Darkness clung to him long after his mind began to stir.
Aeris floated, weightless, suspended in something cold and thick as his awareness crawled back from nowhere. Sounds came first—muted, distant, like someone was speaking three rooms away through water.
"…last capsule…"
"…finally stabilized…"
"…tell Director Solvene—"
"…that mutation spike again?"
Light pushed against his eyelids, a soft pulse of color. Hazy blues and violet streaks bled across his vision when he tried to open his eyes. His chest burned all at once, his lungs screaming for air.
He tried to breathe and got only metal and frost.
Panic snapped through him. His body jerked but barely moved; his limbs were stiff, held in place by the thick gel around him. Somewhere close, machinery whined. A siren gave a single warning chirp and cut off.
Then the gel around him shuddered and began to drain.
It slid past his skin in slow, icy waves, rushing toward some seam beneath his feet. The pressure eased. A sharp hiss cracked through the chamber as the glass pod split open—cold air slapped him in the face.
He fell forward, coughing violently as frigid liquid spilled from his mouth.
Hands caught him before he smashed into the floor.
"Easy, easy—subject A-1997 is conscious," someone said nearby, their voice steady, practiced. "Welcome back, Aeris Vale. You gave us a bit of a scare."
Aeris blinked hard, forcing the blur to clear.
The cryo-bay lights were too bright. Rows of pods lined the chamber in a wide arc, most of them empty now, their glass lids open and dripping. Steam coiled up from vents in the floor. Cables hung overhead like a metal jungle of veins and nerves.
White-coated researchers and armored Augmentors circled him, holding tablets, scanning his vitals, typing notes. Shimmering glyphs scrolled along the walls, projecting data he couldn't focus on.
He looked sideways.
His pod was the last one still frosted over on the inside.
"…Trouble?" Aeris managed, his voice raw and dry.
A tall scientist stepped forward, visor lit with floating symbols.
"Your vitals stalled during the thawing cycle," the man said. "We detected a disruption in your murium-adapted genome and an irregular fluctuation in your qi strands. For a moment, your spiritual thread and your body were… out of sync."
He tapped his visor, then chuckled.
"Honestly, we thought the machine glitched. Happens sometimes when Murim decides someone's going to be interesting."
Aeris tried to swallow, but his throat felt like sandpaper.
"Am I… late?" he asked.
A few of the researchers laughed under their breath.
"Very," the scientist said. "You're the last of your cohort to wake up. Everyone else has already been processed and moved to the Awakening Hall. Don't worry—you haven't missed the formal introductions. Director Solvene insisted we wait."
Aeris shifted his weight, feeling his legs under him for the first time.
They didn't feel like his legs.
They were steady, too steady. His muscles felt new—smooth, unscarred, humming faintly beneath the skin. Deep inside, somewhere under his sternum, there was a soft tingling, as if thin qi strands were slowly unknotting themselves and trying to remember how to flow.
This is… my body?
One of the researchers tapped a panel on the wall. A nearby door hissed open, revealing a long corridor lit with pale, shifting light.
"Come," the lead scientist said, gesturing him forward. "They're waiting for you in the Awakening Hall."
Aeris stepped away from the pod. The floor was shockingly solid beneath his bare feet, cold metal humming with the ship's distant power. He took a slow breath. The air tasted cleaner than anything he remembered from his old life—filtered, sharp, with the faint tang of recycled qi essence in the vents.
He had only taken three steps when a booming voice rolled down the corridor.
"There you are!"
A short, round man with a thick curled beard and a long coat woven with faintly glowing murium-thread marched toward them. His presence filled the hallway more than his body did.
Director Solvene.
Aeris recognized him from the orientation images he'd been shown before cryosleep—back when this all sounded like a distant possibility instead of a lived reality.
"Aeris Vale," Solvene said, his eyes crinkling in amusement as he stopped in front of him. "Our final sleeper finally decides to rejoin the living. I'd make a joke about beauty rest, but frankly, you had us wondering if you were going to stay in there forever."
The researchers snorted.
Aeris flushed and dipped his head awkwardly. "S-Sorry, sir."
"No need for apologies," Solvene said, waving a hand dismissively. "Sometimes the world of Murim takes its time deciding how to knit soul and body together. And in your case…"
He tilted his head, studying Aeris with sharp, curious eyes.
"…it seems the knitting took an… unusual turn. We'll keep an eye on that."
That didn't sound comforting.
"Come," Solvene said, clapping a heavy hand on his shoulder and steering him toward the open door. "Your peers have already been introduced to their new lives. You should hear this with them."
They walked.
The corridor opened into a rising walkway that curved upward. Translucent panels lined the walls, showing glimpses of other sections of the ship—shadows of people moving through distant halls, flashes of transit pods streaking by, the faint silhouette of one of the city's inner towers.
"So," Solvene said casually as they walked. "You remember the terms, yes? The contract. The choice."
Aeris's chest tightened.
"I… remember enough," he said. "I was… enlisted. Then transferred. Signed into the Phoenix Program for… a new path."
"A polite way to say you were sold," Solvene said mildly, not unkind. "But you did sign. You agreed. That's what matters."
Aeris didn't answer.
He had been a low-ranking soldier on the outer edge of Murim's North American defense grid, barely strong enough to circulate qi strands past his arms without his meridians aching. He didn't have a clan. He didn't have a sect. He barely had a future.
When they'd told him he could trade that life for a new body, new strength, and a place on the Crucible Prime?
He hadn't hesitated.
"What matters now," Solvene continued, "is that from this day forward, you are no longer a nameless soldier. You are Phoenix Born. You'll live, train, fight, die, and rise again in service to something larger than any nation or old-world border."
They reached a towering set of doors etched with light.
Glyphs shimmered across their surface, forming and unforming phrases in the old Murim script—a language Aeris only half-recognized from mandatory classes.
"These doors," Solvene said, pausing before them, "separate your past life from your next one."
He turned to Aeris and smiled in a way that was almost gentle.
"On the other side, you'll meet your cohort. Your academy. Your city-ship. Your sect. And the program that will use your lives to drag Murim civilization into a new era among the stars."
Aeris swallowed, throat tight.
"Is it… really immortal?" he asked before he could stop himself. "The Phoenix part?"
Solvene's eyes gleamed.
"Immortal enough," he said. "Your soul-thread is bound to a biocrystal. When your flesh dies, your Qi condenses, your essence retracts, and the crystal returns to its origin point. Given proper preparation? You rise again in a new vessel."
He leaned in just slightly.
"But don't let that idea get too cozy in your skull. Death still hurts. And each life still costs you something. Immortality is not a toy. Treat every one of your lives as if it may be your last, Aeris Vale."
The words sank into him like cold water.
Solvene straightened again and raised his hand toward the doors.
"Now then. Time to join the others."
The doors rumbled, splitting down the middle. Pale light poured through the widening gap as the stone-like panels slid open.
"Welcome to your future," Solvene said. "Step through, and become part of the first generation of Phoenix Born—the ones who will carry Murim beyond its old skies and into the unknown."
Aeris took a breath, stepped forward—
—and walked into the light.
The brightness swallowed him, then softened.
He blinked rapidly as his eyes adjusted.
The Awakening Hall wasn't just large. It was immense.
Tiered platforms rose along a circular wall that climbed into the shadows above. Rows upon rows of seats were filled with young men and women in simple white uniforms, their faces turned toward the center of the chamber.
Overhead, massive holographic projections rotated slowly—a three-dimensional image of the Crucible Prime, diagrams of the ship's internal sectors, and an animated outline of a human body threaded with glowing qi strands.
The center of the chamber was a broad, raised platform.
That was where Aeris now stood, with Director Solvene at his side.
He froze for a heartbeat.
Every eye in the chamber was on him.
"…that him?"
"The error case?"
"Last one to wake…"
"He looks normal."
Aeris's palms went damp.
Solvene clapped a firm hand between his shoulder blades, nudging him a step forward. "Don't mind them, boy. If they're whispering about you, they're not thinking about how terrified they are themselves."
He wasn't wrong.
Even from here, Aeris could see the tension in some students' shoulders, the way a few clutched their uniforms too tightly, the hollow look of others who clearly hadn't fully processed what cryosleep had done to them.
A chime rang out, clear and bright.
The room quieted.
Above them, the hologram of the Crucible Prime rotated slowly, bathed in soft light. It was shaped like a layered disc, ringed with spires and domes—more city than ship.
"Students," Solvene's voice boomed, deep and warm and effortlessly commanding, "welcome to the Crucible Prime."
The words hung in the air.
"You come from every corner of Murim," he continued. "From clans and houses, armies and monasteries, backwater districts and shining city-states. Some of you were scouted. Some of you were volunteered." His eyes flicked toward Aeris for a moment. "Some of you were… transferred."
A low ripple of discomfort.
"But you all agreed. You chose to enter cryosleep, surrender your old bodies, and awaken in vessels capable of surviving what the cosmos will throw at you. For that choice alone, you stand apart from the rest of our world."
Aeris swallowed thickly, listening.
"You are Phoenix Born," Solvene said. "The first generation raised not only to cultivate qi strands and essence, not only to touch elemental affinity, but to do so in a body that can be reforged, reset, and pushed past mortality's limits."
A few students leaned forward, eyes shining. Others flinched at the word reset.
Solvene raised one hand, and four symbols appeared in the air, rotating around the hologram of the ship.
"The Crucible is supported by four major pillars. You will come to know them well."
One symbol brightened—a radiance, a halo.
"The Luminary Order," Solvene said. "Our ascendant faction—those who seek enlightenment, clarity, and spiritual refinement above all. Thinkers, meditators, soul-artists. They polish qi essence until it glows."
Another symbol flared—a fang, a claw, a streak of red.
"The Dominator Houses," he continued. "Our martial power. Those who refine their bodies as weapons and wield qi like a brutal edge. Warriors, enforcers, conquerors. They believe only strength carves destiny."
A third symbol appeared—a compass overlaid with a starfield.
"The Pioneer Fleet. Explorers. Navigators. Survivalists. They will chart the unknown, walk where no Murim-born has walked, and decide where our people can set down roots among the stars."
The last symbol took shape—a gear encircling a crystal.
"And the Artisan Guild. Engineers, smiths, traders, crafters. They shape murium into tools, weapons, homes, and systems. Without them, this city-ship falls apart."
The symbols slowly orbited each other.
"These are not your only paths," Solvene said, "but they are the foundation beneath your feet. Over the coming years, you will gravitate toward one—or more—of these pillars. You will earn the right to stand under their banners."
He turned slightly, gesturing toward Aeris.
"But before all of that… you must stand together. As a cohort. As the first Phoenix Born."
The spotlight overhead tightened without warning.
It pinned Aeris in its beam.
"And this," Solvene said, cheerfully cruel, "is the last among you to rise. Aeris Vale."
The hall rustled.
"An orphan, right?"
"Military transfer."
"He almost failed his awakening."
"Mutation spike, they said."
Heat rose under Aeris's skin.
Solvene didn't seem bothered in the slightest.
"Subject A-1997 here," he said, "experienced a unique irregularity during his thaw phase. His qi strands misaligned with his murium-adapted vessel for several seconds. His soul-thread nearly slipped loose."
He smiled.
"But he adapted. Stabilized. Survived. From where I stand, that makes him resilient. And resilience…" He spread his arms. "Resilience is what keeps you from breaking the first time death throws its weight at you."
A few students laughed quietly. Some regarded Aeris with new interest. One girl in a white-trimmed Luminary uniform watched him with steady, unreadable eyes, as if trying to see past his skin.
In one of the higher tiers, a broad-shouldered student in darker gear—probably Dominator—leaned forward, smirking.
Somewhere off to the side, someone waved.
Aeris couldn't tell who.
Solvene let the moment stretch, then dropped the spotlight and clapped his hands once.
"And now," he said, "let us move from ceremony to reality."
Large gates along the edges of the hall slid open, revealing multiple skybridges and transit platforms. Sleek capsules waited on floating rails, humming softly.
"You will now be escorted to the Orientation Wing," Solvene announced. "There, you will undergo your post-awakening assessment. Your qi strands will be scanned. Your affinity will be tested. Your new bodies will be calibrated. You will receive your identity seals, uniforms, and dorm assignments."
His tone softened for just a heartbeat.
"You will also be given time to breathe."
Light laughter drifted through the hall.
Solvene turned to Aeris one last time.
"Go on," he said. "Your peers are eager to meet the one who held up their schedule."
Aeris nodded, then stepped down from the central platform.
As he descended the stairs, students shifted aside to make space. He felt their eyes on him—curious, suspicious, indifferent, fascinated. Some gave tight nods as he passed. Others looked past him like he was already part of the scenery.
He tried not to trip.
Halfway down, something prickled along his spine.
A faint vibration. Not in the air, but under his feet. Deep. Almost below the hall. Like a distant heartbeat pulsing through thick metal.
For a moment, it felt like something far beneath the chamber had turned its attention upward.
Aeris paused.
The sensation faded before he could pin it down.
Cryosleep side-effect, he told himself. His qi still felt loose, the strands sluggish, not yet gathered into proper essence. His senses were probably just misfiring.
"Hey!"
The shout snapped him out of it.
At the base of the stairs, next to one of the waiting transit capsules, a boy with curly brown hair and a bright grin waved him over. A shimmer of metal framed his ears—cybernetic implements linked to his nervous system.
"You're Aeris, yeah?" the boy called. "Last sleeper?"
Aeris blinked. "...Yeah."
The boy threw him a thumbs up. "Nice. I'm Orion Vega. Pioneer track. C'mon, Vale, if you're late again, everyone's gonna start calling you 'Delayed Respawn' or something."
Aeris stared for half a second.
"I literally woke up ten minutes ago."
"Exactly!" Orion grinned wider. "New record for dramatic entrance. Let's go before they shut this thing and make us run there."
With no chance to argue, Aeris stepped into the capsule beside him.
The door slid shut.
Soft light filled the small space. A gentle hum vibrated through the floor as the capsule disengaged from its dock.
As it shot forward along its invisible rail, carrying them deeper into the Crucible Prime, Aeris pressed his hand to the wall, feeling the faint buzz of power, of qi circulation arrays, of the ship-city breathing around him.
New body.
New life.
New world.
Somewhere far below, unseen, something stirred again—just a little.
Aeris didn't notice.
He only knew one thing:
This was his first day as Phoenix Born.
Whatever waited ahead—tests, training, death, or rebirth—
there was no going back.