The plane lifted from the runway in Xylanthia with a smooth, controlled roar.
Through the oval window beside him, Aldric watched the city shrink into patterns of glass and steel until the clouds swallowed it whole. The cabin lights dimmed slightly as the aircraft stabilized into its climb.
Four hours to Castria.
Four hours alone with his thoughts.
Aldric leaned back in his seat, the secure phone Fox had given him resting in his palm. He hadn't turned it on yet.
Instead, he closed his eyes.
And began to think.
"To brainwash someone," Aldric murmured quietly to himself, barely louder than the low hum of the engines, "you'd have to let them forget themselves first."
His fingers tapped lightly on the armrest as the idea unfolded in his mind.
"Then you teach them what you want them to know."
He stared ahead, eyes distant.
"You control them through the things they see… the things they eat… the things they buy… the things they watch…"
His voice lowered slightly.
"And most of all…"
A pause.
"The things they learn."
Education.
Media.
Food chains.
Economic pressure.
Aldric's lips curved faintly.
"A system."
He opened his eyes slowly.
It wasn't chaos controlling the world.
It was structure.
Aldric exhaled softly.
"It would start young," he continued quietly. "Very young."
Children were the easiest to mold.
Teach them the shape of reality early enough, and they would never question the walls of the room.
"But at some point," Aldric said, "you'd have to get their consent."
He tilted his head slightly.
"Not real consent."
Manufactured consent.
People agreeing to the systems that controlled them.
Voting inside predetermined frameworks.
Choosing between identical outcomes.
Believing freedom meant selecting which chain to wear.
"In other words…"
Aldric's voice grew colder.
"Control."
The plane leveled out above the clouds.
White stretched endlessly below them like an ocean.
Aldric watched it silently for a moment before speaking again.
"I don't go to church," he said softly, "but I believe in the creator."
A flight attendant passed down the aisle. Aldric paused until she moved past.
Then he continued.
"It's my perspective of the creator that made me different."
He folded his hands together.
"In truth…"
A faint smile appeared.
"It's like being a sane person surrounded by aimless zombies."
Not evil.
Not malicious.
Just unaware.
Aldric's gaze drifted toward the cabin ceiling.
"I don't trust the word of the book."
Religion had always fascinated him—not as doctrine, but as architecture.
"Because it's not complete."
He remembered reading the academic findings years ago.
"The scholars of the Council of Nun proved that the text was altered across centuries."
Edited.
Translated.
Rewritten.
"What remains reads like mythology."
Stories layered on stories.
"And the son of the creator…"
Aldric shook his head faintly.
"Likely invented."
But the concept of the creator itself?
That was something else entirely.
"I see it differently," Aldric whispered.
"The creator," he said quietly, "is each and every one of us."
He tapped his chest once.
"A consciousness inside a shell."
The human body.
Temporary.
Fragile.
"Our spirit is energy," he continued. "Energy doesn't die."
The plane vibrated slightly as it cut through a patch of turbulent air.
"On this place we call home…"
Aldric paused.
"…Planet Mercury."
The name felt strange even in his own thoughts.
"This world doesn't resonate at the frequency we originate from."
So existence required a form compatible with the environment.
A vessel.
"We start over," he said quietly. "Again and again."
Forgetting.
Learning.
Remembering.
"Because in truth…"
His voice softened.
"We are the divine."
Energy.
Connected.
"One."
Aldric looked back down at the secure phone in his hand.
"And that truth," he said slowly, "is the one thing they can't allow people to understand."
Because a population that understood its own nature couldn't be ruled.
"So they give you the word."
Half truth.
Half nonsense.
Enough to guide belief—but not enough to reveal reality.
"The rest," Aldric said quietly, "is rubbish."
His fingers tightened slightly.
"And the ones responsible…"
He stared at the phone.
"…are called the Kurogami."
No one knew who they were.
No official records.
No public identities.
But their influence touched everything.
Crime networks.
Financial markets.
Political movements.
Education systems.
Human trafficking.
Drug trades.
Media conglomerates.
If power moved in the world, the Kurogami had already touched it.
Not visibly.
Never directly.
"Subliminal control," Aldric muttered.
Invisible pressure points.
Manipulation disguised as coincidence.
"But it's bigger than that."
Because even the Kurogami had a hierarchy.
Someone controlled them.
Aldric opened the phone Fox had given him.
He didn't unlock it yet.
Instead, he replayed the moment outside the car.
Fox's lips moving silently.
6, 1, 13, 9, 12, 25
18, 15, 25, 1, 12
Aldric whispered them again under his breath.
Then something clicked.
"If you switch the positions…"
He sat up slightly in his seat.
"Royal family."
His eyes narrowed.
"But it can't be one."
Too small.
Too centralized.
So what did it mean?
Aldric's mind ran through possibilities rapidly.
Then the answer surfaced.
"The twenty-five royal families."
Not a single dynasty.
An alliance.
Ancient.
Hidden.
Power passed through bloodlines rather than institutions.
"They control the governors," Aldric said quietly.
"And the governors control the ministries."
Ministries shaped laws.
Laws shaped society.
"And the ministries control the people."
Aldric leaned back slowly.
The structure was elegant.
Terrifying.
Invisible.
"Nothing is real," Aldric whispered.
At least not the version presented to the masses.
Every narrative.
Every war.
Every financial collapse.
Every cultural shift.
Guided.
Manipulated.
Manufactured.
He rubbed his temple slowly.
"When you learn that," he said quietly, "you feel disgusted."
Not anger.
Not fear.
Disgust.
Because billions of people were being guided like livestock.
Some would never accept the truth.
Some would call it insanity.
Others would deny it outright.
"But eventually," Aldric murmured, "they will learn."
Whether willingly or not.
Aldric laughed quietly.
History had already shown what happened to people who resisted.
Leaders.
Activists.
Truth-seekers.
Men and women who stood up.
"They were killed," Aldric said flatly.
And the public was given a different explanation.
Assassination reframed as tragedy.
Exposure reframed as madness.
Their deaths used to reinforce the very system they opposed.
"They have no morality."
None.
Just maintenance of power.
Aldric's eyes sharpened.
"But now…"
He leaned forward slightly.
"…in this era…"
His smile returned.
"You've met me."
He looked out the window at the endless clouds.
"I'll be your migraine."
A slow breath.
"One that doesn't stop."
Even if the system fought back.
Even if the enemy was something darker than human ambition.
"Even if it's the devil."
Aldric closed his eyes briefly and organized his thoughts.
Five facts.
Five anchors in the storm.
He spoke them softly.
"First…"
"Cain discovered a control pathway."
"And he was eliminated."
A beat.
"Second…"
"President Raktomb threatened the same network."
"And he was removed."
Another breath.
"Third…"
"Marwen's trial was engineered to pressure Fox's trade system."
Fourth.
"The mastermind hides power through financial routing and legal structures."
And finally—
Aldric opened his eyes.
"The network traces back to something called the Royal Family."
Silence settled around him.
The plane continued its steady flight toward Castria.
Aldric finally unlocked the secure phone.
He bypassed three layers of encryption manually.
Then opened a communication protocol Fox had clearly prepared.
He typed carefully.
Every character encrypted through a chain that bounced across multiple satellite nodes.
Untraceable.
The message was simple.
To: LCO Command
To: President Sky
Stop all investigations immediately.
Do not engage any suspects.
Do not access the financial network again.
Wait for me to return.
A pause.
Then he added one final line.
The board is larger than we thought.
He sent the message.
Within seconds the encryption system wiped the transmission trail entirely.
Aldric powered the phone down.
Outside the window, the horizon shifted as the aircraft began its descent route toward Castria.
The game had changed.
And for the first time—
The system would have to deal with someone who understood it.
Castria was waiting.