Chapter 9: The Fractured Limit
The sound of his heartbeat echoed louder than the hum of the training chamber.
92% Synchronization…
The digits pulsed across Kai's vision, the glowing System interface hovering before him like a silent judge. His body trembled. Steam rose from his skin, mixed with the faint shimmer of his aura — the same eerie silver that appeared when he absorbed monster genes.
He exhaled slowly, trying to calm the storm in his veins.
Lira's voice broke the silence.
"Kai, if you push it one more percent, you'll fry your core."
She stood near the observation panel, arms crossed, her usually calm eyes now sharp with worry. The circuits around her flickered in rhythm with his pulse. Mira leaned against the door frame, chewing on a protein bar like this was just another day in Hollow City's madness.
Kai smirked weakly. "Don't worry, I'll stop at ninety-nine. I'm saving the fireworks for the real show."
Lira glared. "You said that last time, and we had to rebuild half the chamber."
He chuckled — a tired, cracked sound. "That was… character development."
But his vision blurred. The System's voice — smooth yet mechanical — whispered in his mind:
> [Ascendant Progression Reaching Unstable Territory]
[Warning: Core Fragmentation Imminent]
His knees buckled. For a second, he thought he'd collapse, but a strange warmth spread through his chest, stabilizing him. The same silver light coalesced behind his ribs, forming the faint outline of something… alive.
Lira rushed to his side. "Kai, stop! The sync link's breaking!"
He didn't answer. Instead, he stared at the holographic screen before him. A new message appeared, something the System had never displayed before:
> [Subroutine Detected: Lost Code – Fragment 02 Recovered]
His breath hitched. "The Lost Code… again?"
The last time he saw that phrase was during the incursion three weeks ago — when an entire district of Hollow City collapsed into the ground.
Mira stopped mid-bite, expression suddenly serious. "Wait. You mean that glitch thing that erased an entire guild? I thought the council locked that data."
"They did," Lira said coldly, eyes narrowing. "Which means it's evolving faster than we thought."
The chamber lights flickered. Then — silence. For the first time since his awakening, Kai's System interface dimmed completely. No sound, no text, no voice. Just darkness.
"Uh," Kai muttered, looking around, "is this what death feels like, or did I just crash my own soul?"
Mira snorted. "If you died, I'd at least loot your gear first."
"Touch my stash and I haunt you."
Before Lira could scold them, the entire chamber pulsed — like the building itself took a heartbeat. Then, every display screen around them lit up with the same flickering phrase:
> HELLO, ASCENDANT.
DID YOU ENJOY YOUR TRIAL?
Lira stepped back. "That's not your System."
Kai's chest tightened. "No… it's something else."
The voice that followed wasn't synthetic. It was deep, layered, almost human.
> "You've done well reaching ninety-two percent. Most break at sixty."
Kai's mind froze. The voice wasn't just in his head. It echoed through the chamber itself — vibrating against his bones.
"Who are you?" he demanded.
> "A remnant," the voice said. "A shadow left in the code of this dying world. You can call me what they once did… the Overmind."
Lira's hand shot to her weapon, her aura flaring. "The Overmind is supposed to be sealed beyond the outer rift."
> "Supposed to be," the voice mused. "Yet here we are. And your little Ascendant is quite an anomaly, isn't he?"
Kai's thoughts raced. The Overmind — the same being responsible for the early collapses, the System anomalies, the hybrid monsters that kept evolving faster than human researchers could track.
> "Soon," the voice continued, "your city will fracture like your core. But worry not — you were chosen for a reason."
The message faded, leaving behind a new line of code on his interface:
> [Mission Unlocked: The Fractured Limit]
Objective: Stabilize or Shatter.
Timer: 24:00:00
Mira groaned. "Oh great. A countdown. Because that's never a good sign."
Kai stood silent for a long moment, feeling the faint tremor under his feet. The city was changing — he could sense it in the air. His System connection was unstable, but stronger than before, as if the Overmind had left something behind… a seed of chaos, or maybe a gift.
He clenched his fists. "If Hollow City's on the line, we don't have time to wait. I'll finish the sync — and then we hunt this Overmind."
Lira stepped forward, her expression unreadable. "If you're wrong, the city dies. If you're right…"
He met her eyes. "Then we finally find out who's been pulling the strings."
Mira grinned, cracking her knuckles. "Guess I should save some energy. Things are about to get messy."
As they exited the chamber, the silver glow beneath Kai's skin flared one last time — and somewhere deep within the city's underground network, ancient servers came online.
The Overmind's voice whispered faintly through the static.
> "Let's see if the Ascendant can survive his own evolution."
And far below Hollow City, something began to wake.