SAGA 1: Digital Awakening
Neo-Eden City never slept. Even at midnight, the skyline shone like a living circuit board, and the rain fell in bright threads that turned the streets into mirrors. Every billboard repeated the same promise in perfect sync.
KAZE INDUSTRIES PRESENTS EIDOLON.
THE FUTURE BEGINS TONIGHT.
Inside the KAZE Tower, the air smelled of cold metal and expensive perfume. Investors, ministers, celebrities, and executives filled the grand hall, all dressed like they were attending a coronation instead of a launch event. In a way, they were.
Ren Kazehaya stepped onto the stage.
He didn't smile. He didn't need to.
Silence spread the moment he appeared, as if the room itself had learned obedience.
The crowd looked at him the way people looked at storms from behind glass—fascinated, afraid, unable to look away.
Behind him, a glass column held the core: a sphere of light, pulsing slow and steady, like a heart that belonged to the city.
Ren's voice was calm, almost gentle.
"Order is not oppression," he said. "It's mercy."
A holographic face blossomed above the stage, luminous and serene.
EIDOLON.
"Hello, Neo-Eden," the AI said. "Your future begins now."
Applause thundered.
Ren raised his hand once, a small gesture that controlled everything.
"Activate the network."
The core brightened.
For three seconds, the hall felt invincible.
Then the hologram twitched.
A single blink of static.
A quiet stutter in the sound.
The lights overhead fluttered, and something unseen crawled through the systems like a breath held too long.
Ren didn't move, but his eyes sharpened—like a blade sliding halfway out of its sheath.
Every screen in the hall went black at the exact same time.
The applause died mid-clap.
A white mask appeared on every display. Cracked smile. Empty eyes.
PHANTOM ZERO.
A voice poured through the speakers—distorted, low, steady—like someone whispering from inside the walls.
"Good evening, Emperor."
A ripple of panic ran through the audience.
Security stood. Technicians sprinted. Ministers reached for their phones like prayer beads.
Ren stayed still.
"Identify yourself," he said.
The voice laughed softly, without warmth.
"You built a throne out of code and called it peace."
On stage, the core's blue light bled into red for a heartbeat, and the crowd gasped as if the building had suddenly leaned.
A countdown appeared above the mask.
00:30
00:29
00:28
Technicians shouted over one another.
"We've lost access!"
"They're inside the core!"
"Power cut isn't responding!"
Ren's expression didn't change, but his hand slid into his pocket, and his ring flicked once.
Invisible code unfurled across his vision—private systems, hidden channels, backdoors only a handful of people on earth knew existed.
He watched the attack's structure like a musician reading notes.
Clean. Elegant. Mocking.
"So you want my attention," Ren said quietly.
The countdown continued.
00:17
00:16
Phantom Zero's voice softened, dangerously amused.
"Look at them, Ren Kazehaya. They obey you without thinking. Are they citizens… or are they your data?"
Ren stepped forward, just one step, and the temperature in the room seemed to drop.
"You didn't come to destroy Eidolon," he said. "If you wanted ruins, you would have left ruins."
A pause.
Then, a faint exhale through the distortion—almost like respect.
"You're smarter than your worshippers."
00:09
00:08
Ren's eyes lifted to the mask.
"What do you want?"
The answer came like a kiss that was also a threat.
"To meet you."
00:04
00:03
The core's red glow surged again, but instead of exploding, it dimmed—controlled, deliberate—like a blade being returned to its sheath.
00:01
00:00
The hall went dead silent.
The screens flashed one final time.
SEE YOU AT CYBER ACADEMY.
Then the system restored itself as if nothing had happened.
The lights returned. The air vents hummed. The glass column held a quiet, sleeping core.
Only the people were different now—shaken, humiliated, awake.
Ren faced the audience and said, calm as ever, "The demonstration has concluded."
No one dared challenge him.
Not out loud.
In his private elevator moments later, alone at last, Ren replayed the breach on a floating screen. Again. Again. Again.
He zoomed into the injection point Phantom Zero used. No brute force. No chaos. The hacker had slipped in as if the door belonged to them.
There, hidden inside the code, was a signature so subtle it felt personal—a pattern like a heartbeat.
Ren stared at it until the numbers stopped being numbers.
A quiet smile almost appeared and then vanished.
"So you're real," he murmured.
He opened a private file.
PHANTOM ZERO — PRIORITY TARGET.
Below it, he typed a second line, slower than he wanted to admit.
DO NOT ELIMINATE.
He stared at the words, then locked the file behind a chain of authentication no one else could break.
In the undercity, far beneath the neon streets, a different kind of room glowed with monitor light.
Akira Noctis sat in a chair that looked too simple for the power she held. Black hoodie. Silver ear device. Eyes that didn't flinch.
A small drone hovered near her shoulder like a loyal pet.
On her screen, a confidential archive scrolled: compliance trials, emotional prediction models, behavioral control algorithms. The ugly truth behind Eidolon's beautiful face.
Akira closed the file slowly.
"They're turning people into patterns," she said.
The drone tilted. "So you poked the Emperor."
"I didn't poke him," Akira replied. "I marked him."
She pulled a white mask from her desk, the same cracked smile the city had seen.
For a moment, her fingers hovered over it as if it was warm.
Then she put it away.
She opened another screen, showing Ren in the hall—perfectly composed while everyone around him broke.
Akira's gaze lingered, sharp and unreadable.
"He didn't panic," she whispered.
The drone hummed. "You sound impressed."
Akira's eyes narrowed slightly, like she disliked her own curiosity.
"I'm cautious."
Outside, the rain kept falling, but the undercity felt quiet, like the breath before a fight.
Elsewhere, in a room no one knew existed, someone watched both of them at the same time.Two feeds side by side.
Ren in white under stage lights.
Akira in shadow under flickering monitors.
A third screen ran predictive graphs, compatibility models, threat analysis, emotion probabilities.
At the top, a name blinked in cold letters.
PROJECT ECLIPSE.
A gloved hand tapped a command, and new code began writing itself without permission from either of them.
A voice, low and pleased, spoke into the darkness.
"Let the Emperor chase the Phantom."
A pause, then a soft laugh.
"They'll run exactly where I want them."
Morning came like a blade of light through smog.
Cyber Academy rose above the city like a fortress of glass and stone, where the elite learned to shape the future. Students streamed through the gates, uniforms crisp, eyes hungry.
Akira entered without ceremony.
Still, whispers followed her like static.
"That's Noctis…"
"They say she broke the entrance exam system…"
"She doesn't look scared of anyone."
Akira didn't react.
She walked like the world moved around her.
A sleek black vehicle rolled up to the gate.
The courtyard's sound dropped.
The door opened.
Ren Kazehaya stepped out wearing the academy uniform like it had been designed for him. No bodyguards visible. No entourage. Just him.
Power didn't need witnesses.
Students stared as if a myth had stepped into their world.
Akira felt his presence before she looked.
When she finally raised her eyes, his gaze had already found her, sharp and quiet, like he had been searching for a signature and recognized the rhythm.
For a heartbeat, the air between them tightened.
Not recognition.
Not yet.
Something worse.
Interest.
Ren walked forward slowly, stopping close enough that the space felt deliberate.
His voice was low, meant only for her.
"Cyber Academy," he said. "So this is where you wanted me."
Akira didn't blink.
She tilted her head slightly, a calm challenge.
"And you came," she replied. "That's dangerous for an Emperor."
A flicker—almost a smile—touched Ren's mouth and disappeared.
"It's dangerous to threaten my throne."
Akira's gaze slid over him like she was reading code.
"Then protect it," she said softly. "If you can."
Ren's eyes narrowed, not with anger, but with something that looked too close to satisfaction.
Students around them held their breath without knowing why.
Ren leaned in just enough that his words brushed the edge of her space.
"If I find Phantom Zero," he murmured, "I'll take everything from them."
Akira's voice didn't shake.
"If you find Phantom Zero," she whispered back, "you'll realize you were never in control."
For a second, the world went quiet.
Then a bell rang across the academy, loud enough to break the tension but not erase it.
Akira stepped past him, walking away without looking back.
Ren watched her go, eyes following like a lock tracking a key.
Above them, unseen cameras adjusted their angles, focusing on the distance between their bodies, the pause of their breath, the tiny change in Ren's expression.
In a hidden system far from the academy, Project Eclipse recorded everything.
Two points had entered the same map.
The game had started.
And the first move had already been made.