Zen lay in the dark, staring up at the ceiling.
The excruciating fire in his shattered ribs had finally faded to a tight, heavy ache. It wasn’t natural healing.
Deep inside his chest, just beneath his own pulse, he could feel a faint, secondary heartbeat echoing through his veins... Maya’s Vitality tether.
It was a strange, invasive sensation, but it was keeping his physical tissues glued together.
"System," Zen commanded silently, his jaw clenched. "Drop the core inversion."
[Warning: Total Core Inversion cooldown has twelve hours remaining. Attempting to force a reversion early will result in severe mana-burn and potential organ trauma.]
"I don’t care," Zen thought coldly. "I’m not laying here as a crippled Low F-Rank for another minute. Just do it."
[Calculating... Override acknowledged. Brace for impact.]
Zen bit down hard on his own forearm to muffle his groan.
A sickening crack echoed inside his chest as his mana core violently twisted right-side up.
White-hot agony flared behind his eyes, but a second later, a rush of clean, stable energy flooded his limbs.
He didn’t need a soothsayer to tell he was back to being High F-Rank. He could feel it in his bones.
Zen let out a ragged, shaking breath, wiping cold sweat from his forehead.
It felt better, but it wasn’t enough. Not anymore.
The walls were closing in. The Inquisitor was hunting an ancient anomaly in his backyard, and Aurelia was quietly manipulating his finances from across the continent.
His cover as an invisible student was still holding, but it was hanging by a single, fraying thread. If things escalated, High F-Rank wouldn’t be enough to protect himself or his secrets before he got his soul fragnts.
He needed to level up... fast. And to do that, he needed Heart-Stones.
Zen reached down and pulled his heavy canvas bag onto the bed. He dug out his hacked GE burner drone and tapped the power rune.
He needed to find coordinates to a fresh, unmapped fracture zone near the city borders. He would sneak out, hit the dungeon and clear out as many as he could, then be back in this bed before sunrise.
The little silver ball floated into the air, its red light blinking on. Zen pulled up his encrypted terminal to access the local bounty boards.
The screen flickered.
Zen frowned, tapping the glass. The standard grey interface of the proxy network completely vanished, replaced by a wall of rapidly descending purple code.
"System, kill the connection," Zen ordered instantly. "We’re being traced."
[Warning: Proxy network overridden. Manual disconnect failed. Hardware is locked.]
The floating drone spun around, locking its cara lens directly onto Zen’s face as the red light shifted to a piercing, pale violet.
The purple code on Zen’s terminal dissolved, revealing a crystal-clear video feed. The screen showed a dark, ultra-modern room crowded with hundreds of glowing monitors. Sitting in the center, bathed in the violet light of the screens, was a silhouette.
A pair of glowing purple eyes stared directly through the cara and into Zen’s soul.
Nyx.
Zen let out a long, heavy sigh, slowly rubbing the bridge of his nose.
He didn’t reach for a weapon or try to smash the drone. He just stared back at the Spymaster of the Omni Domain, feeling a complicated, exhausting knot of old affection and deep resentnt tighten in his chest.
It had been five hundred years, but looking into those digital purple eyes, it felt like yesterday.
"You were always too clever for your own good," Nyx whispered softly, her synthetic voice dripping with an ancient, obsessive hunger. "Hiding behind an avatar and blinding the Vanguard caras in District 7 just so you could use your old parlor tricks in the dark... you really do dance in the shadows perfectly."
The video feed shifted to a high-resolution satellite map that zood in rapidly. It crossed the ocean, bypassed the Ares Domain border walls, and plunged straight into District 7.
Finally, it locked onto the wealthy residential ring, focusing directly on the blueprint of Valeria’s townhouse.
A pulsing violet dot appeared exactly over Zen’s bedroom.
"But you cannot hide from the network," Nyx said softly, the feed cutting back to her glowing eyes. "I built the network specifically to find you."
Zen leaned back against the headboard. She didn’t just suspect; she had him entirely boxed in.
"I see you’re still as dramatic as ever," Zen finally said aloud, his voice sounding profoundly and universally tired. "What is it you want, Nyx?"
"I want you," the Spymaster replied instantly, her voice cracking with emotion. "I want you back where you belong. With ."
A digital tir appeared on the screen: 24:00:00.
"You have twenty-four hours," Nyx stated, regaining her chilling authority. "Leave the Ares Domain. Cross the Omni Domain border. Co to on your own two feet."
"Nyx, I just got my ribs crushed today," Zen said, a hint of his old, familiar exasperation bleeding through. "And if I don’t?"
"If that tir reaches zero," Nyx said softly, ignoring his complaint entirely, "I will broadcast your exact GPS coordinates, your unmasked face, and your true identity to the global Vanguard feed. Valeria will not have to hunt for you. She will just tighten her grip. And then, I will bring my entire digital army to rip her city apart to get you back."
The purple eyes narrowed affectionately. "Do not be late, my love."
POP.
The burner drone hovering in the air violently sparked and short-circuited.
It dropped out of the air like a stone, hitting the floor and smoking. The encrypted terminal in Zen’s hand went completely black, the motherboard utterly fried.
Silence once again filled the bedroom.
Zen slowly stood up from the bed, running a hand through his hair.
In just a minute, the board hadn’t just changed... it had been flipped over and set on fire by his digital ex.
His plan to casually sneak out, raid a dungeon for Heart-Stones, and co back for morning classes was dead.
I need my soul fragnt, Zen thought, his eyes narrowing in the dark. I need to get it from her tonight.
He had to accelerate his tiline. He had to go out into the hallway, find her, seduce her, and do whatever it took to get close enough to her core to recover his old power.
He took a deep breath, ignoring the ache in his ribs, and walked quietly toward the heavy oak door of his bedroom to go find the Goddess of War.
He reached for the brass handle and gave it a push, but it wouldn’t budge.
Zen frowned. He pushed harder. The handle was locked solid, and a faint, glowing golden Aegis rune pulsed to life across the wood. The door was magically sealed.
"You’re up late."
A sweet, soft, and terrifyingly calm voice ca from the darkest corner of the bedroom.
Zen froze.
The hairs on the back of his neck stood straight up. Slowly, he turned around.
There, sitting in the plush velvet armchair in the corner of the room, was Valeria.
She wasn’t wearing her fake academy glasses anymore. The dim moonlight filtering through the window caught the terrifying, crimson glow of her eyes.
Resting casually in her lap was Zen’s old, leather-bound Imperial notebook... the one she had been secretly writing her observations in.
She tilted her head, and a dark, perfectly psychotic smile spread across her lips. "Going sowhere... my Emperor?"
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