The sky no longer truly existed on the surface.
What was still called "sky" was only a ceiling of ash, where colors died in cold shades. Shadows of nonexistent birds occasionally slid over the ruins, memories of a world erased. Everything here breathed the end: shattered roads, blackened skeletons of towers, carcasses of a past too ambitious.
Jun ran.
He had no weapon, just a worn blade he had ripped from a dead soldier weeks before. Burning breath in his lungs, he zigzagged between rubble, collapsed walls, broken glass, his steps pounding the poisoned earth in desperate rhythm. Behind him, a beast was panting. A creature of the ruins.
Not an Altered, no. A simple Deformed — fast, vicious, but stupid. Still, one bite was enough. The saliva of the Deformed could rot the mind, infuse the anomaly. And he didn't have a fragment yet. Nothing. Just his will.
He slipped on a damp slab, fell, and got up immediately. His leg was bleeding. He was doomed. And yet…
A noise. A whistle. Then nothing.
He turned around.
The beast lay there, its head shattered. A dagger planted in its eye socket.
Jun didn't understand at first. He looked around. Someone was watching him from the heights of a collapsed old building. A thin silhouette, dressed in black and soft leather. Glasses gleamed under the dim light.
But they vanished immediately.
He didn't wait. He ran on. Farther. Away from the beast, the shadow, the death.
Then he saw it.
A light.
An immense cracked glass sphere, suspended in the air a few meters above the ground, held by black roots planted in the soil. It beat faintly, like a sick heart. The Core of a Vestige.
A Seed.
His breath caught. He knew what it was. He had read old fragments of diaries, stolen forbidden words. A Seed Core: the gateway to an impossible world. To a Vestige.
He should never have approached it.
But he did.
Hours earlier, beneath kilometers of concrete and steel, in one of the noble cities of the Underground…
"You're crazy, Lina."
The voice was dry, sharp as a blade. Maya crossed her arms, her eyes hard beneath her drawn bangs. She still wore her study lab coat, stained with ink and dust. Facing her, Lina smiled.
"Not crazy. Curious."
"The surface is off-limits. There are penalties. And creatures. You don't even have a fragment."
Lina shrugged. Her blond hair shone under the pale lights of the access tunnel. Her outfit was practical, simple, yet elegant despite everything — noble fabric sewn to resemble those of the Scouts.
"Exactly. That's why I have to go. I've been told everything, Maya. About ruins, shadows, monsters… but never seen. Only heard. Don't you find that strange?"
Maya sighed. Long and heavy. Then she checked her bag and activated her energy scanning gauntlet.
"You owe me a bottle of wine if we don't die."
"Promise."
They passed through the security gate. A hiss. The air changed.
And the surface swallowed them.
The world above was gray. The winds carried whispers, screams from another age. Concrete cracked beneath their boots, collapsed structures forming labyrinths of silence.
Lina looked around with wide, amazed eyes. Maya observed every movement, every ripple, every anomaly. She caught faint resonances, ghostly echoes. Nothing stable, nothing activated.
"There," Lina said, pointing at a clearing between broken buildings.
A strange light pulsed. Maya frowned.
"A Core. A Seed. Active."
Lina smiled.
"Then let's go."
They approached.
Jun was already there, breathless, hand on his wound. He raised his head toward the sphere, fascinated. He had never seen a Core up close.
Then he heard footsteps. He turned. Two girls. Clean. Too clean. He guessed immediately: nobles. Girls from below.
One wore a long black coat, the other a lighter but tailored outfit. They stopped, wary when they saw him.
He froze too.
Silence.
"Who are you?" asked the girl with black hair (Maya).
"Jun." He pointed at the sphere. "I was chased. I took refuge here."
Lina stepped forward, curious eyes. She looked at his leg, his dirty clothes, his thin arms.
"You live here, on the surface?"
He nodded. His gaze remained hard. He didn't trust them. Who would trust nobles?
But Maya approached the sphere.
"It's unstable. Opening phase. If we enter, it's now or never."
Jun blinked.
"Wait… you intend to go in?"
Lina turned her head to him.
"And you? You plan to stay outside waiting for the beasts?"
A sudden noise, far away.
A Deformed's cry.
Jun gritted his teeth.
He looked at the sphere. Then at the two girls.
And he took a step toward them.
At that moment, the Seed Core opened. A deep cracking echoed. Filaments of light escaped from the cracks. The air vibrated, shattered. Reality warped around them.
The ground gave way.
And the three of them fell.
The air changed. It was neither hot nor cold, neither dry nor humid. Just… absent. As if the atmosphere had been swallowed by something invisible.
Jun opened his eyes.
The world was gone.
No ground beneath his feet. No sky above. Not even darkness. Nothing but him, suspended in absolute void.
He hadn't screamed. Hadn't even been scared. The moment his hand touched the surface of the Core — that organic sphere embedded in the ruins — everything had stopped. The creatures chasing him, the trembling ground, the burning breath in his throat… all had been sucked out of reality.
And now, he was here.
Alone.
A voice rang out, but not in his ears. It echoed inside his skull, vibrant, strange, as if coming from within his own consciousness.
"Jun. You stand before me. The Core."
He froze.
The voice was void of accent, of emotion. It did not ask a question. It stated a fact. He was here. And he would be judged.
"Before entering a Vestige… you must be weighed. Your mind. Your choices."
Jun said nothing. There was nothing to say.
Before him, a light was born. A simple white flame, suspended in the void. Slowly, it transformed. Two shapes took form, like ancient symbols made of light: two paths. Two outcomes.
Words accompanied them.
Choice 1: Sacrifice yourself.
Your body disappears. Your mind is erased.
But the planet will be saved. Humanity will survive.
Choice 2: Save yourself.
You remain alive.
But the rest of the world is doomed.
Jun frowned.
It was a test. He was sure of it. But it was not a logic game. It was not a moral dilemma posed to embarrass him. This choice, he felt it to his core, was real. The Core was not simply asking what he would say. It was probing what he was.
He thought of the surface.
The ruins, collapsed roofs, rust-eaten vehicle carcasses. The grimy, starving survivors, hunted.
He thought of his past.
His mother, dead of exhaustion working as a servant for nobles underground. Her hands, deformed by cold. Her voice, always gentle despite the pain.
He thought of the rich.
Those living underground, sheltered. The clans sending troops to "study" creatures, Vestiges. Those owning resources, water, warmth.
He thought of his dreams.
To change this world. To survive. To find a reason. To become someone.
The choice was there.
He stared only a few seconds. Then he raised his hand.
He touched the second.
Save yourself.
The symbol flickered, then vanished.
The light contracted.
And one last word appeared:
Why?
He could have lied.
He could have invoked fear, instinct, selfishness. He could have claimed he wanted to find a way to save both. But that wasn't it. That wasn't the truth.
So he answered.
"Because I haven't finished what I started."
Silence.
But this silence was no longer empty. It had weight. Density. The Core listened. The Core judged.
Then, the light exploded.
The void dissolved. Jun felt a force pull him downward, as if falling endlessly. Lights danced around him, shards of memory, indistinct whispers. He closed his eyes.
And landed.
Harshly.
The ground was hard. Mineral. He staggered upright, head heavy, lungs burning. He was back.
The room was immense, circular. At the center, the Core floated, imprisoned in a network of crystallized roots, as if nature itself had tried to seal it.
Jun was not alone.
Two other glowing circles extinguished beside him. And two people emerged slowly.
Two young women.
The first, tall, straight-backed, wearing a black coat adorned with a golden insignia, seemed to examine every detail of the place with an almost military precision. Her cold blue eyes shone with curious light. She did not seem surprised to be here.
The second, quieter, with brown hair tied in a tight braid, held a notebook in her hands. She quickly scribbled something before looking calmly at Jun.
Their eyes met.
No words were exchanged for several seconds. But there was a silent understanding. They had all been confronted with something. A choice, a truth. And they were still here.
The Core emitted a faint beat of light, like a living heart. The ground vibrated beneath their feet.
The voice returned, but this time it addressed them all:
"Three minds. Three Resonances. The entrance is open."
A wall vanished. A tunnel appeared, leading into pulsing darkness.
Jun straightened up. He knew nothing about these two girls. But he knew no one survived alone in a Vestige.
The first stepped forward. Her voice was calm.
"My name is Lina."
The other followed, putting away her notebook. She simply added,
"Maya."
Jun looked at them for a moment, then nodded.
"Jun."
Lina raised an eyebrow.
"You come from the surface?"
He nodded.
"I was running… from things. I stumbled upon the Core by chance."
Maya noted something in her notebook, then said,
"We should join forces. At least to understand where we fell."
Jun stared down the tunnel. He already sensed this was just the beginning. That this Vestige would break them or transform them.
He took a deep breath.
"All right."
They crossed the threshold together.
And the Vestige closed behind them.