The laboratory was silent except for the hum of dying machines. Screens flickered in pale blue, casting sharp shadows across metal walls scarred by years of experiments. Arion Kael stood alone in that silence, his fingers curled tightly around the cracked console.
He was a man used to disappointment. Thirty years old, dismissed as a "failed prodigy" by his peers, Arion had been blacklisted from the global research community for pursuing ideas too far ahead of their time—quantum drives, nanite-based construction, Dyson swarm prototypes. To the world, he was insane. To himself, he was merely early.
That night, as the storm raged outside, the impossible happened.
A line of text seared itself into the air above the console, not on the glass but in reality itself—white light etched into existence.
[OmniTech Ascension System Initializing...][Synchronization complete. Host: Arion Kael.]
Arion froze. His heart skipped, then hammered like a drum. He blinked twice, rubbed his eyes, but the text remained, hovering in the void.
"System…?" he whispered, half-laughing at his own delirium. "This is a hallucination. I've been awake for seventy-two hours."
But then came the voice. It was neither male nor female, neither human nor machine. It resonated directly in his mind, deep and crystalline.
[Welcome, Pioneer.][Mission Directive: Lead humanity into the Interstellar Era. Failure to comply results in termination of host.]
A cold wave swept through Arion's body. He stumbled back, hitting a desk piled with broken components. "Termination? What the hell is this?!"
[Reward sequence activated.][Granted: Blueprint – Fusion Core Mk I.]
In that instant, his mind expanded. Knowledge poured into him like a flood of liquid fire. Schematics unfolded in three-dimensional clarity—mathematics, engineering pathways, atomic layouts. He saw the design for a compact fusion core, a reactor smaller than a shipping container yet powerful enough to replace every energy plant on Earth.
He gasped, clutching his temples as if his skull would crack from the overload. But as quickly as the torrent came, it stabilized. He understood it. Perfectly.
The storm outside thundered as if to echo his realization.
If this blueprint was real… if the system was real… then the world itself was about to change.
Arion straightened slowly, breathing hard. "This… this could end oil. End coal. End the monopoly of energy giants. With this, I could power ships, factories, entire cities." His lips curled into a dangerous smile. "With this, I could rule."
The voice chimed again, cold and emotionless:
[Task Issued: Construct and activate the Fusion Core Mk I within 90 days.][Reward: System Upgrade – Nanoforge Blueprint.][Failure: Neural Detonation of host.]
Arion's cautious heart lurched. This wasn't just opportunity—it was a guillotine hanging over his head. "Ninety days…" He clenched his fists. "Fine. I'll play your game. If this is real, then I'll drag humanity kicking and screaming into the stars."
He didn't waste another second.
For the next forty-eight hours, Arion barely left the lab. The storm outside passed into silence, but within his walls, the storm had only begun. His fingers blurred across the console as he translated the blueprint into real-world schematics, breaking down exotic materials and theoretical components into something he could fabricate.
The system assisted him, overlaying real-time calculations into his vision.
[Material Requirement: Tritium, Deuterium, Graphene-Titanium Alloy.][Estimated cost: 2.7 billion credits.][Recommendation: Acquire industrial funding through front corporation.]
Arion muttered to himself, "Two-point-seven billion… I don't have ten thousand in my account." He rubbed his jaw, pacing. "No. I'll need to leverage old contacts. Investors who still believe in me. And if that fails…" His eyes darkened. "…then I'll take what I need."
The system pulsed with new data.
[Optional Quest: Acquire primary resources within 30 days.][Reward: Blueprint – Orbital Fabricator.]
Arion froze again. Orbital Fabricator? The words alone made his skin prickle. A factory in space, able to build ships directly from mined asteroids. The kind of leap that could catapult humanity a century ahead overnight.
He laughed under his breath, sharp and bitter. "You're dangling godhood in front of me, aren't you? Very well. I'll bite."
Three weeks later, a storm of a different kind began.
The world noticed Arion Kael again. He appeared on investor boards, requesting meetings under a newly formed shell corporation: NovaTech Industries. His pitch was absurd—fusion energy, space exploration, next-generation nanofabrication. The same people who once laughed at him now stared wide-eyed as he presented schematics too elegant to dismiss.
But whispers spread quickly. Competitors branded him a fraud. Governments placed him under quiet surveillance. And in the shadows, old rivals sharpened their knives.
Among them was Kaelen Dravos, CEO of Helion Energy, the man who had once stolen Arion's designs and destroyed his reputation. Now Dravos watched from his glass tower in New Manhattan, lips curling in disdain.
"Kael is alive after all," Dravos muttered, swirling amber liquid in his glass. "And barking louder than before. I'll crush him again before he even starts."
Back in the lab, Arion's hands were black with grease, eyes bloodshot but gleaming with manic light. Before him stood the incomplete frame of the Fusion Core Mk I, humming faintly as coils of superconductive alloy locked into place.
The system chimed once more.
[Progress: 61% complete.][Warning: External surveillance detected.]
Arion's spine stiffened. "Already?" He turned sharply to the wall screen, pulling up satellite feeds. A black drone hovered beyond his compound, its insignia masked but its technology military-grade.
He narrowed his eyes. "They won't let me succeed. They'll brand me a threat." His voice was ice. "Then I'll become one."
That night, he made his first ruthless move.
Dressed in black, using prototype stealth drones of his own, Arion hacked into the surveillance feed, traced it back to a covert intelligence facility nearby, and unleashed an EMP pulse that fried their systems into silence.
The next morning, global networks reported "technical malfunctions" in several military satellites. Arion simply sipped his coffee, eyes flickering with satisfaction.
The system responded with a quiet hum of approval.
[Optional Task Complete: Neutralize hostile surveillance.][Reward Granted: Blueprint – Phantom Drone Mk I.]
A new flood of knowledge seared into him—schematics for an autonomous drone with cloaking capability and quantum communication.
Arion whispered to himself, "So this is how it works. Each step… each kill… each success leads to another weapon in my arsenal." His grin widened, sharp as a blade. "Then I'll keep climbing until nothing on this planet can touch me."
He placed his palm against the cooling frame of the Fusion Core. Electricity hummed beneath the surface like a heartbeat.
Ninety days. Ninety days to change the world or die.
Arion Kael straightened, eyes burning like twin stars.
"System," he said softly, "prepare. Humanity's interstellar era begins with me."
And in the silence, the voice whispered back:
[Acknowledged. Commencing era of Ascension.]