CHAPTER 195 — WHEN THE SYSTEM FOUGHT BACK OPENLY
By nightfall, the city no longer felt divided quietly.
The tension that had been growing beneath the surface for days had finally risen high enough to be seen in the open, not through violence or visible destruction, but through the atmosphere itself. Elena felt it everywhere now, in the strained silence hanging between conversations, in the unnatural pauses before people responded to instructions they once followed automatically, in the way entire crowds moved with hesitation instead of unconscious rhythm. The city was still functioning, but it no longer trusted the force guiding it.
And the system could feel that trust slipping away.
