The plain narrowed into stone.
Not carved stone. Not constructed.
Stone that had risen where walking had been attempted too often.
Liora followed its quiet incline until she reached a precipice.
Below: nothing she could name.
Mist gathered in layers, luminous and depthless. Not darkness. Not light. A suspension.
Across the expanse stretched a bridge.
Or rather — the suggestion of one.
A single arch extended outward from the cliff’s edge. It was made of something like pale timber, though no grain was visible. The first dozen steps were solid.
Beyond them, the bridge dissolved into fog.
There was no visible far shore.
Behind her stood a cluster of travellers.
They had camped near the edge. Ropes coiled neatly. Measuring rods aligned. Stakes driven into stone as though anchoring certainty itself.
One of them addressed her.
“We have been waiting.”
“For what?” Liora asked.
“For the rest of it to appear.”
She looked again at the bridge.
The first steps were undeniably real. The railings curved outward in graceful symmetry. The craftsmanship was delicate — almost precise to excess.
“How long have you waited?” she asked.
“Three days.”
Another traveller added, “We assume it completes itself when conditions are correct.”
“What conditions?”
Silence.
They gestured toward the mist.
“We need to see the destination.”
Liora approached the first plank.
It did not tremble beneath her weight.
She stepped onto it.
The travellers inhaled sharply.
“Careful,” someone whispered.
She took a second step.
The bridge remained stable.
At the twelfth step, the visible timber ended.
Before her lay only mist.
She paused.
The air felt different here — not threatening, not welcoming. Responsive.
She lifted her foot.
Behind her, a voice called out:
“Don’t.”
She did not turn.
She placed her foot forward.
Where it descended, something formed.
Not abruptly. Not with theatrical flourish.
A plank emerged precisely under her weight, as though called into articulation by contact.
She shifted her balance.
The plank solidified.
Behind her, gasps.
She took another step.
Again: emergence.
The bridge did not extend ahead of her.
It extended with her.
After five new steps, she glanced back.
The section she had crossed remained intact — now fully visible, receding into mist.
The travellers stared.
“It’s assembling,” one breathed.
“No,” said another quietly. “It’s responding.”
Liora continued.
Each step required commitment — not blind faith, not reckless leap — but deliberate movement. If she hesitated too long mid-air, the plank beneath her foot thinned, as though uncertain.
She understood.
The bridge did not reward speculation.
It actualised through participation.
Halfway — though “halfway” had no meaning here — she encountered a subtle resistance. The mist thickened. The air felt denser.
She slowed.
The next step did not immediately form.
Behind her, one traveller called out:
“You see? It ends.”
She steadied her breath.
Instead of projecting forward, she attended to the sensation beneath her standing foot — the firmness of the present plank, the slight vibration within it.
She shifted her weight more fully.
The next plank unfolded.
Not because she forced it.
Because she committed.
The mist parted slightly. Still no visible far shore.
The bridge curved gently upward.
Behind her, the travellers began arguing.
“It only works for her.”
“No — she is simply less cautious.”
“Or more foolish.”
The youngest among them stepped tentatively onto the first plank.
It held.
He swallowed and took another.
At the twelfth step, he froze.
Beyond him: nothing visible.
Liora turned her head slightly.
“Do not search for the end,” she called softly. “Attend to the next articulation.”
He exhaled and stepped forward.
A plank formed.
He laughed — not in triumph, but in astonishment.
“It’s there,” he said.
“Of course,” Liora replied. “It was always there. It simply had not yet been required.”
More travellers approached.
Some retreated after two steps, unnerved by the mist.
Others advanced slowly, discovering the same principle: the bridge did not present itself as a completed object.
It refused completion.
It refused to become a totalised span from origin to destination.
It was a field of conditional emergence.
As Liora continued, she noticed something else.
When she tried to anticipate too far ahead — imagining the far shore, constructing it mentally — the next plank formed more slowly.
When she returned to the immediacy of her step, it formed cleanly.
Precision without projection.
Commitment without certainty.
After a time — though time felt strangely irrelevant — the mist began to thin.
Not revealing a fixed island, not unveiling a predetermined city.
Simply widening.
The bridge beneath her feet extended into clearer air.
Behind her, the once-invisible span now arched elegantly across the expanse, fully formed — but only in retrospect.
The travellers who had crossed stood scattered along its length, each occupying a different segment of emergence.
Some looked back at the cliff they had left.
Some forward into the widening horizon.
None could point to a single moment where the bridge had “completed.”
It had never been whole in advance.
It had never been absent.
It had always been in articulation.
Liora reached a point where the mist dissolved entirely.
The bridge beneath her feet felt no different — still precise, still responsive.
Ahead lay open ground.
She stepped off.
The plank behind her solidified into place, completing the curve for those still walking.
She did not turn to instruct them further.
They now understood the principle.
The bridge had refused to end.
Not because it was broken.
But because thresholds are not objects to be surveyed.
They are movements to be enacted.
And only in crossing do they become visible.
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