The System's reaction was immediate.
The very moment the faces of the nine shriveled Constants filled every screen across the Artificial Paradise, a convulsion rippled through the network. Billions of processors overheated simultaneously. Somewhere deep beneath the Upper City, in the heart of the Dead Moon, colossal Omni-energy reservoirs ignited with an alarming crimson glow.
And then the Voice spoke.
It echoed everywhere at once: through implants, street speakers, the air itself, inside people's bones. Deep, calm, almost fatherly, which only made it even more terrifying.
> "ATTENTION. CRITICAL INFORMATIONAL INFECTION DETECTED. PROTOCOL 'HARVEST' ACTIVATED AHEAD OF SCHEDULE.
Repeat: Protocol 'Harvest' activated ahead of schedule.
Citizens, remain calm. Your Spark will be collected for the continued prosperity of Paradise."
Inside the Vault's central hall, Kai froze with his fingers hovering above the terminal.
"They've lost their minds…" he whispered. "Two weeks… they still had two weeks before the scheduled harvest…"
Lyra slowly lowered her rifle. Her face turned ash-gray.
"They don't care about schedules anymore. We just showed everyone the truth. They decided to erase the witnesses."
On the streets of the Upper City, the apocalypse began.
Only seconds earlier, people had stood frozen before the holograms, staring at the horrifying mummies inside their capsules. Some cried. Some screamed in rage. Others had already begun smashing advertisement panels with their fists.
Then the sky opened.
High above the streets, ten or fifteen meters in the air, black circular vortexes began to appear.
They emerged silently: perfect discs of absolute darkness ringed with pulsing golden halos. The vortexes widened and expanded, breathing out a cold, sterile wind.
The first scream came from a young woman in a pale dress who had just been embracing her child.
Her body suddenly arched backward.
A bright silver-violet beam burst from her chest: her Spark.
It ripped free as though someone had hooked her soul and tore it out.
The woman collapsed onto the pavement like a discarded puppet, eyes wide open and empty. Her Spark soared upward and vanished into the nearest vortex.
And then it began.
Across the Upper City, people started falling.
Thousands of them.
Some tried to run, but the vortexes opened directly in front of them. Others clung desperately to railings, trees in the floating gardens, to each other. Nothing helped.
Sparks tore from bodies with a wet, horrifying sound, like roots being ripped from living soil. Silver, gold, violet, different colors, different lives, all of them streamed upward toward the Dead Moon like iron filings drawn to a colossal magnet.
A man in an expensive suit who had just screamed, "Lies!" froze with his mouth still open.
His Spark shot out so quickly that his body remained standing for several seconds, fist still raised, before collapsing lifelessly.
A young couple embracing on an observation deck fell together. Their Sparks intertwined in the air for a brief moment, as though trying to stay together, before vanishing into the same vortex.
Children cried.
Old people prayed.
Some tried firing pulse pistols at the vortexes, but the energy bolts simply dissolved into the black void.
The Corporation had chosen not to wait two weeks.
They had begun the Harvest now.
Not to gather energy according to schedule.
No.
They activated it to destroy evidence of their lies. To erase the millions who had just seen the true faces of their "gods." To reduce the newborn rebellion into empty shells that could later be disposed of and replaced with fresh, obedient copies.
Inside the Vault, the main terminal began displaying real-time data.
Kai stared at the numbers in disbelief.
"More than two hundred thousand collected in the first thirty seconds… God, they're not even giving people time to understand what's happening."
Astra, still trapped in Form 2, stood in the center of the shattered hall surrounded by rubble and Valius's golden blood. Her spider-like limbs trembled. Black tears streamed down her face as she heard the Voice.
She felt millions of Sparks racing through the network like comets.
Every single one screamed.
Every single one poured its agony into the ocean of fury already boiling inside her.
Valius, kneeling in his ruined armor, let out a weak laugh. Blood dripped from his mouth.
"You see?" he rasped. "Even now… we win. You revealed the truth… and we'll simply… harvest everyone who heard it. Clean. Fast. Efficient."
Astra turned her distorted face toward him.
Her five remaining spider limbs twitched sharply.
"You… devour… your own children…" she growled in a voice woven from thousands of others.
Valius tried to raise his spear, but his fingers no longer obeyed him.
And above the Upper City, the vortexes continued to grow.
The Dead Moon hanging over the artificial world began glowing with a sinister golden radiance.
It drank the harvest greedily.
Far below, in the middle and lower levels, people began collapsing as well. The Harvest spread through every layer of society.
No one was spared.
Lyra stood by the shattered terminal-room window, staring at the city transforming into a graveyard.
"Astra…" she whispered, though she knew Astra could no longer hear her. "If you give up now… all of this will be for nothing."
Kai clenched his fists so tightly his nails cut into his palms.
"We have to reach her. While she's still holding the Form. While she still… remembers who she is."
Outside, the screams did not fade.
They only grew louder.
And somewhere deep within the network, inside nine golden capsules, the Constants smiled with dead, shriveled smiles.
The harvest was especially rich this time.
And it had only just begun.