The bookstore was silent.
The walls had stopped shaking. The glass door no longer trembled in its hinges. But the air itself felt broken, as if something invisible had cracked and leaked from another layer of reality. The corpse of the intruder lay in a mess of limbs and armor, twitching faintly as black mist leaked from its wounds.
Rudra stood over it, breathing quietly, his school uniform now slightly stained on the hem with blood — but not his own.
His eyes weren't scared.
Not anymore.
> He had just summoned a comic book character.
Not in a dream.
Not as a hallucination.
But here. On Earth. In full, violent reality.
And the worst part?
It hadn't felt unnatural.
It had felt… right.
---
The Zix Core pulsed faintly inside his chest.
> [Summon Duration Complete.]
[Combat Feedback Stored.]
[Dimensional Stability Fluctuation: 14.2%]
[You have drawn attention.]
"I know," Rudra said softly, answering the system aloud as he knelt down beside the corpse. He didn't touch it. Just observed.
The masked man wasn't just some local punk with a cursed artifact.
His armor was organic, the kind that merged with the user's aura — forbidden even among sanctioned awakened guilds. The weapon he'd used wasn't steel; it was obsidian runed in a forgotten script. His eyes, even in death, carried the afterimage of a true-level awakening.
Which meant… he'd been sent.
> Someone had sensed the summoning.
Someone had dispatched a killer within seconds.
And yet Rudra had survived.
He clenched his jaw and stood, glancing around the store. Thankfully, no one had entered. The summoning had warped the building's dimensional frequency, temporarily locking it from mundane interference.
A strange side effect of the Zix Core: it isolated reality when necessary.
---
> [You are calm.]
The voice of the system — flat, but warmer than before — echoed in his mind.
Rudra didn't reply at first.
He pulled out his phone, wiped the blood from the edge, and checked the time.
5:52 PM.
His parents would expect him back within the hour.
"Because panic is useless," Rudra finally said aloud. "I did what I had to do. I survived."
> [You summoned a fictional being into reality. This is a Tier-4 breach of natural law. This world is not built to handle such interference. You will be hunted.]
"I was already going to be hunted," Rudra said, turning toward the back door. "That's the cost of having power."
> [Not just power.]
[The Zix Core is awakening a lost function: Summoning from Unwritten Realities. You are reaching beyond the Multiverse.]
He stopped at the door.
"…Unwritten realities?"
> [Yes.]
[Where ideas become blueprints. Where stories once dreamed live. Your mind bridges that gap. You are no longer just a host of avatars. You are a Creator's Echo.]
Rudra's heart skipped once.
A strange chill crept down his back.
For the first time in days… he felt overwhelmed.
Not from fear.
But from the sheer scope.
"This is too early," he murmured. "I haven't even unlocked the elf. The barbarian. The merchant avatar…"
> [Correct. But your control is accelerating faster than the design.]
[Ratri's loyalty, Kaalkrit's obedience, the duality of the second realm—they've all boosted system growth.]
[You are adapting too quickly.]
Rudra opened the back door and stepped into the dusky alley.
"I don't care," he said firmly, stepping over a spilled crate of books. "If power comes early, I'll shoulder it. If enemies come sooner… I'll kill them sooner."
> [Rudra.]
The system called his name for the first time.
He stopped walking.
> [You summoned Bloodfang. You connected a fictional realm to reality. That… was not in the original blueprint.]
"Are you warning me?"
> [I'm not warning you. I'm asking you.]
[Why did you choose him?]
That made Rudra pause.
He leaned against the cold wall of the building, watching a moth flutter under the alley's flickering lamp.
"…Bloodfang is simple," he said. "He's raw. Instinctive. He doesn't question orders. Doesn't fear death. He just does what must be done."
> [You felt aligned.]
"Yes."
A short silence.
> [Do you desire destruction?]
"No," Rudra said, shaking his head slowly. "I desire… freedom."
He turned his gaze upward, where stars were starting to flicker into view.
"All my life, I've seen people act like they know who they are. What they can be. But I always felt like I was behind a glass wall. Watching. Waiting."
He closed his eyes.
"Now… the glass is gone."
---
Meanwhile — Elsewhere on Earth
Beneath a temple carved into the underside of a dormant mountain, a circle of robed figures sat in ritual formation around a floating crystal.
The crystal had turned black.
One of them — a woman with a metallic veil across her eyes — spoke first.
"The boundary is pierced."
Another — a thin old man with no mouth, only scars where lips should be — whispered mentally.
"The Zix Core has activated Summon-Type."
A third voice — young, male, arrogant — growled, "So? We've stopped awakenings before. He's just a boy."
"No," the woman said. "This one… is more than awakened."
She reached her hand into the crystal.
Blood spilled from her fingers immediately, but she did not pull away.
"He has altered fate."
---
Back in the city, Rudra entered his home silently.
The lights were off in the living room. His father's shoes were missing — meaning he'd gone on a night patrol. His mother's soft hum echoed from the kitchen.
He slipped in, washed his hands, and sat at the table.
His mother brought him lentils, rice, and warm vegetable curry.
She smiled gently.
"You're late again," she said. "School project?"
Rudra nodded. "Library work."
She didn't ask more.
She never did.
But her eyes lingered a moment too long on his hands.
The slight red stain beneath his nails.
Then she looked away.
"I warmed your portion," she said, "in case you came back tired."
"I'm not tired," he said softly.
"I know."
She didn't elaborate. She simply walked back to the kitchen.
---
As he ate, Rudra felt the Zix Core hum with a rhythm that wasn't mechanical.
It was almost…
Alive.
> [Would you like to draw a second summon?]
[Tier-C Available – Character Suggestion: Ravenmarch (Arcane Gunslinger)]
[Type: Mid-Range, Tactical, Support Summon – 60 Seconds Cooldown]
Rudra wiped his mouth calmly.
"Yes," he whispered.
> [Memory Sample Needed.]
He closed his eyes and focused — remembering the old comic cover. Ravenmarch standing on the cliff, holding dual pistols that shimmered with glyphs, his coat fluttering in magical wind.
The page glowed in his mind.
And then—
The contract began to form.