With the apocalypse caused by the falling debris that birthed the Shadow Eaters, the human race stood at the very edge of extinction. Cities fell overnight, the government collapsed, and hope itself became a scarce resource. Yet in that very moment when humanity was about to be wiped out, something else was born.
The Marked.
The Marked were certain individuals who had been cursed with the Mark; a strange, sigil-like tattoo that manifested on the forearm of each person it contacted. At first, the Mark was treated as a horrifying disease that slowly drained the life force of its host, leeching vitality from their very being, making them appear increasingly shrunken, paler with each passing day, and visibly weaker, death slowly claiming them inch by mere inch.
However, when the Mark fully manifested, It granted the humans who survived its initial stages the strength needed to stand against the nightmarish hordes of Shadow Eaters. Allowing them reclaim fragments of the world that had been swallowed by the darkness of the plague at that time.
It was through these individuals that humanity managed to form factions which were the organized strongholds of resistance that prevented total annihilation of mankind.
Even so, the Mark was never truly seen as a blessing, instead It was referred to as a curse, and for good reasons.
The moment the Mark completed its manifestation, it sent the soul of its bearer into a realm known as the Fallen Realm of gods: A forsaken place where ancient deities had perished and left behind cruel trials in which to return to the human world, one had to complete them all.
While Some survived, unfortunately, many did not as the odds of survival were painfully slim.
And for someone like Steven who had no family, no faction backing, no influence or protection, just a poor orphan scraping by at the bottom of society with debts to his name, his odds were even slimmer.
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After showing his Mark to his landlord and the other two, the officials had been contacted as procedure demanded, and after a few minutes, they arrived.
Men dressed in high-ranking green army uniforms, holding state-of-the-art weaponry Steven had never dreamt of seeing in his life, removed him from the apartment forcefully despite him not resisting.
They secured him like he was some kind of rare artifact, guiding his every step with excessive caution. Or perhaps it was the opposite, they didn't see him as an artifact at all, but rather as a ticking time bomb ready to explode at any moment.
Still, he did not resist, allowing them to take him from the apartment. And surprisingly, there was a number of people outside watching the extraction, Dozens of which were members of the press with cameras raised as they sought to make the headlines with Steven's pitiful state, while others were mere onlookers drawn by fear and curiosity.
He frowned further at this. 'Already seems like a funeral,' he thought pitifully, following the soldiers toward a heavily secured military van parked just outside the apartment complex.
The moment he stepped inside, he was strapped tightly to a metal chair positioned at the center of the van. His wrists and ankles bound firmly to the armrests and legs of the chair, restraining him completely. It felt less like transportation now and more like containment. As though he was some kind of dangerous experiment that had escaped and was now being retrieved.
Well…
He had expected this much, at the very least.
After confirming something with their superiors through their communicators, the van doors were shut with a heavy clang, the engine roaring to life, as they began moving, shipping Steven off to who knew where.
The drive lasted roughly thirty minutes until eventually, the van slowed before coming to a full stop, alerting Steven wherever they were taking him to, they were already there.
Soon enough Several guards entered the back, uncoupling him from the chair without delay. Then he was guided forward until they reached a small, square room made entirely of transparent material.
Glass? Or at least something that looked like it.
They escorted him to an entrance that seamlessly opened along the structure's surface. Once Steven stepped inside, the entrance sealed shut behind him, vanishing as though it had never existed at all.
Steven scanned his surroundings carefully.
Apparently he was in a transparent cage that stood in the middle of a larger room filled with numerous computer systems, blinking monitors, and strange machinery he had no understanding of. And the walls around him were no ordinary glass, they seemed more durable and thick, and without fail would be impenetrable to some extent since it was a containment cell designed for a marked such as himself.
His gaze shifted to the soldiers that had escorted him here retreating back to the van. They stepped inside and in the blink of an eye, the vehicle vanished into thin air gone without a trace.
At this Steven's tired eyes blinked a few times as though he had seen a ghost, finding it hard to believe that had been real.
Steven Let his gaze linger there for a moment before breaking off to study the larger room he was in. Seeing along one side of the wall shelves stacked with advanced weaponry, the same kind the soldiers had carried earlier. Other walls were lined with machinery that hummed quietly with an unknown purpose.
And then... He noticed him.
A man sat casually on a metallic chair, holding a checklist in one hand and in the other a pen pressed onto his lips as he thought. His posture on his chair rather a relaxed one as though this was nothing more than another mundane task.
Steven grunted softly at the sight, suppressing the urge to speak feeling curious at just who this man was but he remained silent, choosing to simply observe the enigmatic man carefully.