The morning air was the same as it always had been: crisp, slightly biting, and filled with the hum of the city waking up. Dioka and Guakulia sat on the roof of an old, abandoned building, legs dangling over the edge, sharing a pack of street snacks they'd "borrowed" from the corner shop.
"You ever think," Dioka started, smirking as he tossed a chip into the air and caught it with his mouth, "that everything could just… explode tomorrow?"
Guakulia didn't look up from the little device he was tinkering with. "You mean metaphorically, or are you just trying to get me to worry so you can watch me panic?"
Dioka laughed, a low, rolling sound that echoed across the empty alley below. "Maybe both. Life's boring, man. Needs a little oomph."
Guakulia rolled his eyes. "You're going to be the death of me before anything else."
For now, the city was ordinary. Streets crowded with commuters, neon lights flickering, the scent of street food and gasoline mixing in a strangely comforting haze. Nothing hinted at what was coming.
Then came the first ripple.
A subtle blue-white shimmer ran along the horizon. It was so faint that most people didn't notice it, dismissing it as a glitch in their vision. But Dioka and Guakulia did.
"Uh… that's new," Guakulia said, voice calm, but his eyes scanning the horizon like a predator.
Dioka grinned. "Ohhh… feels like trouble. Wanna go say hi?"
The shimmer grew. The hum of the city changed, almost like the atmosphere itself had a heartbeat. Birds froze mid-flight, cars stalled, neon signs flickered violently. The air tasted electric.
Then the world cracked.
Not like a sound or an explosion, but like reality itself had split a hair too thin. The pulse was everywhere at once—silent, blue-white, impossible to ignore. People screamed. Windows shattered. The streets convulsed like they were liquid. And then… the change began.
Some humans screamed as their bodies contorted unnaturally, muscles twisting, bones shifting, eyes glowing with unknown energy. Others—fewer—stood motionless, eyes wide, untouched but aware that the world had rewritten itself.
Dioka and Guakulia were different. While the chaos unfolded, they moved almost casually, exchanging looks, smirks, and a few sarcastic remarks.
"You feel that?" Dioka asked, cracking his knuckles. "Like… really strong weirdness."
Guakulia's fingers danced over his device, scanning the energy patterns. "It's not a typical mutation wave. The system is… broken here. Whatever this is, it doesn't apply rules to us."
And it didn't.
As the city around them descended into anarchy, supernovas of all kinds began to rise. Ordinary humans mutated, their abilities raw, unpredictable, dangerous. Some became monstrous, some ethereal, some frighteningly clever. Power surged like a tide, and the world's hierarchy began to form in real-time.
But the duo didn't need to follow it.
While everyone else struggled to survive or impose order, Dioka and Guakulia moved through the chaos with laughter and mischief. A collapsing building? Sidestepped with a grin. A newly risen supernova attacking civilians? Redirected with a flick of instinctive power. The world was burning, but they were already… different. Untouchable. Anomalies.
"You know," Dioka said as they leapt across a crumbling street, "this is the kind of Monday I like."
Guakulia smirked, adjusting the straps on his bag, "You mean the kind where we literally survive the end of the world and still have time for breakfast?"
Dioka laughed again, a wild, untamed sound that seemed almost in harmony with the chaos around them.
The Shattering wasn't just the rise of supernovas—it was the awakening of the two anomalies. The world was fracturing into lanes, factions, and rules. But they were untethered, unconcerned, a storm laughing at the edges of reality itself.
And as the sun set behind a city now unrecognizable, Dioka and Guakulia stood together amidst the ruin, grinning like idiots, knowing one thing for sure:
The game had started.