferent.

  He turned, face pale. "It's not-"

  Someone else shoved past him, tried again.

  Stolen story; please report.

  Then another.

  A small crowd pressed in, boots scuffing against the dry earth, hands outstretched as if they could force the system to behave through sheer insistence.

  The portal didn't move.

  It didn't open.

  It didn't answer.

  A cold realization crawled through the group.

  They hadn't arrived at a new floor.

  They'd been locked into it.

  Sora felt the unease settle deeper into his bones.

  If this was a mistake, there was no authority to fix it.

  If this was intentional, it meant something far worse.

  Someone spoke louder now.

  "We need the boss. Fast. If this is a broken floor, clearing it might reset everything."

  That idea took hold quickly.

  Hope disguised as urgency.

  If they found the boss soon enough, maybe this world would correct itself. Maybe a real city would appear. Maybe they would be safe again.

  People began moving before a plan existed.

  Some dragged supplies from their inventories.

  Others scouted the immediate terrain.

  A few clustered protectively around the glowing portal behind them, as if it were the only stable thing in an unstable world.

  Sora looked back once at the light.

  Then out again at the endless plains.

  World Four did not look like a desert yet.

  It looked like a place slowly remembering that it wanted to be one.

  And for the first time since entering DREAM Online, it did not feel like they had arrived somewhere designed for them.

  It felt like they had been dropped into something that would not adjust to their presence.

  Abigail was the first to steady herself.

  She didn't speak, not at first but Sora noticed the way her eyes scanned the terrain automatically, marking distance, cover, movement, wind direction.

  Old habits. Necessary ones.

  Harvald planted his feet, exhaled slowly, and let his hammer rest against his shoulder.

  "Hotter than I expected," he muttered.

  Sora nodded.

  For a moment, they stood together without moving, three people who had crossed three worlds side by side and were now standing at the edge of a forth that already felt less forgiving.

  Players began to spread out.

  Some pressed forward immediately, restless, hungry for progress.

  Others clustered near the portal, hesitant, as if its glow offered safety that the world in front of them refused to provide.

  William's banner was visible almost instantly.

  His people organized fast, faster than anyone else. Marking positions, setting perimeter, directing movement with efficiency.

  Matteo's group moved differently.

  Quieter. Looser. Less theatrical.

  They helped a shaken player to their feet. Shared water. Help repairing equipment.

  Two futures walked on the same ground.

  Sora felt the tension before anyone spoke it aloud.

  They moved away from the crowd.

  Not far, just enough to breathe.

  Abigail crouched near a patch of cracked earth and pressed her palm to the ground, feeling the heat through her gloves. She closed her eyes briefly, then stood again.

  "This world is going to hurt people," she said quietly.

  Harvald gave a short, humorless chuckle. "Every world does."

  She looked at him, then at Sora.

  Her gaze lingered on him.

  "You didn't sleep," she said.

  It wasn't a question.

  Sora hesitated, then shook his head. "Not much."

  She studied his face, then nodded once, not satisfied, not relieved, just aware.

  Harvald shifted his weight. "I'll stay near the camp at first. Help set up, check gear, make sure people don't overextend."

  Abigail glanced toward the horizon. "I'll scout."

  Sora opened his mouth but then stopped.

  For the first time since World One, he didn't know whether he should follow.

  He felt the pull to move, to fight, to adapt and at the same time, a quiet exhaustion that made every step feel heavier than it should have been.

  Abigail must have seen it.

  She didn't say anything comforting.

  She simply met his eyes and said, "Don't disappear."

  He almost laughed.

  Instead, he nodded.

  The camp took shape quickly.

  Tents were erected. Watch rotations established. Water distributed. Paths marked with stone to showcase some progress.

  Sora helped where he could, carrying supplies, steadying an anxious player, scanning the distant dunes.

  But inside, something was drifting.

  Not collapsing.

  Drifting.

  When the work slowed, he found himself walking again, drawn toward the edge of the camp where grass met sand.

  The boundary was not clean.

  Tufts of dry green faded into brittle yellow, then into dust, then into full desert farther out. The wind carried fine grit that stung his cheeks.

  He stood there for a long time.

  His thoughts came without warning.

  How long will this take?

  How many more worlds are there?

  Will they even end?

  He pictured his family, not clearly, just impressions, a room, a table, a voice he could no longer hear with certainty. He wondered whether time outside still moved the same way, or whether this world had stretched it thin.

  A familiar tightness rose in his chest.

  He forced it down.

  Habit.

  By dusk, the sky turned red.

  The desert breathed heat upward even as the sun sank lower, making the horizon shimmer like liquid glass.

  Sora returned to camp.

  Harvald was near the forge-in-progress, already helping hammer together makeshift repairs. His movements were slower than before, steadier, as if he had found a rhythm that fit him better than combat ever had.

  Abigail stood alone on a ridge a short distance away, silhouette sharp against the fading light.

  She didn't look back.

  Sora opened his interface.

  Abigail - Online

  His finger hovered.

  Typing...

  He stopped.

  Closed it.

  Not tonight.

  Later, when the camp quieted and the stars cut clean lines across the sky, Sora sat with his back against a stone slab and stared into the darkness.

  Somewhere beyond the dunes, distant movement flickered, torches, monsters, or something else entirely.

  He didn't chase it.

  Not yet.

  His thoughts didn't go to schedules.

  They didn't go to banners.

  They went to a figure moving alone through the heat.

  Violet.

  He tried to picture where she was now and realized he couldn't. World Three had been open enough that you could disappear without dying immediately. World Four didn't feel like that. World Four felt like a place that punished distance slowly, without giving you a moment dramatic enough to fight back.

  He replayed the Champion fight without meaning to.

  Not the kill.

  The moment the line tore and the corridor turned into angles, and she drifted into it because she kept moving, because movement was what she did. The sound of metal. The dust. The split-second where his body chose for him and he broke formation.

  Shoulders almost touching.

  Heat of her breath between swings.

  "Left," he'd said, and she'd moved like the word was a signal she didn't need to understand, only obey.

  They hadn't looked at each other then either.

  They'd just functioned.

  Efficient. Brutal. Unspoken.

  He wondered if she was still functioning now.

  If she was still moving.

  If she'd finally taken a hit she couldn't outpace.

  Sora stared at the stars until they blurred at the edges.

  He opened his interface.

  Paused.

  Closed it again.

  No message would reach her even if he tried.

  And that was the part that sat heaviest.

  Not fear.

  Not guilt.

  Just the quiet awareness that, somewhere out there, she might be bleeding in the dark and he wouldn't know until it was already too late.