The sight of the shattered mirror, glinting like malevolent ice in the streetlight's glow, sent a cold fury through Alex that burned away the last vestiges of sleep. This wasn't a corporate maneuver anymore; it was a direct, physical attack on his family. The line had been crossed.
He didn't wake his parents. Instead, he retreated to his room, the door clicking shut with a sense of finality. The fear was still there, a cold knot in his stomach, but it was now encased in a shell of hardened resolve. They wanted to play it this way? Fine.
He sat before his ThinkPad, the green glow of the CODEX interface springing to life in his vision, a familiar and now deeply personal fortress.
[USER: ALEX CHEN // DESIGNATION: ARCHITECT]
[SYSTEM: CODEX // STATUS: SYNCHRONIZED]
[CODE POINTS: 700]
[CORE ATTRIBUTES]
- INTELLIGENCE: 14 (+3 from Skills)
- DEXTERITY: 9
- CONSTITUTION: 10
- WISDOM: 12
- CHARISMA: 8 (+1 from Skills)
[ACTIVE SKILLS]
- C++ PROFICIENCY (EXPERT)
- NETWORK SECURITY (EXPERT)
- ADVANCED CRYPTOGRAPHY (INTERMEDIATE)
- SOFTWARE ENGINEERING (PROFESSIONAL)
- ADVANCED INFRASTRUCTURE ENGINEERING (PROFESSIONAL)
- FINANCIAL MARKETS (NOVICE)
- DIGITAL MARKETING (BASIC)
- BUSINESS-TO-BUSINESS SALES (BASIC)
- PROJECT MANAGEMENT (PROFESSIONAL)
[BLUEPRINTS UNLOCKED]
- 'SENTINEL' ENCRYPTION PROTOCOL (v0.1)
- 'NEXUS' CORE (v0.5)
- 'GHOSTNET' ANONYMIZATION LAYER
- 'AEGIS' FIREWALL CORE (v1.0) - DEPLOYMENT MODULE
- 'VOIDWALKER' DECENTRALIZED DATA FRAGMENTATION
The stats were a cold comfort. His intelligence was high, his technical skills formidable, but his Charisma was lacking, and his physical stats were average. He was a brain in a vulnerable shell. He needed to change that. But first, he needed to respond.
A new mission pulsed with a harsh, red border, more urgent than any before.
[CRISIS MISSION: DEFEND THE NEST.]
[OBJECTIVE: IDENTIFY THE PERPETRATOR OF THE ACT OF VANDALISM AND NEUTRALIZE THE THREAT. ESCALATION IS IMMINENT.]
[REWARD: 500 CODE POINTS. FAILURE: CATASTROPHIC PERSONAL LOSS.]
500 CP. The system understood the gravity. Neutralize the threat. The words were open to interpretation, and a dark part of him relished the ambiguity.
His first move was defensive. He spent 100 CP on [PERSONAL DIGITAL SECURITY (EXPERT)]. Knowledge of encrypted communications, secure browsing, burner phones, and detecting surveillance flooded his mind. He immediately set to work. He configured his new phone—his father's gift—with military-grade encryption, stripping out all non-essential Google and carrier services that could be used to track him. The phone from Reed went into a Faraday bag he constructed from aluminum foil and a static-shielding bag from an old motherboard. It was a digital tomb.
Next, he needed eyes on the street. He spent another 150 CP on a system utility: [AUTONOMOUS SURVEILLANCE NODE DEPLOYMENT]. It wasn't a skill, but a one-time power that would allow him to deploy three low-power, wireless camera nodes within a one-kilometer radius.
That night, under the cover of darkness, he became a ghost. He told his parents he was going for a walk to clear his head. His [DEXTERITY] might only be a 9, but his [WISDOM] and newfound security knowledge guided his movements. He stuck to shadows, moved quickly, and avoided main streets. He placed one node high on a lamppost down the block, giving a view of his building's entrance. Another he tucked into the rusting gutter of a vacant building across the street, aimed at the spot where the mirror was shattered. The third he placed on a roof two blocks away, covering the primary escape route.
Returning home, his heart thumping, he accessed the feeds through an encrypted tunnel. The video was grainy, low-frame-rate, but it was live. He had extended his senses beyond his room.
The following morning, the household was tense. Jiang Chen stared at the broken mirror, his face a mask of stoic anger. "Hooligans," he muttered, but the look he gave Alex was laced with a new, unspoken question. Was this connected to his son's new world?
Alex said nothing. He helped his father clean up the glass, the sharp pieces scraping against the pavement a grim soundtrack to his thoughts.
He spent the day watching the camera feeds while pretending to work on Sentinel. It was tedious, mind-numbing work. Hours of nothing. A woman walking her dog. A mail truck. Kids on bikes.
Then, in the late afternoon, a figure appeared on the roof-cam feed. A man in a dark hoodie, his face obscured, walking with a purpose that didn't match the casual strollers. He stopped at the edge of the roof, looking directly down towards the Chen apartment. He wasn't doing anything illegal, just... observing. After five minutes, he turned and left.
It was him. Alex knew it. This was the reconnaissance before the strike.
He didn't have a face, but he had a pattern, a timing, and a direction. The man had come from the south. Using public city data and satellite imagery he cross-referenced through the CODEX system, he identified a handful of buildings with roof access in that direction that matched the camera's angle.
The next step was risky. He needed to get closer. He needed a different kind of skill.
He looked at his remaining 450 CP. He needed an edge, something beyond coding. He navigated the System Shop, past the programming and business skills, to a new section that had appeared, glowing faintly.
PHYSICAL & TACTICAL PROFICIENCIES
[SITUATIONAL AWARENESS (BASIC)] - 80 CP
[URBAN TRACKING (NOVICE)] - 120 CP
[DEFENSIVE DRIVING (NOVICE)] - 100 CP
[PERSONAL COMBAT (BASIC)] - 150 CP
These weren't the skills of an architect. These were the skills of a soldier, a spy. The system was adapting, offering him the tools for the war that had been brought to his doorstep.
He purchased [SITUATIONAL AWARENESS (BASIC)] and [URBAN TRACKING (NOVICE)]. The knowledge seeped into him—how to read a crowd, identify tails, use reflections, understand urban terrain, and follow a subject without being seen. It felt alien, a layer of grimy, street-level savvy laid over his clean, digital logic.
That evening, he told his family he was meeting a client. He took a convoluted route, using his new skills, constantly checking reflections in shop windows and car mirrors. He felt paranoid, but also empowered. He was learning to see the world as a battlefield.
He stationed himself in a diner with a view of the most likely building he'd identified—a four-story mixed-use building with a seemingly accessible fire escape. He nursed a coffee, his senses on high alert, his [SITUATIONAL AWARENESS] making him hyper-aware of every person who entered or left.
And then he saw him. The same build, the same purposeful walk. The man from the roof cam, now in a leather jacket, exiting the building. He didn't look like a thug; he looked like a gym rat, clean-cut but with a predatory stillness.
Alex's heart hammered against his ribs. This was it. He left cash on the table and slipped out, falling into the flow of foot traffic, using the techniques from [URBAN TRACKING] to maintain a safe distance. He followed the man for three blocks, to a non-descript black sedan parked in a paid lot. Not the BMW from before. A different car. A rental, maybe.
The man got in and drove off. Alex didn't have a car to follow. But he had something else. As the car paused at a stop sign, Alex, acting on pure instinct, pulled out the encrypted phone Reed had sent him. He didn't call. He simply took a clear, sharp photo of the car's license plate.
The act felt incredibly dangerous, a direct provocation. But it was also a declaration: I see you.
He immediately powered the phone down and stuffed it back into the Faraday bag. He had taken a shot across their bow. He had a license plate. It was a thread, a tiny crack in their anonymity.
He walked home, the night air cold on his skin. He wasn't safe. His family wasn't safe. But he was no longer just a target. He was a hunter who had just caught the scent of his prey. The shield was up, and now, he was sharpening the spear.