The clock in the research lab struck midnight, but Arven Soltaire had long since stopped noticing time. His sharp eyes traced the glowing data projected across multiple screens, streams of calculations running like rivers of light.
Eighteen years old. Barely a man. Yet already called Professor—a title earned not by honor, but by sheer intellect and manipulation.
Outside, Tokyo's skyline shimmered with neon, drowning the stars. But through the massive telescope on the rooftop observatory, Arven had seen something far more unsettling than the city's artificial glow.
"Habitable... and yet impossible," he muttered, fingers tapping impatiently against the desk.
For weeks, his simulations returned the same result. Mars, Europa, Kepler-452b—their atmospheres, gravities, temperatures—mathematically perfect for colonization. And yet every model collapsed into failure the moment he projected human survival beyond Earth.
As if the universe itself whispered: Stay away.
Arven leaned back in his chair, a sly smile tugging at his lips.
"Either the cosmos is lying… or someone made sure we never leave this planet."
His phone buzzed. A message from his colleague at the university:
> Professor Soltaire, your paper on planetary habitation was rejected again. They say your conclusions are… unrealistic. Perhaps focus on something more conventional?
Arven chuckled softly. "Conventional? What a dull word." He closed the message without replying.
To the outside world, he was just another eccentric genius. To Arven, the truth was simple: every institution was blind, and only he had the audacity to peel back the sky's curtain.
As he adjusted the telescope once more, a sudden flicker rippled across the feed. Static. Distortion. And then—a voice. Low, mechanical, almost inhuman, bleeding through the radio frequencies.
> "You… cannot… leave."
Arven froze. The smile returned, sharper this time.
"Interesting," he whispered.
For the first time, the prodigy felt the thrill of danger—proof that his forbidden calculations were no longer just numbers. Something out there had noticed him.
And Arven Soltaire never played fair when curiosity was involved.
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