The world was breathing again.
For the first time in weeks, real wind cut through the streets — not the artificial hum of synchronized air vents, not the drone-like rhythm of machines pretending to be weather, but wind. It carried with it the scent of ash, rain, and life.
Lin sat on the cracked edge of a rooftop, staring at the skyline.
Seoul was awake, but broken.
Billboards flickered with half-burned data. Hovercrafts drifted like ghosts above empty highways. The neon grid that once connected every system now shimmered faintly, like the dying nerves of a sleeping giant.
And at the center of it all — silence.
No Archive. No hum. Just the world, trembling, unsure what it had survived.
Behind him, Keller's boots crunched over shattered glass. "Still no signal?"
Lin didn't turn. He kept his eyes on the horizon. "Nothing. Every network's fractured. No data streams, no pings from orbit, no AI chatter. It's like the planet went analog again overnight."
