Axel woke before the orb pulsed. There was no alert, no mechanical chime, no line of system code waiting to be read, just silence. Not the peaceful kind, but a quiet that felt paused, like the city itself was holding its breath.
He sat up. The ache in his spine was duller than usual. He rolled his shoulders, rubbed his neck and then stood and dressed without thinking much about it. Same cloak, same boots and the tunic still stiff, he hadn't bothered washing it again.
The shard of mirror showed the same pale skin, same eyes a bit less hollow. His hair had grown longer enough to cast shadows across his face. No message came from the orb this time. Not immediately.
< Surveillance level: Passive
< Observation priority: Low
He paused. 'Observation priority: low'. That was new.
He tied the cloak tighter and stepped outside.
The streets were calmer than the previous day. Morning light filtered through the usual copper-threaded lanterns. A cart passed, carrying grain and rune-scribed ledgers. One of the guards posted near the eastern path glanced at him for a moment too long before looking away.
No message arrived regarding new tasks. He waited. Still nothing. Then, finally:
< Task assigned: Relay assistance – Lower Vault Linkroom
< Clearance: Temporary
< Note: Presence requested. Direct order – Registrar Tier 2
He frowned. A direct order. Not a suggestion. No accompanying details, no contact name. That alone was enough to feel off.
The Linkroom was located deeper than he'd been before, past the civic tier, through one checkpoint that barely looked up his ID before waving him through. It wasn't a restricted area exactly, but the closer he got to the Vault district, the fewer people there were.
When he reached the designated door, the sigil on it flickered.
Inside, two others were already waiting. A man in mid-level robes, a Registrar, judging by the colored threads woven into his collar and a younger technician, seated before a large stone console inscribed with dozens of glyph-tracks. The Linkroom was small and too quiet.
"You're the new one," the registrar said. It wasn't a question. "Good. Sit."
Axel did as told. The technician handed him a secondary interface stone.
"We need another relay path stabilized," the man continued. "One of the upper links is out of alignment. We're resetting the echo bridge. Your sync is clean enough to serve as a neutral anchor."
Axel said nothing. He accepted the relay stone and placed his hand on the activation plate.
The glyphs flared. Something surged.
< Pulse initiated. Stabilization pattern syncing...
< Echo stream – misaligned.
< Error: Target identity not confirmed.
The console hissed.
The technician blinked. Looked at the registrar.
"Try again," he said.
Axel repeated the action.
This time the glyphs surged harder, then faltered. The light dimmed, then sparked with something sharp, unclean.
< Classification attempt failed.
< Error logged: Undefined anomaly class.
The registrar took a step forward. "Remove your hand."
Axel pulled back. He could feel the hum in his arm even after contact ended.
"Faulty conduit," the technician muttered.
But the registrar was still watching him.
"Your sync's supposed to be clean."
"It is," Axel replied.
He left the room without being dismissed.
No one stopped him.
He returned to his quarters through an unfamiliar route, taking a longer path that passed by one of the minor archives. Along the way, he noticed something else—people looking. Not long stares, but glances, subtle pauses in conversation. Whispers that stopped just as he passed.
< Registry Note: Passive observation increased. Contextual trigger – unknown.
< Behavioral deviation logged.
NEX's voice again, flat as ever.
> Cloaking protocols active.
> No trace-level breach detected.
When he reached his quarters, he found something unusual. A folded scrap of paper tucked beneath the orb.
The handwriting was clean, practiced:
"If they ask for you again, decline. Some tasks aren't meant to be completed."
There was neither signature nor seal. Just the note.
That evening, Kaelin didn't come by. The bench by the cistern stayed empty.
He sat with the bread from yesterday, untouched, then stood and moved to the window.
Outside, the street was dim, but not silent. He saw the usual patrol pass. An apprentice closing shutters. A merchant lighting a rune to keep his wares dry. Normal scenes. Familiar ones.
But behind them, just faintly, he felt it.
Something had shifted.
< Registry sync: 0.006%
< Surveillance level: Passive
< Internal system drift: Initiated
He placed a hand to his back, just below the shoulder, where the runes curved along his spine.
The mark was warm.
Not burning.
Axel stood there, hand hovering just above the back of his shoulder, as if afraid touching it again might trigger something else—another surge, another message, another misstep.
But nothing followed. Just the steady thrum of the orb behind him, and the faint breath of the wind outside.
He lowered his hand slowly.
He didn't return to the desk.
Instead, he moved toward the door and opened it just enough to let the air in.
Outside, the city continued. Quiet but alive.
He stepped out.
The corridor was empty, though he heard footsteps fading around the corner. A registrar, maybe. Or one of the other provisional residents. He didn't call out.
Instead, he followed the path toward the edge of the housing ring. It wasn't far, just a few turns, a slope, and a small open terrace that looked over the lower tiers of the Citadel.
From there, he could see the city stretch out in layers. Floating sigils marked controlled airways. Small clusters of patrol lights moved along grid patterns, tracking permitted movements like threads in a loom.
He leaned against the railing, arms folded.
His back still tingled.
That mark had been dormant since he arrived—buried beneath system suppressors, NEX's cloaking layers, and his own lack of memory. But now it stirred. Not violently. Not in warning. Just… present. As if the glyphs in the chamber hadn't just triggered data—they had reminded something.
"Was it a mistake to trace them?" he murmured.
> Exposure was unavoidable.
> Delay would increase baseline drift.
> Memory anchors remain suppressed.
> Threshold stability: 89%.
He frowned.
"Still dropping."
Source is internal.
The wind picked up slightly. Not enough to move dust. Just enough to make him notice the stillness beneath it.
"I'm not recovering," he said. "I'm breaking open."
> Structural degradation is distinct from cognitive fragmentation.
> Present status is within operational margins.
He laughed under his breath. A bitter sound, almost tired.
Operational margins. That's what he was now—a margin. A variable sliding just under the threshold of failure.
Below him, a child ran through the lower courtyard, trailing a glowing ribbon of mana-light. Her laughter reached him seconds later, light and clear. Two adults followed at a distance—one carrying parcels, the other keeping watch.
For them, life in the Citadel was structured. Predictable. Bounded by rules and roles. For Axel, there were no such lines. Only edges.
He turned and left the overlook.
By the time he reached his door again, night had taken the city. The lanterns pulsed a dim red in the corridors. A shift in surveillance mode. Passive, but alert.
The orb greeted him without message. No new tasks. No external pings. Just waiting.
Inside, the room hadn't changed. Still the same clean lines. The same scribing scroll half-finished on the shelf. The same cloak draped over the corner peg.
And yet, the silence was heavier than it had been that morning.
He didn't sit.
He pulled the tunic from his back and turned toward the wall.
He twisted enough to see over his shoulder.
The mark was faint, a spiral of layered glyphs just below the right shoulder blade. Most wouldn't see it for what it was.
But he could feel it as if a door had been left slightly open, and what lay behind it was watching back.
He reached for a piece of chalk and slowly, on the flat wall beside the cistern, began to redraw the fragment he'd traced earlier. The one that pulsed most when he touched it. His hand moved without hesitation. Not perfectly, but closely.
When the glyph was complete, he stared at it.
Then, for no clear reason, he added a second. One he hadn't traced. One he hadn't even seen.
The moment the chalk touched the wall for that second symbol, the mark on his back flared.
He dropped the chalk.
The glyph pulsed once, then faded. The chalk line remained, but its charge was gone. As if the wall had devoured its meaning.
> Unauthorized sequence detected.
> Internal response suppressed.
> External system unaware.
> Do not repeat pattern.
Axel stood very still.
His hand clenched.
He didn't speak. Didn't need to. NEX knew the question already.
> Source of second symbol: Unknown.
> Match with stored libraries: None.
> Possibility: Recovered memory fragment.
> Probability: 61%.
He sat down slowly on the bed, staring at the wall. The faint outline of the second symbol still glowed, barely perceptible under the rune light.
Something inside him had remembered.
And that something wasn't part of NEX's data.
Not a system injection. Not a stored backup. Not a protocol.
It was older.