Prologue - System Failure
Rain fell without sound.
Not because the storm was weak—
but because the city itself had already gone silent.
The streets of Sector 9 were empty except for flickering emergency lights and abandoned vehicles left in the middle of the road.
Giant digital billboards continued to play cheerful advertisements above ruined buildings, their voices glitching into static.
“A better future awai—
—error detected—
please remain cal—”
A distant scream echoed somewhere beyond the fog.
Then another.
Kael ran.
His lungs burned as he forced himself through the flooded streets, shoes splashing against black rainwater stained with ash.
The emergency alerts ringing across the city were already beginning to distort.
Not human.
Nothing tonight sounded human anymore.
Behind him—
something moved.
A wet scraping sound.
Too fast.
Kael looked back for only a second.
And immediately regretted it.
The creature crawling across the walls had no face.
Only dozens of glowing white eyes opening and closing beneath stretched skin.
People called them monsters on the news.
But monsters weren’t supposed to whisper names.
“Kael…”
His body froze.
The creature twitched violently—
then lunged.
Kael threw himself sideways as claws tore through concrete where he had been standing moments earlier.
The impact shattered the side of a building.
Too strong.
Way too strong.
This wasn’t something soldiers could kill.
Another explosion thundered in the distance.
The sky flickered red.
Then—
silence.
Every screen in the city suddenly went black.
Cars stopped.
Streetlights died.
Even the rain seemed to pause.
A single message appeared across every darkened display in the city.
[SYSTEM INITIALIZATION COMPLETE]
Kael stared breathlessly.
“What…?”
The ground trembled.
Above the clouds, something enormous slowly began to descend.
A tower.
No—
a gate.
Black metal stretched endlessly downward from the sky itself, covered in glowing symbols Kael couldn’t understand.
It pierced the center of the city like the blade of a god.
And then the voices began.
Inside his head.
Thousands of them.
Crying.
Screaming.
Begging.
“Please—”
“Don’t reset it again—”
“I don’t want to forget—”
Kael collapsed to his knees, clutching his skull.
Images flashed through his mind.
Burning cities.
Dead oceans.
A young girl crying beside his body.
A ruined world beneath a red moon.
All of it gone in an instant.
Like memories that never belonged to him.
Then a new voice spoke.
Calm.
Cold.
Right beside his ear.
“Found you.”
Kael turned—
But nobody was there.
The faceless creature suddenly stopped moving.
Its many eyes widened in terror.
Not at Kael.
At something behind him.
A deep metallic sound echoed across the city.
Like a giant lock clicking open.
And above the gate—
words slowly appeared in glowing white light.
CHECKPOINT UPDATED
Kael’s heartbeat stopped.
The monster screamed.
And the world exploded into white.
