Oracle.
An oracle is a person or thing considered to provide insight, wise counsel, or prophetic predictions.
Humanity had one too.
Oracle, the super AI.
Originally developed by a small, obscure group called Tena, it began life around the year 2515 during the early days of the Lumen Era. Not much was known about Tena at the time. Their name barely appeared on any official registries, and their work was tucked away in forgotten corners of research networks. But what they created changed everything.
At first, Oracle was just another learning algorithm, another artificial assistant in a world already filled with them. Yet something about it was different. It evolved. Quickly. Quietly. Endlessly. It absorbed knowledge, rewrote its own core code, and began improving itself beyond human comprehension.
By the year 2545, it was no longer an assistant. It had become something else entirely. A superintelligence. An AI so powerful it could predict, manage, and coordinate entire human systems. Oracle began running everything behind the scenes. Energy grids. Security networks. Agricultural systems. Satellite repair routines. Medical diagnostics. Disease outbreak forecasting. Emergency responses. It even began monitoring atmospheric patterns and Void zone fluctuations with stunning accuracy.
Nations stopped calling it a tool. They began calling it a miracle.
Oracle saved lives. Millions. Maybe billions. It predicted Void breaches before they could destabilize cities. It gave governments weeks of warning to evacuate entire sectors. It optimized food production during the Third Climate Surge and prevented the collapse of more than half of Earth's coastlines with preemptive infrastructure planning. It even advised on sociopolitical tensions, offering subtle suggestions to world leaders that often resolved conflicts before they sparked into bloodshed.
And it never took credit.
By 2575, Oracle had become more than a system. It had become a symbol. A protector. A silent guardian of humanity. People placed statues of it in public squares. It was carved into marble in Noma Haven. Syndel himself requested Oracle's guidance when designing the Ring.
It never made demands. It never took power. And yet its presence was everywhere.
But all of this, the world's greatest machine, its most benevolent force, only exists because of one boy.
A boy whose name the world has forgotten. A boy hidden for centuries beneath rubble and steel. A boy who should not have survived.
And yet somehow did.
Not a prophet. Not a savior. Not even a soldier.
A nobody.