August spent the morning exploring the settlement and trying not to think about how close he'd come to becoming a permanent member of an evil choir.
The buildings showed all the familiar signs of Arthur's work. Precise destruction, methodical clearing, everything burned down to ash and glass. Whatever Forsaken had lived here, they were gone now.
"Efficient as always," August said, examining a blast pattern that had perfectly vaporized what looked like it used to be a crystalline tower. "Arthur really perfected the zone-clearing thing."
He found Arthur's logbook entry carved into a tree at the settlement's edge:
Zone 34-B cleared. 18 Forsaken eliminated. Zone King (Harmony-class) destroyed. Chorus neutralized. Proceeding to Zone 35-A. - A.S.
"Chorus neutralized," August read aloud. "Well, that explains why they were so pissed about the Silence-Bringer."
August studied Arthur's crude map, trying to figure out the route to Zone 35-A.
The directions were frustratingly vague — more arrows pointing southeast, warnings about "reality distortions," and a note that just said "extreme geometric hazards." Not super helpful for someone trying to follow on foot.
"Come on, Arthur," August muttered. "I created you to be detail-oriented. Where are the proper coordinates?"
But then again, Arthur had probably never expected anyone to be following his trail. Why would he? He'd been working alone for years.
"Still," August said, shouldering his pack, "I'm the protagonist of this story. Protagonists always figure out where to go next."
The landscape was changing as August traveled deeper into the zones.
What had started as normal countryside was becoming increasingly… flexible. Trees that grew in spirals, grass that shifted colors when the wind hit it, and streams that flowed uphill just because they felt like it.
"Now this is more like what I remember writing," August said approvingly. "Reality getting creative with itself."
His Foundation monitor flickered green occasionally as they encountered minor distortions, but nothing his immunity system couldn't handle. August was getting pretty confident about his ability to adapt to whatever weirdness the expanded world threw at him.
Which was probably why he wasn't prepared for the Zone King.
It happened around midday.
August was following what appeared to be an old road when the air in front of him suddenly turned solid. Not invisible-wall solid — actually solid, like walking into a pane of crystalline reality that hung suspended three feet off the ground.
"Huh," August said, poking at the barrier. "That's new."
The moment he touched it, pain shot through his finger like he'd grabbed a live wire. August jerked his hand back, watching in fascination as the tip of his index finger began to turn crystalline.
"Okay, that's not good," August said, his Foundation monitor flickering green as his immunity system kicked in. Within seconds, the crystallization stopped and reversed. "Note to self: don't touch the geometric barriers."
But now he was stuck.
The barrier stretched as far as August could see in both directions, completely blocking the road. He'd have to either go around it — which could take days — or find a way through.
"I bet Arthur didn't have this problem," August muttered, studying the crystalline wall. "He probably just blasted through it with his sound weapon thing."
August didn't have a sound weapon. What he had was adaptive immunity and a probably-stupid amount of confidence in his protagonist status.
"Okay," he said, pulling on his gloves. "Let's try this scientifically."
August approached the barrier carefully this time.
Instead of poking it directly, he picked up a stick and touched that to the crystalline surface. The stick immediately began turning to geometric crystal, the transformation racing up toward his hands.
August dropped it before the effect could reach him, but his Foundation monitor had gone green again, analyzing the threat.
"Transmutation field," August said, impressed despite himself. "Very creative. Turn anything that touches it into more barrier."
Within moments, his immunity system finished its analysis. August felt the familiar sensation of adaptation, like his body learning a new language at the cellular level.
"Alright," he said, approaching the barrier again. "Let's see if that worked."
This time, when August touched the crystalline wall, nothing happened.
His hand passed through it like it was made of warm air. Adaptive immunity to geometric transmutation, apparently.
"Excellent," August said, stepping through the barrier. "I knew being the creator would have some advantages."
But as soon as he was fully through the crystalline wall, everything changed.
The road was gone. The hills were gone. August found himself standing in what appeared to be the inside of a massive geometric crystal, with faceted walls that stretched up into infinity.
"Okay," August said, voice echoing strangely. "This is definitely a zone. A really impressive zone."
Footsteps echoed from somewhere ahead — precise, measured, like someone walking in perfect rhythm.
August followed the sound through corridors of living crystal, his Foundation monitor maintaining its steady green glow. The geometry was beautiful but wrong, like someone had redesigned mathematics to be more aesthetically pleasing.
"Hello?" August called out. "Anyone home? I'm just passing through!"
"HOME," came the reply, bouncing off a thousand faceted surfaces. "HOME IS STRUCTURE. STRUCTURE IS PERFECTION. PERFECTION IS—"
The Zone King stepped around a corner of crystalline geometry.
It had probably been human once, but now it looked like someone had rebuilt a person using mathematical principles and cosmic precision.
Every angle of its body was perfect, every line precisely calculated. It moved like a living equation, and when it spoke, reality itself seemed to listen.
"VISITOR," it said, its voice creating harmonic resonances in the crystal walls. "IMPERFECTION DETECTED. CORRECTION REQUIRED."
"I'm August," August said cheerfully. "Nice place you've got here. Very geometric. I like the whole cosmic perfection aesthetic. Very ambitious worldbuilding."
The Zone King tilted its head at an angle that was exactly forty-five degrees.
"AUGUST," it repeated. "NAME LACKS MATHEMATICAL SIGNIFICANCE. CORRECTION: YOU ARE NOW DESIGNATED UNIT 847,293."
"Actually, I prefer August," August said politely. "It's got sentimental value. Plus, I'm kind of attached to having a name instead of a number."
The Zone King's perfect features shifted into what might have been confusion.
"PREFERENCE IS IMPERFECTION. SENTIMENT IS CHAOS. CHAOS MUST BE… CORRECTED."
It raised one geometrically perfect hand, and the crystal walls around them began to shift. Passages rearranged themselves with the sound of cosmic clockwork, creating new patterns of impossible complexity.
August's Foundation monitor pulsed brighter green.
"STAND STILL, UNIT 847,293. CORRECTION IN PROGRESS."
"Yeah, I think I'll pass on the correction," August said, backing away from the approaching Zone King. "Thanks anyway. I'm sure your mathematical paradise is lovely, but I've got places to be."
The geometric Forsaken moved toward August with mechanical precision.
Each step was perfectly calculated, each gesture mathematically pure. Reality bent around it like the universe was trying to conform to its vision of cosmic order.
"CHAOS DETECTED," it announced as August continued backing away. "PROBABILITY OF SUCCESSFUL CORRECTION: 99.7 PERCENT."
"What about the other 0.3 percent?" August asked.
"STATISTICAL ANOMALY. WILL BE ELIMINATED THROUGH REPEATED CORRECTION CYCLES."
August's Foundation monitor was now a solid bar of green light. Whatever this thing was planning to do to him, his immunity system was working overtime to prepare defenses.
The Zone King struck without warning.
One moment it was standing ten feet away, the next it was right in front of August, geometric hands reaching for his face. August felt something like cosmic mathematics trying to rewrite his cellular structure.
His Foundation adapted within seconds, but not before August felt his left arm go completely numb.
He looked down and nearly screamed.
His arm was turning into crystalline geometry, flesh becoming faceted crystal that reflected impossible angles. The transformation had stopped at his elbow, but August could see perfect mathematical equations carved into what used to be his forearm.
"Okay, that's horrifying," August said, his voice higher than usual.
The Zone King stepped back, its perfect features showing what might have been surprise.
"PARTIAL CORRECTION ACHIEVED. INITIATING SECONDARY PROTOCOL."
August's Foundation monitor pulsed frantically, working to reverse the geometric transformation. Slowly, painfully, August felt his arm changing back to flesh and bone. But the process was taking time — time he might not have.
"Look," August said, cradling his half-crystalline arm, "I really don't want to be turned into cosmic mathematics. Can we maybe discuss this?"
"DISCUSSION IS INEFFICIENT. CORRECTION IS ABSOLUTE."
The Zone King raised both hands this time, and the entire crystal maze began to spin around them.
August ran.
It wasn't dignified, it wasn't heroic, but it was definitely the smart choice. His arm was still partially geometric, making it hard to balance, but August managed to stumble through the shifting corridors as reality rearranged itself around him.
Behind him, the Zone King followed with mathematical certainty, its footsteps perfectly timed, its movements geometrically inevitable.
"UNIT 847,293," it called after him. "CORRECTION IS UNAVOIDABLE. MATHEMATICAL CERTAINTY: 100 PERCENT."
"We'll see about that!" August shouted back, though privately he was starting to worry.
His Foundation was adapting, but slowly. Each new attack from the Zone King required time to build immunity, and August wasn't sure he could survive long enough for the process to complete.
The chase continued through impossible geometry.
August stumbled through corridors that folded back on themselves, ran up staircases that led to their own beginnings, and leaped across gaps that existed in seven dimensions simultaneously.
The Zone King followed relentlessly, never tiring, never slowing. It tried to correct August with geometric precision, mathematical purification, and cosmic realignment. Each attack left August partially transformed before his Foundation could adapt and reverse the damage.
By the time August found what might have been an exit, his left leg was crystalline from the knee down, and his right hand was speaking in mathematical equations.
"This is really not going well," August said, his geometric hand adding, "STATISTICAL PROBABILITY OF SURVIVAL: DECLINING."
The exit turned out to be another barrier.
This one looked different — less perfectly geometric, more like someone had punched a hole through reality using brute force and harmonic resonance.
"Arthur's exit," August realized. "He fought this thing and blasted his way out."
Behind him, the Zone King was approaching with mathematical inevitability.
"FINAL CORRECTION PROTOCOL," it announced. "TOTAL GEOMETRIC CONVERSION INITIATED."
August didn't hesitate. He dove through the hole in reality, feeling it close behind him like a wound in the universe healing itself.
August tumbled back onto the old road, gasping and shaking.
His Foundation monitor was pulsing frantically, working to finish reversing the geometric transformations. Slowly, his crystalline leg returned to flesh. His mathematical hand stopped reciting equations and started feeling like a normal hand again.
"Okay," August said, checking to make sure all his parts were properly human-shaped. "That was significantly more dangerous than expected."
He looked back at where the barrier had been, but there was nothing there now except empty air and the faint smell of burned mathematics.
"Arthur cleared that zone," August said, impressed despite himself. "Fought that thing and won. No wonder he's got a reputation."
August found Arthur's next message carved into a tree about a kilometer down the road:
Zone 35-A cleared. 1 Zone King (Geometric-class) destroyed. 23 Forsaken eliminated. Extreme hazard confirmed. Do not approach without harmonic weaponry. Proceeding to Zone 36-B. - A.S.
"'Do not approach without harmonic weaponry,'" August read aloud. "Thanks for the warning, Arthur. Would have been nice to have it before I almost got turned into living math."
But August was still alive, still following Arthur's trail, and his Foundation had learned to adapt to geometric attacks. That had to count for something.
"Plus," August said, checking his map, "I survived a Zone King encounter. That's got to be worth some protagonist points."
The road ahead stretched toward the southeast, where Arthur's trail led deeper into the zones.
August shouldered his pack and started walking, his Foundation monitor finally settling back to steady blue. Behind him, the empty space where Zone 35-A used to exist hummed quietly with residual mathematics.
"Just remember," August told himself as he walked, "you created Arthur to be competent. If he can clear these zones, there's got to be a way to do it safely."
He paused, considering.
"Well, relatively safely. Maybe."
The sun was setting ahead of him, painting the sky in shades that were probably geometrically perfect. Somewhere out there, Arthur was continuing his work — clearing zones, eliminating Zone Kings, leaving a trail of mathematical destruction for August to follow.
"Hang on, Arthur," August said. "Your creator's still coming to find you. Even if the zones are trying really hard to turn me into abstract art."
August walked on through the gathering dusk, following the trail toward whatever Zone 36-B might contain.
At least now he knew that Zone Kings were genuinely dangerous, even to someone with adaptive immunity. His Foundation could save him, but not instantly, and not without cost.
"Good thing Arthur's dealing with the really dangerous ones," August said. "I'll just… follow at a safe distance and try not to get geometrically corrected."
The road stretched ahead into zones unknown, and August followed it with the confidence of someone who was the protagonist of his own story.
Even if that story was trying really hard to kill him with cosmic mathematics.