Seven years ago, the world underwent a significant transformation. All calendars were reset to zero.
Now, only certain people can grow a seed of golden tears in their hearts. If it successfully blooms, they are called Awakeners, gaining powers according to their deepest obsessions.
A father obsessed with protecting his sick child gained healing abilities. An artist created stunning illusions. But not all obsessions are noble. A man obsessed with a woman who rejected him could control minds. A greedy businessman turned everything to gold, destroying the economy. The most terrifying? Those obsessed with destruction itself.
This is God's blessing and His curse.
Year 7.
Andreas VI Crimson stared at the black-blue crystal inside the containment tube. It was the size of a fist, its surface moving like liquid but solid as stone. Strange geometric patterns rotated within it.
"Seven years... finally," he whispered.
Dr. Helena Vorst, the senior researcher on his team, looked at the crystal with awe and fear. "Are you sure this is safe, Andreas? The radiation it emits..."
"As long as it's not touched directly." Andreas pressed a button. A holographic screen displayed complex data. "I found it 12,000 meters below the North Ocean. I call it Obsidian Null. Within a 10-meter radius of this crystal, Awakener abilities completely stop."
Helena stepped back. "My God..."
"We can build prisons, limiting bracelets. Stop dangerous Awakeners without killing them." Andreas exhaled, staring at the crystal with an almost... possessive gaze. "With this, I can make all threats insignificant. I can control the scale of problems. Make the dangerous become small. Powerless."
Helena looked at him strangely. "Andreas... you sound like..."
"I'm fine," he cut her off quickly. "Tomorrow I'll announce this to the World Government Coalition. They need to see that I... that we have the solution."
"This will change everything," Helena said softly.
Andreas didn't see the cold calculation and guilt in his assistant's eyes.
The next day.
A secret bunker deep beneath Coalition headquarters. Forty-seven world leaders surrounded a giant round table. In the center of the room, a tube containing Obsidian Null emitted a dim light that made the room feel... empty.
Andreas presented enthusiastically. He explained how the crystal worked, its potential for special Awakener prisons, humane limiting bracelets.
"How much of this mineral deposit did you find?" asked the President of the Sakura Nation.
"One large deposit in the North Ocean. Enough for thousands of limiting devices."
A general stood. "Can this be weaponized? Projectiles coated with Obsidian Null?"
Andreas fell silent. "Theoretically... yes. But that's not my purpose..."
"Or a bomb containing Obsidian Null dust?" another general interrupted. "Something that could spread in the air and incapacitate all Awakeners in a wide area?"
"Wait, this isn't for war..."
"This is for controlling threats," the Coalition President stood, his face hard. "Fifty thousand people died in Delta Nation two weeks ago because one Awakener lost control. The solution isn't limiting bracelets, Dr. Crimson. Awakeners won't voluntarily wear them."
"Then we create regulations..."
"Regulations don't stop someone who can destroy buildings with their mind!" another general snapped.
Andreas felt the situation shift. "You've already decided something. Even before I came here."
The President stared at him flatly. "Your research is a blessing to humanity, Dr. Crimson. With Obsidian Null, we can end this age of terror."
"By killing them," Andreas whispered. Realization hit him. "You're going to make weapons of mass destruction. Massacre Awakeners to maintain your status."
"We will protect billions of lives. Restore world order."
"I didn't create this to support your dominance!" Andreas stepped forward, but two soldiers blocked him. "This is to protect people, give them control over their powers, not a tool for slaughter!"
"Dr. Crimson." A familiar voice from behind.
Andreas turned.
Dr. Helena Vorst entered, followed by armed soldiers. In her hand, a tablet displaying a map of the Obsidian Null deposit coordinates.
"Helena...?" Andreas stared in disbelief. "What are you doing?"
"I'm sorry, Andreas. But the world needs to be saved."
"Since when?"
"Since the beginning." Helena's voice was cold. "The Coalition funded your research. They gave you access to the submarine for exploration. They... allowed you to find Obsidian Null."
Andreas felt his world collapse.
The President raised his hand. "Dr. Crimson, from now on, Obsidian Null is a Coalition asset. All your research will be taken over."
"You can't..." Soldiers dragged him away from the containment tube.
"Officially, you will be announced dead in a laboratory accident." The President stared at him coldly. "You know too much."
"You're insane!" Andreas struggled. "When weapons of mass destruction are formed, human deaths are no longer lives, just statistical numbers like the past! Awakeners are still human! Many of them are innocent..."
"No one is innocent when they have the power to destroy cities," the President replied. "Take him away."
The soldiers pulled Andreas harder. Helena walked toward the tube, her hand almost touching the crystal.
Inside Andreas's chest, something broke.
For seven years, he had buried his obsession behind scientific logic. The obsession with control. To make all threats insignificant. To make every problem in this world... small. Manageable.
That crystal, his discovery, was the manifestation of that obsession. A way to make dangerous Awakeners powerless. A way to shrink threats.
And now they were going to take it.
No. NO.
Sharp pain stabbed his heart. The seed inside his chest, the seed he had always ignored, that he thought never existed, suddenly bloomed with terrifying violence.
His obsession screamed: "If they're threats, make them SMALL."
"LET GO OF ME!"
Andreas touched the arm of the soldier pulling him. He felt it: size, mass, scale, everything could be changed. He pulled, and the arm shrank. Bones, flesh, everything became smaller in an instant, like a toy. Blood spurted from the disproportionate joints. The soldier screamed.
Andreas broke free. His hand swept through the air in wild movements.
A general's rifle shrank to the size of a matchstick. A leader's chair suddenly shrank. His body fell, his head hitting the floor with a deafening crack. Blood pooled.
"He's an Awakener!" Helena screamed, backing away.
"SHOOT HIM!" the President ordered.
Dozens of soldiers fired simultaneously. Andreas swung his hand in panic. Five bullets shrank to dust, but his movements were slow, untrained. Two bullets pierced his stomach. One tore through his thigh.
Andreas collapsed, but his obsession screamed louder.
He crawled, his hand touching the floor. All the tiles beneath the three soldiers suddenly shrank. They fell into gaps, their legs trapped between the size-changing floor. Bones broke with a sickening sound. Screams filled the room.
"STOP HIM! NOW!"
A general charged at Andreas, trying to restrain his hands. Andreas touched his face. Half the general's skull shrank. His left eye collapsed inward. His jaw became smaller. He fell, still alive but half his face destroyed, choked screams coming from a mouth no longer symmetrical.
Blood everywhere. Seven dead. Dozens were severely injured.
But Andreas was at the end of his strength. His own blood soaked the floor. His hands trembled. His vision blurred.
Helena moved quickly. She grabbed the Obsidian Null crystal from the tube and raised it high.
The crystal's radius spread.
Instantly, Andreas felt his power extinguish. Like fire doused with water. The warmth in his chest vanished, replaced by painful emptiness. He collapsed.
"Fool," Helena said coldly, clutching the crystal. "You see for yourself why Awakeners must be eliminated."
Andreas coughed up blood. His obsession still screamed in his head: make them small, make this threat insignificant, but his body couldn't hold on. He stared at the corpses around him, the people he had "shrunk" to death.
"You... forced me... to become a monster..."
"No," Helena stared at him without emotion. "You always had that obsession, Andreas. You just wrapped it in noble words like 'control' and 'solution'. But the core of your obsession is the same as that of other Awakeners: you want to bend the world to your will. Make everything you consider a threat... meaningless."
Andreas fell silent. In his heart, he knew Helena was right.
His crystal, Obsidian Null, wasn't to save Awakeners. It was to control them. To make them insignificant.
Just like what he had just done to these people.
Soldiers surrounded him with weapons aimed. Andreas couldn't move anymore.
The crystal he found to "save" the world now became the tool to suppress his own obsession.
And the blood on his hands proved that the obsession to "shrink any threat"... was just as dangerous as any other obsession.
Andreas stared at the moon from his prison cell.
"This is my fault," he whispered. "God gave a new opportunity, an era where human obsession could be a blessing or a curse. But I created a way to return to the past. False peace through weapon dominance."
He laughed bitterly.
"Obsession continuously suppressed... will eventually explode."