The elevator humd in its descent, soft light washing over rlin’s reflection in the glass panel. The city stretched endlessly beneath him, a constellation of artificial stars blinking through the night fog.
But his mind wasn’t on the skyline. It was on the single, vanishing ssage still burned into his mory.
You shouldn’t have touched the Lazarus core.
The words had disappeared from his phone seconds after appearing, no trace, no tadata, no number. Just gone, like a phantom whisper swallowed by the void.
rlin tapped the screen again, scrolling through his recent logs. Nothing. Not even a record of the notification.
"...Ghost line," he muttered under his breath.
There were whispers of such things even in the novel, secure communication networks that operated through fragnted mana pulses, invisible to normal digital channels.
Used by rcenaries, black market traders, and the kind of people who moved in shadows between nations.
But in this world, those systems shouldn’t have been active yet.
The tiline’s diverging again, he realized. The Lazarus core must’ve triggered sothing earlier than it was supposed to.
The elevator doors opened with a soft chi.
He stepped out, coat brushing against the marble floor, the quiet chill of the tower’s lobby greeting him. A few guards nodded his way; they recognized him from earlier. He offered a small nod back but didn’t stop.
Outside, the night air bit cold against his skin.
By the ti he reached the street, the crowd had thinned to soft murmurs and fading lights. A drizzle misted down from the cloud-heavy sky, dimming the glow of the lamps along the boulevard.
rlin turned his collar up, scanning for taxis, but his phone buzzed again before he could wave one down.
A new ssage.
Unknown:
"If you want to understand the core, co alone."
Coordinates followed.
A district na blinked beneath it: Old Deren Industrial Zone.
rlin frowned. That area had been shut down years ago, condemned after a factory explosion. Even the main roads leading in were supposedly blocked by wards.
He checked the tistamp.
Sent less than a minute ago.
He looked up. The drizzle intensified, streaking silver in the streetlight.
"...If this kills , I’m blaming the universe," he muttered.
The cab ride was long and quiet. The driver said nothing, content to let the radio murmur static.
rlin leaned against the window, watching the city’s heart slowly dissolve into its darker edges, the glitter of skyscrapers giving way to crumbling concrete and abandoned warehouses.
When the cab finally stopped, the air had turned heavier, the fog swallowing sound itself.
"This is it?" the driver asked, glancing at the GPS uncertainly.
rlin nodded. "Thanks. Keep the change."
He stepped out, shutting the door softly behind him. The taxi’s taillights bled red through the mist before vanishing entirely, leaving him alone with the ruinous silence of the district.
Rows of old buildings stood like sleeping giants, tal scaffolds rusted and bent, windows shattered into spiderwebs. Sowhere far off, a loose sheet of iron clattered in the wind.
rlin walked forward, his steps echoing faintly against the wet ground.
He reached into his coat, fingers brushing the inside pocket, his blade wasn’t there, of course. Weapons weren’t exactly legal to carry here. But his affinities were.
A soft hum of mana shimred under his skin. He didn’t draw it out yet, but it was there, ready.
At the coordinates, a warehouse lood ahead. Its doors hung half-broken, one side leaning inward like a wounded beast.
He pushed it open slowly.
The sll hit first: dust, oil, and the faint tallic tang of mana residue. The air was thick, still.
And then a voice.
"You ca."
rlin froze.
The figure stepped out from the shadows between the rusted cranes.
A man, tall, lean, wrapped in a black coat that looked too clean for the surroundings. His hair was ash-gray, his eyes unreadable, glowing faintly with artificial luminescence, a synthetic implant.
rlin recognized the design instantly. That kind of tech didn’t exist publicly yet.
"Who are you?" rlin asked, his voice steady.
The man smiled faintly. "Soone who prefers to remain alive."
"Not an answer."
"I’m not in the business of offering those for free."
rlin took a slow step forward. "You sent the ssage about the core."
The man’s expression shifted just slightly, approval, maybe. "You’re sharper than I thought. Most wouldn’t show up. Especially not soone your age."
"I’m not most."
The man chuckled softly. "No. You’re the one who touched the core and didn’t get erased."
rlin’s eyes narrowed. "...Erased?"
The man tilted his head. "You really don’t know, do you?"
"Enlighten ."
The man turned, walking deeper into the warehouse. "Follow."
rlin hesitated for a heartbeat before doing so. The air grew colder the farther they went, until they reached a hollow where the roof had collapsed inward, exposing the stars.
The man stopped before an old terminal, its surface flickering with weak mana light. He tapped a few commands, and a holographic projection sprang to life above the rusted machine.
A sphere, almost identical to the Lazarus core — floated in the projection, humming with faint energy.
"This," the man said quietly, "is one of six."
rlin stared. "Six cores?"
"Yes. Each one discovered in a different region, each one with the sa properties. Energy that doesn’t trace to any known affinity or elental source. The energy reads as negative. It erases. It consus."
rlin felt a chill crawl up his spine. "And Invoke has one of them."
The man nodded. "We called them Lazarus because every ti soone tried to destroy one, the data revived sowhere else."
"Self-replicating?"
"In a sense. But it’s not technology. It’s... alive."
rlin’s pulse slowed. His system remained quiet, almost too quiet.
The man turned toward him. "You touched it. It responded to you."
rlin didn’t move. "So?"
"So," the man said, "either you’re its target... or its key."
For a long mont, only the rain filled the silence, dripping through the broken ceiling.
rlin stared at the hologram again, his mind racing.
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