Earth Orbit.
Flagship cruiser of Admiral Socrates.
Interrogation Hall.
Cold.
Here it's not just a temperature.
It's a living presence—
seeping into metal, into air, into bone.
The cold of intention.
Gray walls swallow sound,
as if the architecture itself refuses to be a witness.
No echoes.
No traces.
Only the silence where faith breaks.
The holographic light flickers—nervous, unsteady—
as though the lamps know something irreversible
is about to happen here.
In the center: six figures.
Prisoners.
Suspended in midair like marionettes,
held not by chains but by gravitic locks—
motionless,
stripped of all freedom.
Their bodies are still,
their breathing almost nonexistent.
Only their eyes are alive—bright with an inner fire.
They neither plead nor fear.
They are not here to surrender.
They carry something larger.
Their faith is not a shield.
It is a weapon.
The door opens.
A hiss—almost gentle.
He enters.
Admiral Socrates.
The man they call the Iron Will of Earth.
Tall. Imposing.
Each step a slow approach toward inevitability.
His uniform—black, immaculate.
His face—controlled, obsessed.
His eyes—direct, unyielding.
Officers straighten without command.
Socrates walks toward the prisoners.
Unhurried.
Measured.
"What god do you serve?" he asks.
Quietly.
No threat in his tone—
as if he were asking the time.
Which makes it far more terrifying.
One prisoner—the man in the center—slowly turns his head.
A face of carved bronze,
eyes like a navigator who has stared through death and charted it.
Captain Samon.
Helmsman of Mercury.
He speaks for them all.
"We serve Hanaris."
The name falls into the air
like a challenge.
Like a virus.
It hangs there—blasphemy etched into the code of reality.
Silence stretches, taut as a nerve.
Socrates doesn't answer.
He simply looks.
Long.
Like a surgeon before the first incision.
"Tonzel insists they'll renounce their faith," he says at last, turning to his aide.
"How do we initiate the process?"
The aide—short, precise, almost machine-like—
answers with digital frost in his voice.
"Trigger phrase:
'You no longer believe in the god Hanaris.'"
Socrates nods.
Steps forward.
"You no longer believe in the god Hanaris."
Instantly—like a switch thrown—
all six bodies go limp.
As if someone pulled the plug.
Eyes shut.
Breathing halts.
It's unclear—are they alive?
Or… simply rebooting?
Socrates's voice trembles for the first time.
"What just happened? Are they dead?"
"No, Admiral. This is a system restart.
Their link to Hanaris is severed.
Their cognitive cores have lost the sync command.
Sixty seconds until reinitialization."
Exactly one minute later, the first twitches.
Then another.
One by one, their eyes open.
But there's no faith left.
No light.
No inner fire.
Whatever drove them—
is gone.
What remains is… shell.
The aide steps to Samon, pulls back the collar of his uniform.
The Hanaris amulet is gone.
"Synchro-artifact destroyed.
They're no longer connected."
Socrates studies him.
Long.
Then, almost ceremonially,
he removes his own Kairus amulet.
He fastens it around Samon's neck.
The change is instant.
Samon's body straightens.
His eyes ignite again—
but with a different light.
Colder.
Alien.
"I believe in Kairus."
The hall freezes.
Even the holograms seem to dim.
Reality itself holds its breath.
Socrates steps back.
A near-smile touches his lips.
But it isn't joy.
It's engineering precision.
"This is an absolute success," he says.
"We haven't just cut the link.
We've rewritten it.
An adept of Hanaris now serves Kairus.
He is the first."
He signals to the officers.
One by one, they place amulets on the others.
Crystals flare.
Light shifts.
"I believe in Kairus."
"I believe in Kairus."
"I believe in Kairus."
A chorus.
Not blind.
Not fervent.
Mechanical.
Like a formula.
Like a virus.
This isn't the cry of faith.
It's code.
A rewritten identity.
A religion for a new generation.
Socrates watches.
His eyes glint—
not with emotion,
but with the clarity of a completed objective.
The war of gods is nearing its end.
And this time, the victors will not be the ones who pray.
But the ones who can reprogram belief itself.