The night didn't feel like night anymore.
Yu Ren sat with his back against the cold cement wall of the underground chamber, the flickering battery lantern casting soft, yellow light across Kai's sleeping face. The steady rhythm of Kai's breathing should have been comforting, but Ren's nerves were frayed. His fingers twitched near the handle of the folding knife tucked beneath his jacket.
Something had followed them.
Not literally—not in the usual sense. But since the incident with the whispering void and the System's second evolution, there had been a… presence. A sensation that clung to Yu Ren's skin like wet fog. Not every moment. But at the edges of sleep. At the bottom of silence. When the generator clicked off, and the only sound was his own heartbeat.
[Passive Skill Activated: Perception Surge – Fear Proximity Detected.]
The message popped up again. Third time in two hours.
Ren's eyes shifted to the shadowed entrance of the chamber. The hatch they'd sealed earlier hadn't budged. He'd checked it three times. Still, the System didn't lie.
The air was too still. Too clean.
It reminded him of the time he woke up in the old hospital's morgue with nothing but a scalpel, a missing shoe, and blood under his nails he couldn't explain.
"Don't think about that now," he muttered to himself. He touched the base of his throat, where the skin still prickled from the foreign script burned into it by the void's whisper.
The System hadn't explained what that "Mark of Listening" meant. But it was there. Subtle. Glowing faintly when Kai touched him, and burning cold when he was alone.
---
[System Notification]
Behavioral Instability Detected. Calculating Mutation Risk.
…
Estimated Risk: 3% and rising.]
"Shut up," Ren whispered hoarsely. "I'm not turning into one of them."
He couldn't. Not now. Not with Kai asleep right there, trusting him. Dreaming, maybe. Or pretending to. Kai had grown quieter since they entered this part of the underground facility—less sarcastic, more alert. Like he, too, had noticed the world's breathing was wrong.
Kai stirred in his sleep, fingers curling near his weapon belt. As if in response to Ren's thoughts.
Or something else.
---
Ren stood, the slight scrape of his boots against concrete louder than it should be. He padded quietly to the outer corridor, knife in hand. The hallway bent left, then right. Beyond that was the stairwell that led to the forgotten upper floor of the shelter—where they hadn't explored yet.
That was where the signal came from earlier. The one Ren heard in static, right before the System evolved again.
It had said:
"He remembers you."
Who? Who was 'he'? Kai? Or someone else?
---
As Ren reached the end of the corridor, a cold gust slithered across the back of his neck. There were no windows here. No vents. The air shouldn't move like that.
[Skill Triggered: Premonition Surge I]
His hand snapped out to the wall just before his knees gave out. Pain lanced through his skull—a migraine from the System dumping unfiltered threat data directly into his brain.
"Abort. Abort. Abort."
The same whisper as before. Not in the language of the System. Something older.
Then—footsteps.
Human, but wrong. Too slow. Too deliberate.
He pressed himself to the wall and listened. No pattern. A pause. Then a shuffle. Then breathing.
But it wasn't breathing.
It was imitating breathing.
Ren turned sharply, and saw it.
A figure—human-shaped, barely. Its arms too long. Its body clad in ragged remnants of military gear. Skin stitched together. Patches of technology embedded into its flesh. Half of its face was a polished mirror.
But what made Ren's stomach twist was that it wore a lanyard with a photo ID. The name on it?
Kai
---
Ren's thoughts stuttered. No—no, it was fake. A trick. The ID looked old, from before the world ended. But the Kai he knew didn't talk about his past. Never even mentioned if Kai was his real name.
The creature didn't move, but the mirrored half of its face tilted—just slightly. As if acknowledging Ren. Then, it opened its mouth, revealing nothing but a speaker embedded in its throat.
Static buzzed from it, then a voice—Ren's voice—came out.
"He's not who you think he is."
Then silence.
---
Ren backed away, bile rising in his throat.
A lie. It had to be. Just the System messing with his perception. It had done that before. Hallucinations. Simulation overlays. Those had been glitches.
But the way the creature's head tilted—it mimicked Kai's body language perfectly.
Too perfectly.
Then it took a step forward.
[New Threat Unlocked: Echo Protocol – Hybrid Sentinel]
Class: B++
Sub-Type: System-Mimic
Warning: Engages with psychological warfare. Do not trust its words.]
Too late for that.
---
"Yu Ren?"
A voice behind him—this time real.
He spun, blade raised.
Kai stood at the end of the hallway, fully awake now, dark eyes scanning the shadows. His presence was grounding. Familiar. Real.
But Ren couldn't help it.
His grip didn't loosen.
Kai stopped mid-step. "...What did you see?"
Ren hesitated. Then said, voice trembling, "It looked like you."
There was a beat of silence.
Kai's expression didn't change. But Ren noticed his shoulders subtly shifted into a more defensive stance.
"Was it wearing my face?"
"No. Your ID."
Kai let out a soft breath, barely audible. "...I hoped they burned those."
"You knew about it?"
"I designed them," Kai said. "Back before all this. It's part of why they dragged me into the Project."
Project.
Ren's mind reeled. He wanted to ask more—no, demand more—but Kai had already stepped past him and was approaching the corridor where the mimic had been.
It was gone.
Only the ID remained, fluttering on the floor.
Kai picked it up, stared at it for a long time, then crushed it in his fist.
"You shouldn't follow me next time," Kai muttered.
"I wasn't following. I was protecting."
A pause.
Then—unexpectedly—Kai's mouth twitched into a small, genuine smile.
"I know."
---
[Kai's Favorability +1]
[Kai's Favorability: 91/100]
[New Passive Trait Unlocked: Tethered Instinct – When Kai is near, fear effects are reduced by 20%.]
---
The Blackout Beneath Our Feet
For a while, there was only silence. Not the peaceful kind, but the kind that gnawed at the base of Yu Ren's skull. No alarms. No mutterings. No system messages. Just the fading echoes of footsteps as those two survivors vanished into the stairwell.
Yu Ren exhaled slowly, turning toward Kai. "We shouldn't stay here."
"No," Kai said immediately, already pulling out the folded map from his bag. "If the lower floors are being searched, and power's going out—something is interfering with more than just surveillance. Something systemic."
He traced a line on the map with his finger. "This stairwell runs to the supply storage down two more levels. If we assume their path leads to the same place, we have two options: intercept… or avoid."
"Interception means confrontation," Yu Ren murmured. "We don't know if they're rogue survivors or something else."
"They had proper weapons," Kai noted. "Blades that weren't rusted. Movement was trained. And the one in front… you saw the stance?"
Yu Ren remembered. Military. That deliberate footwork. Even his own senses, dulled slightly from fatigue, recognized it.
Kai continued, "We should prepare for another confrontation—if not now, then soon. And I don't like surprises."
He reached for one of the duffel bags they'd recovered earlier. Within was a mix of salvaged medkits, protein bars, scavenged ammo—standard loot from what remained of the floor above. But Yu Ren noticed that Kai had repacked everything with almost surgical care. Even now, Kai handed him a gas mask, silently.
"What is this?"
Kai fastened his own. "Just in case the ventilation system is compromised. If they're using blackout gas or disrupting electronics, there's a chance they're also weaponizing the air."
Yu Ren took the mask and fitted it over his face, feeling the tight pull around his jawline. The world muffled slightly, like he was listening through cotton. He didn't like it.
As they began their descent, the stairwell grew narrower, more industrial. The walls had lost their paint—now exposed metal and insulation. Emergency lights flickered intermittently, but something else was strange.
The silence was too loud.
"Why isn't the system pinging us anymore?" Yu Ren asked.
Kai slowed his steps, brow tightening behind the mask.
Then it hit.
[SYSTEM INTERRUPTION DETECTED.]
[CORE FUNCTIONALITIES: OFFLINE TEMPORARILY.]
[SURVIVAL MODULE: ACTIVE IN BACKUP MODE.]
Yu Ren felt the drop in his stomach. No quest updates. No notifications. No map overlays. It was like losing a limb.
Kai's eyes narrowed. "The system… is being jammed?"
"Can they do that?" Yu Ren asked. "Is that even possible?"
Kai didn't answer immediately.
"I thought the system was above human tampering," Yu Ren continued. "Built to regulate survivors, right? It's a constant across all regions."
"Exactly," Kai said, voice low. "But if someone has found a way to disrupt it, they're not just scavengers. They're part of something else. Possibly remnants of an old faction… or worse."
Yu Ren's breath caught.
"The Project?" he whispered.
Kai turned his gaze to him sharply, then nodded—just once.
Another ten steps. Then, a faint sound—a beep.
Both froze.
It was coming from below. A short, electronic tone followed by a mechanical hum.
Yu Ren motioned with two fingers, crouching low.
Kai nodded again, eyes sharp.
They crept down the last section of stairs, careful not to make any noise.
And then they saw it.
The lower level was a massive underground garage—or what used to be. Crates were piled in orderly rows. Shelving units of old gear had been repurposed. There were people—but not many. Six? Maybe seven?
All in similar gear. Tactical. Organized. One was hunched over a portable device—a makeshift server or control unit, wires trailing into a disassembled panel on the wall.
Kai mouthed, "System disruptor."
Yu Ren tilted his head. "Should we retreat?"
But Kai was already scanning the environment. One side of the room had crates labeled NEXIS: STORAGE MODULE 3B. Old supply logs were still visible, even after so long.
And just above the crates—a maintenance tunnel. Narrow, dark, half-collapsed… but potentially usable.
"Climb up," Kai said. "We circle around. I want to see what they're actually doing. If they're just disrupting surveillance or if this is larger."
Yu Ren hoisted himself silently, boots bracing against rusted rungs. The tunnel was tight, but navigable. Dust clung to every breath. The air felt old. Like it hadn't been touched in years.
Half-crawling, they moved forward, until a metal grate gave them a view of the lower level from above.
Then they heard it.
"We'll finish uploading in three minutes," one of the figures said, tapping keys. "After that, the system's entire floor control will be rerouted to Test Group Theta. The Aegis Net won't respond unless manually reset from a main node."
Yu Ren's fingers gripped the grate. His pulse spiked.
They weren't just jamming the system.
They were rerouting it.
Taking control of a section of the network. A takeover.
Another voice—familiar. Sharp.
"The experiment has begun. Once it registers the first behavioral divergence, we'll introduce the control anomalies."
Yu Ren turned toward Kai, eyes wide.
An experiment?
Control anomalies?
A chill spread down his spine.
"We have to stop this," Yu Ren whispered.
Kai didn't answer.
His eyes were locked on one figure in particular—the one issuing commands. Tall. Calm. A black patch on his shoulder with an emblem half-faded: a circle with a vertical line through it.
Kai stiffened.
Yu Ren noticed.
"You know him?" he whispered.
Kai's voice was a whisper of steel.
"Not anymore."
---
To be continued.