The first rain came three days after the pulse changed.
It wasn't the usual kind — not the soft, scheduled mist that the city's weather engines released to mimic nature. This rain fell, raw and uneven, cascading down in sudden sheets that hammered the rooftops with erratic rhythm. It startled birds, bent glass leaves, and sent people running for cover like children discovering surprise for the first time.
Seo Jin stood at the edge of the balcony, his hands on the railing, watching the droplets scatter through the aurora-lit air. The hum of the Core had changed; he could feel it in the marrow of his bones. No longer constant. No longer precise. Sometimes it skipped. Sometimes it sighed.
Sometimes… it sounded like it was listening.
Li Ran appeared behind him, towel slung over one shoulder, a faint smile tugging at his lips.
"Still standing in the rain like a tragic poet?"
