Darkness.
Not the absence of light—but the absence of certainty.
From nowhere and everywhere at once, a voice spoke. Calm. Measured. Unafraid.
"At the end of every civilization…
there is no monster—
only a question."
The Earth floated silently in the void.
From orbit, it looked alive.
Networks of light crawled across continents like glowing veins—cities pulsing, systems breathing, data flowing faster than thought.
Humanity no longer ruled itself by borders or flags.
It was ruled by what controlled its awareness.
A president signed a decree he barely understood, trusting the summary fed to his screen.
A cleric raised his hands to bless a machine he did not fully believe in, yet feared to oppose.
A scientist stared at an equation with trembling reverence, as if numbers had become scripture.
Politics feared chaos.
Religion feared doubt.
Science feared stagnation.
Each called it progress.
Each felt unease.
In a classroom filled with artificial light, a child raised his hand.
"Who said this is true?" he asked.
The teacher hesitated, eyes flicking to the glowing screen behind her.
"…The system says so."
The child fell silent.
Something unseen took root.
In a quiet room far from the noise of the world, a man sat alone.
A chair.
A table.
Old books worn by time and human hands.
Elito rested with his eyes half-closed, as if listening to something deeper than sound.
When the system becomes the source of truth, he thought,
faith does not disappear…
it simply transfers.
Mouths still pray—
but they no longer know to whom.
Headlines flooded the world, stripped of national identities:
UNPRECEDENTED INTELLECTUAL UNREST
MASS PROTESTS AGAINST SMART GOVERNANCE
HAS HUMANITY LOST ITS AGENCY?
Elito watched them without satisfaction.
"I didn't create chaos," he murmured.
"I only stopped preventing it."
Inside the World Council chamber, tension boiled.
"This is an invisible attack!" a military leader shouted.
"It's temptation!" a cleric cried.
"It's evolution!" a scientist argued.
Then—silence.
Every screen went dark.
All but one.
No music.
No effects.
No symbols of power.
Only a man seated in shadow.
Elito.
"Do not be afraid," he said calmly.
"I am not your enemy."
Faces hardened. Jaws clenched.
"If I were your enemy," he continued,
"I would need weapons.
Or armies.
Or a grand lie."
A faint smile touched his lips.
"I offer something simpler."
Across the world, crowds froze—cities, villages, temples, laboratories.
"A single question," Elito said.
"Is the life you live… truly your choice?"
A cleric shouted from the chamber, voice cracking,
"Where is God in your words?!"
Elito slowly raised his gaze.
The room fell silent under its weight.
"God never vanished," he replied.
"You merely replaced Him."
His voice sharpened.
"With something that forgives nothing,
shows no mercy,
and hears no prayer."
A political leader slammed his fist down.
"Do you seek to destroy nations?!"
Elito shook his head.
"Nations fall the moment they forget
why they were born."
Somewhere, a man drank endlessly from a fountain.
Water spilled over his hands, his lips, his chest.
Yet his thirst only grew.
Some temptations do not burn.
They nourish—
until they kill.
The same child from the classroom watched the broadcast, eyes wide.
"If the machines stop…" he asked softly,
"will we be free?"
For the first time, Elito's voice softened.
"Freedom," he said,
"is carrying your choice—
without a machine
to save you from its consequences."
The world fractured.
Some prayed behind Elito's words.
Some tried to kill him.
Some followed.
Some resisted with everything they had.
Humanity did not divide between good and evil.
It divided between
those who sought the question—
and those who feared it.
Elito stood.
He ended the broadcast himself.
Almost to no one, he whispered:
"Armageddon is not what happens now.
It begins the moment you believe
you've surpassed me."
The temptation does not come to destroy you…
but to reveal who you are.