Neo-Tokyo High School — 8:00 AM
The morning sun hit the classroom windows, blindingly bright.
Kazuki sat at his desk, staring at a history textbook. To him, the room was vibrating.
He could hear the scratching of twenty pencils on paper. He could hear the fluorescent lights buzzing like angry hornets. He could hear the heartbeat of the girl sitting three rows ahead.
Thump-thump. Thump-thump.
It was deafening.
[ADVICE: SENSORY INPUT AT 120%. SUGGEST DAMPENING PROTOCOL.]
"Quiet," Kazuki whispered to the voice in his head, pulling the collar of his uniform jacket higher.
The Velocity Core was active beneath his clothes. It felt like a second skin of cold water, constantly shifting. He had to wear long sleeves and gloves to hide the silver metallic sheen of his skin.
"Mr. Tanaka?"
Kazuki snapped his head up. The movement was too fast—a blur.
The teacher, Mr. Sato, was frowning at him.
"I asked you a question, Kazuki. The Treaty of 2030. What was the primary cause?"
Kazuki looked at the teacher's mouth. It was moving in slow motion.
Wwwwhhhhaaaattttt... wwwwaaaaassss... thhhheeeee...
Kazuki blinked. He had to consciously wait for the sound to reach his ears.
"Resource scarcity," Kazuki answered. "Specifically, the collapse of the silicon trade routes."
The class stared. Kazuki Tanaka was a C-average student. He usually slept through history.
Mr. Sato raised an eyebrow. "Correct. But please, try to look less... caffeinated."
Kazuki slumped back in his chair.
His phone buzzed in his pocket. A text message.
Unknown Number (Renji): Stop tapping your foot. You're vibrating the floor. You're going to destabilize the building's foundation.
Kazuki looked down. His foot was tapping at super-speed—a blur of motion invisible to the naked eye, but the floor tiles were cracking slightly.
He stopped immediately.
Gymnasium — 11:30 AM
"Dodgeball!" the gym coach yelled, blowing his whistle.
Kazuki groaned. This was the worst possible scenario.
He stood at the back line, trying to look invisible.
Across the court stood Daiki, the school's star athlete and Kazuki's personal tormentor since middle school.
"Hey, Zombie!" Daiki yelled, bouncing a red rubber ball. "You look tired. Want a nap?"
Kazuki didn't respond. He just wanted to go home and eat another nutrient brick.
The whistle blew. Game on.
Balls flew across the court. To Kazuki, they looked like red balloons floating in helium.
He lazily stepped to the left. A ball drifted past his ear.
He leaned to the right. Another ball missed his chest.
Daiki grew frustrated. He grabbed two balls.
"Stand still!" Daiki wound up and threw with everything he had.
[THREAT DETECTED. PROJECTILE INBOUND.]
[TRAJECTORY: CRANIAL IMPACT.]
[AUTOMATED DEFENSE: ENGAGED.]
"No!" Kazuki thought. "Don't!"
But the suit was faster than his thoughts.
As the ball flew toward his face, Kazuki's hand shot up.
He didn't just catch it. He snatched it.
The friction of his hand moving at Mach 1 against the rubber ball created a flash of heat.
POP.
The ball didn't just stop; it burst.
Kazuki stood there, holding a smoking, shredded piece of red rubber.
Smoke curled from his glove.
The entire gym went silent.
Daiki dropped the other ball. His mouth hung open. "Dude... did you just... pop it?"
Kazuki stared at the ruined ball. "I... uh... cheap manufacturing?"
Daiki's face turned red. He felt humiliated. He charged across the centerline.
"You think you're funny, Tanaka?"
Daiki shoved Kazuki's chest.
Mistake.
To Kazuki, the shove felt like a feather.
But the suit interpreted the physical contact as "Close Quarters Combat."
[COUNTER-MEASURE: DISARM AND NEUTRALIZE.]
Kazuki's body reacted on autopilot.
He grabbed Daiki's wrist, spun, and threw him.
It was a judo throw executed at superhuman speed.
WHOOSH.
Daiki flew.
He didn't just trip; he launched. He sailed fifteen feet through the air, clearing the heads of the other students, and slammed into the padded wall on the other side of the gym.
THUD.
Daiki slid down the wall, groaning.
Silence. Total silence.
Every student stared at Kazuki with wide eyes. Kazuki looked at his hands, horrified.
"Tanaka!" the coach screamed, running over.
"I didn't mean to!" Kazuki stammered. "He just... he slipped!"
Suddenly, the gym doors banged open.
A man in a grey janitor's jumpsuit walked in, pushing a mop bucket. He looked bored.
It was Renji.
Renji walked right into the middle of the chaos. He looked at the groaning bully, then at the terrified Kazuki.
He pulled a fire alarm lever on the wall.
RRRRIIIIINNNNNGGGGG!
"Fire drill," Renji announced calmly, though the alarm was deafening. "Everyone out. Orderly fashion. Let's go."
The confusion broke the tension. Students started filing out, whispering and looking back at Kazuki.
The coach glared at Kazuki. "Principal's office. Now."
As Kazuki walked past the "Janitor," Renji muttered under his breath, barely moving his lips.
"You have terrible trigger discipline, kid. Meet me on the roof in ten minutes. We need to talk about your 'secret identity' before you accidentally kill the varsity team."
The Rooftop — 12:00 PM
Kazuki burst onto the roof, pacing frantically.
"I almost hurt him. I almost broke his back."
Renji was already there, leaning against the railing, smoking a cigarette (which looked strange, considering how athletic he was).
"You threw him with 2% force," Renji said. "If you had used 5%, he would be a stain on the wall."
"This is impossible!" Kazuki yelled, ripping off his glove to reveal the silver metal skin. "I can't live like this! I can't touch anyone. I can't play sports. I can't even hold a pencil without snapping it!"
Renji flicked the ash from his cigarette.
"Welcome to the curse of power, Kazuki. You want to be a hero? This is the price. You live in a world made of wet paper."
He walked over and handed Kazuki a pair of glasses. They looked like thick, black-rimmed spectacles.
"Put these on."
Kazuki put them on. "Glasses? My vision is perfect."
"They aren't for vision," Renji said. "They're Limiters. Aeva hacked the suit's firmware. These glasses project a digital dampening field into your optic nerve. They artificially add 'latency' to your brain."
Kazuki blinked.
The world... slowed down. Or rather, it sped up to normal.
The buzzing of the lights stopped. The overwhelming heartbeat sounds faded. He felt heavy, sluggish... normal.
"Whoa," Kazuki whispered. "I feel... slow."
"It caps your reaction time to human levels," Renji explained. "As long as you wear those, you won't accidentally catch a bullet or throw a bully through a wall. But take them off... and the demon comes back out."
Renji grabbed Kazuki's shoulder. His grip was firm.
"Keep the glasses on at school. Take them off when you're with me. You have to learn to switch the switch, Kazuki. Because one day, you'll be holding someone you love, and if you forget which mode you're in... you'll crush them."
Kazuki stared at his reflection in the glass door. He looked like a nerd with the thick glasses.
"Two lives," Kazuki whispered.
"Yeah," Renji said, looking at the city skyline. "And trust me... the lie is the hardest part to maintain."
[To Be Continued…]