The lecture hall smelled like stale coffee and nervous ambition. I slid into my usual seat near the back — invisible, unnoticed. Perfect. I liked it that way.
Eyes flickered my way from time to time, but no one dared come closer. They saw me as a ghost drifting through Veneto University's halls, a puzzle wrapped in silence. That suited me just fine.
I didn't need friends here. I didn't need distractions. All I needed was focus.
People didn't speak to me unless they had to. Some found me cold. Some found me intimidating. I didn't care. At Veneto University — the most prestigious tech university in Europe — everyone had something to prove. I just happened to be better at proving it quietly.
And then he arrived.
The air in the room shifted.
Theo Lucenti stepped in like he was walking onto a runway, late as always, wearing black-on-black and an expression that said, I don't need to try — I already won.
He didn't look at me. Not at first.
But I felt his presence like a voltage spike. And when his eyes did flick my way — blue, amused, sharp — I held the stare for exactly one beat too long.
History dripped between us. Not spoken, not acknowledged. Just silent battles — competing research papers, stolen project leads, sabotaged presentations that no one could ever quite prove.
He dropped into a chair two rows ahead of me, like a throne. Slouched, relaxed, too calculated to be careless.
Lucenti was a problem.
He was also… interesting.
Professor Gallo finally entered, flanked by two assistants holding hard drives and a thick stack of NDA forms. That caught my attention.
"Welcome," Gallo said, voice smooth like a salesman. "First day of the Master's program. I won't sugarcoat it. Half of you won't make it to the second semester."
Murmurs rippled.
"I see familiar faces. And familiar rivals." His gaze flicked toward me, then Theo. "You know who you are."
I leaned back, arms folded. My expression was unreadable. It always was.
As Gallo launched into an explanation of a year-long cybersecurity simulation — an academic tournament dressed like a war game — I reached for my phone.
No one noticed. They never do.
I opened an app that didn't exist, typed a string of code I hadn't shared with another soul, and slipped into the dark.
A secure node blinked alive.
Anonymous. Encrypted. Airless.
A message was waiting.
FROM: Unknown "The supreme art of war is to subdue the enemy without fighting."
I stared at it. No one knew my direct handle — unless I let them.
The quote was from The Art of War, my favorite book. Too specific to be random. Too familiar to be harmless.
Carefully placed words. Designed to provoke. But who would dare?
No name. No traceable signature.
Only one would be that bold. That precise. That reckless.
Lux.
We only communicated in quotes. Everyone felt like a threat or a memory.
He knocked my servers offline once — a careless mistake. He also injected malware that encrypted all my research files, leaving only one message:
"If you know the enemy and know yourself, you need not fear the result of a hundred battles."
So naturally, I deleted the ransomware toolkit he spent years building.
And sent one reply:
"You should've stayed in the shadows."
That was nearly six months ago.
Since then, silence.
Until now.
My fingers hovered over the reply key. I didn't send one.
Let him wonder.
Let him sweat.
Lux had been quiet for months. That alone was suspicious. In the underground forums, whispers had started again — about the ghost who once ruled the darknet, now dethroned and licking his wounds in silence.
But I knew better. Quiet wasn't absence. Quiet meant movement.
And if Lux was watching again, that meant something was coming.
Back in the lecture hall, Gallo clicked through slides outlining the competition's structure — layers of challenges, simulations, hacks, attacks, counterattacks, all staged as a digital wargame across custom-built networks. The simulation wouldn't just test skill. It would test strategy, deception, and control.
I could do this in my sleep.
And I would've — alone.
Then the projector changed.
PROJECT 1 PAIRINGS – SIMULATION ENTRY PHASE
Rows of names flashed across the screen, pairing students into hacker vs. defender teams for the first round.
I scanned the list.
Then stopped.
LORELEI NOCHNAYA — THEO LUCENTI
My spine stiffened.
No. No, no, no.
This wasn't just inconvenient. This was dangerous.
Partnered with Lucenti?
I couldn't decide whether the universe was laughing… or setting a trap.
A flicker of heat brushed the side of my face. I didn't have to look to know who it was.
Theo had turned slightly in his seat. Not enough to draw attention. Just enough so that when his eyes met mine again, they lingered.
The corner of his mouth lifted.
It wasn't a smirk. Not quite.
It was knowledge. Or curiosity. Or maybe something in between.
I narrowed my eyes, then looked away.
If only he knew who he'd just been paired with.
If only I knew who he was.