Morning sunlight filtered weakly through the tall, dusty windows of Lira's lab. Outside, the city remained silent—shrouded in gray fog, as if the haze was draining both sound and life from the streets. But inside the lab, the atmosphere was completely different. The air was tense with electric anticipation, monitors flickered with static, random lines of code blinked across screens, and the low hum of the servers vibrated deep in the chest.
Arin Das leaned over his laptop, eyes red and sleepless. The events of the previous night kept replaying in his mind—Ryan's voice, the impossible but unforgettable whisper: "Arin… save me…"
Lira Han moved quickly across the consoles, her fingers flying over the keyboards like they had a mind of their own. Cameras and recorders were set up in every corner of the lab—monitoring signal interference, network anomalies, everything. Her face was calm, but her eyes betrayed a sharp intensity. The anxiety she felt inside was impossible to hide.
"Arin," she said without looking up, "I've checked all the logs—your phone, laptop, router. Nothing. No outside intrusion, no malware, no sign of hacking. Absolutely nothing."
Arin pressed his head in his hands. "Nothing? Lira, I'm not imagining this. I heard his voice—Ryan's. He died three days ago. And yet… I heard him. This is impossible!"
Lira turned slowly, her eyes piercing.
"Impossible doesn't mean it didn't happen, Arin. What contacted you isn't just using technology—it's manipulating your perception. And it feeds on your emotions—fear, grief, love."
Arin shivered. "You mean… it's alive?"
"In a sense, yes," Lira said calmly. "Folklore calls it a Nishi—the voice of the dead calling to the living. But now it's evolved. It doesn't need the spirit world anymore—it works through devices, networks, even memory. And it learns. Every time someone responds, it grows smarter."
Arin's mouth went dry. "You mean… it's hunting us."
"Exactly," Lira nodded. "And it chooses its prey carefully—those who had emotional bonds with the dead. That's why it came to you."
At that moment, a series of pings sounded from the monitors. Both jumped. A camera in the corner flickered on—showing the corridor outside the lab.
At first, nothing. Then slowly, a shadow moved across the hallway—tall, twisted, as if an invisible force was dragging it along.
"Did you see that?" Arin whispered.
Lira nodded. "It's testing us. Trying to scare us. Emotions are its weapon. Look at the pattern—all previous victims responded themselves. That's the trap."
Arin began pacing. "Then what do we do? We can't just sit here."
"No," Lira said. "We need to find how far it has reached. If it's in the network, there has to be a pattern. Every disappearance, every call—it's all data for it. We'll trace the algorithm."
They got to work. Arin fed the call logs into Lira's custom program—capable of analyzing frequency, duration, even the emotional tone of voices. Hour after hour, they combed through digital echoes, timestamps, signal traces. Slowly, a pattern emerged—Nishi targeted grief first, then trust, then curiosity.
Outside, the city remained indifferent. But through invisible threads in the network, it spread like a ghostly virus.
"Arin," Lira suddenly said, tension in her voice, "look at this."
On the screen, a city map displayed multiple incoming calls—all from phones of recently grieving individuals. Each trace converged to a single location—a mysterious digital node deep within the city.
"So… it's centralized?" Arin asked, voice frozen.
"Exactly," Lira said. "It's not random. Strategic. From there, it collects emotional data, generates voices, and chooses its next target. And…it's growing."
A heaviness settled in Arin's chest. Every friend, neighbor, relative—anyone who recently lost someone—could be the next target.
Then a soft ping from the phone on the table.
The screen displayed—Ryan.
Arin froze.
"Don't answer that!" Lira shouted, but her hand reached toward the phone too—drawn by fear and an impossible curiosity.
The ringtone blared loudly this time. Someone—or something—was calling desperately.
"Arin…" the voice. Just like Ryan's—soft, trembling, but alive. "Help… me…"
Tears welled up in Arin's eyes. His chest trembled.
"I'm coming, Ryan… you—"
Static cut through.
The sound distorted. Multiple voices, laughter, crying, screams—all fused into a monstrous roar.
Arin dropped the phone.
Monitors began flashing. The shadow in the camera distorted, the geometry of the room seemed to warp.
Lira screamed, "It's here! It's reached the boundary. Not just in the network—it's entering reality!"
Outside, the city moved on—the cars, the lights, the indifferent world.
But inside the lab, reality itself seemed to fracture. Walls breathed, air thickened.
After a long while, both collapsed into chairs—exhausted. Fear, fatigue, anxiety—all mingled into a cold void.
Nishi was no longer just data—it had become part of their lives. It fed on their fear, on their weakness, and survived.
"We have to go to its node," Lira whispered. "That's the source. Until we find it… it won't stop."
Arin nodded slowly, still haunted by terror.
"Let's go. We'll find it. I don't know if we can stop it… but we'll try."
Deep within the city, a familiar, distorted voice echoed through th
e electric waves once again—soft, warped, recognizable—
"Arin… I'm watching you…"