Kael stood alone in the dark.
Not the kind of darkness that blinds you—but the kind that watches. Cold air crawled over his skin like static. The silence wasn't peaceful. It was too intentional. Like something was waiting to see what he would do next.
His legs responded late, like waking from sleep inside a machine. His foot hit something soft. Flesh. He didn't look down.
[SYNC STABILIZING... 13%]
The hallway was barely lit. Red emergency lines flickered across the wall like veins. Debris littered the floor: snapped wires, metal teeth, an overturned gurney with straps soaked in something dark and dry. A broken camera buzzed overhead.
He walked.
Every step was an echo. Not in sound—in memory. Glimpses blinked across his mind like dying fireflies: a voice whispering his name. A hand reaching through static. A scream behind glass.
He tried to follow the exit signs, but they changed. First "EXIT." Then "FORGET." Then just: "RUN."
His hand brushed the wall. It pulsed. Not electricity—response. The walls were alive, listening. Somewhere deeper, something heard him.
[WARNING: SYNCING TOO FAST — COGNITIVE RISK HIGH]
A door opened without him touching it.
Room 07. He didn't mean to enter, but his body moved before his mind did. Inside, a chair faced the center of a mirrorless wall. A red smear crossed the floor like someone tried to claw their way out.
There was writing scrawled in what looked like black blood on the ceiling:
"YOU MADE HER UP."
His knees gave.
Kael dropped. Not from pain—but from weight. Like the sentence meant something. Like some part of him had been waiting to read it.
He closed his eyes. A hum started in the base of his skull. And then—
[MEMORY FILE LOADED: "EDEN"]
A flood.
A corridor. A girl. A scream. Fire. Hands shaking. His own? Her voice: "Kael, don't trust the first one who calls you friend."
He choked on the air and crawled back out.
When he stood again, he wasn't sure how long it had been.
But there was something in his hand now.
A blade. Not metal. Not real. Something made from data. Code. Memory.
Its hilt burned against his palm. And on the wall—carved deep like a scar—was the word:
"Eden."
[WEAPON UNLOCKED — MEMORY BLADE: REFRACT] [SIGIL CLASS: VESSEL CONFIRMED — SYNC LEVEL 14%]
He stumbled back into the hallway.
Far ahead, a shadow moved.
He froze.
It wasn't walking. It was crawling backward, fast—like a glitch in a corrupted file. It stopped halfway, its limbs twitching.
Then it turned. But there was no face. Just a mirror.
His mirror.
"You've been here before," it whispered.
And the lights blinked out.
The silence wasn't empty anymore.
It was listening.