The undercity was a place where even shadows went to die.
Beneath the steel arteries of Shin-Tokyo, where the air tasted like rust and decay, people spoke only in whispers. The ones who lived here weren't criminals — they were the remnants. Those who had seen too much, lost too much, or simply refused to look away. Down here, the light never reached. Only the hum of the old power lines sang through the tunnels like a heartbeat.
Reiji descended the concrete steps slowly, the faint echo of his boots following him. He knew this place — the forgotten districts below the central grid, long abandoned after the "Purges." It was here that information flowed more freely than air, and death could be bought cheaper than food.
Kaede's voice came through the commlink, low and careful.
> "I've traced the Broker's backups. There are three potential servers — one beneath the old subway, another near the collapsed reactor, and one… off the grid entirely."
Reiji adjusted his earpiece.
> "You mean unregistered?"
> "No. I mean buried. Deep under Sector 9. No connection, no access from surface tech. Someone wanted those files untouchable."
Reiji stopped mid-step. "Then we go dig."
> "You can't go alone," Kaede said quickly. "The air down there's toxic, and the tunnels aren't mapped anymore. You'll need backup."
"Backup draws attention," Reiji replied coldly. "I'll move faster without it."
> "Faster, maybe," she shot back, "but not smarter."
He said nothing — and that silence was answer enough.
Kaede sighed, frustrated, but she knew better than to argue. The line went quiet, replaced by the soft static of interference.
Reiji pulled up the collar of his coat and stepped deeper into the maze.
---
The tunnel widened into an old maintenance corridor. Broken screens flickered with corrupted text, ghostly echoes of forgotten warnings. Pipes dripped overhead, and somewhere far off, the faint hiss of steam mingled with the murmurs of unseen figures.
He passed two men huddled by a barrel fire, faces half-lit by the orange glow. Their eyes tracked him like animals, but they didn't move. They knew better than to cross someone walking this deep with purpose.
Further ahead, a hand-painted sign hung crooked on the wall:
"Market of Echoes →"
Reiji followed.
The so-called "market" was a circular chamber filled with scavengers, smugglers, and digital brokers. Cables hung from the ceiling like veins, connecting to broken monitors that still pulsed with faint static. Deals were made in whispers, currencies exchanged not in paper or credit, but in data fragments — memories, codes, names.
A woman with silver implants across her jaw noticed him. "You're not from here," she said.
Reiji kept his tone low. "I'm looking for something."
"Aren't we all?" she smiled, revealing metal teeth.
He placed a small data chip on her table. "A name. Broker. I need his trail."
The woman's smile vanished. She leaned closer, voice dropping to a whisper. "You're days late, Shadow. His files have already moved."
"To where?"
"To someone who calls themselves The Keeper. No one's seen their face. They run the undercity's archives now."
Reiji frowned. "Where?"
The woman hesitated, eyes darting to the dark corners of the room. "The Keeper doesn't have a place. They come to you when they want. Or when you've already stepped too deep."
Reiji's jaw tightened. "Then maybe I'll just keep walking."
Her hand shot out, gripping his sleeve. "Be careful. People who go looking for The Keeper… never stop hearing their voice again."
He pulled free, the chill of her words lingering longer than her touch.
---
Deeper into the tunnels, the sound of machinery gave way to silence — heavy, complete. The air grew colder. The fog from above was gone, replaced by dust and old smoke. Reiji turned a corner and stopped.
Someone was waiting for him.
A figure sat calmly at the center of the corridor, masked, motionless. Around them were shattered terminals and old cables glowing faintly blue. The mask was porcelain white, featureless except for a single vertical crack down the left side.
"Shinomiya Reiji," the voice said. It was androgynous, layered with distortion, almost melodic. "You've been searching for me."
Reiji's grip tightened on his blade. "The Keeper."
"I prefer Archivist," the figure corrected softly. "Keeper sounds… too sentimental."
Reiji took a slow step forward. "You have the Broker's data."
"I have everyone's data." The voice didn't rise. It didn't need to. "Including yours."
Reiji froze. "You're bluffing."
The figure tilted its head slightly, and a nearby screen flickered to life. Text scrolled across it — reports, mission logs, surveillance timestamps, and his name at the bottom of every one.
Kaede's voice suddenly came through his comm, but distorted, fragmented:
> "Rei… don't trust… not human—"
Static. Then silence again.
The figure's masked face turned toward him. "You kill to protect secrets, but every secret you protect writes another line in your story. And stories, Reiji… are never yours to own."
Reiji took another step closer, his blade reflecting the faint blue glow. "If you know my story, then you know how it ends."
"Perhaps," the Archivist said. "But the end isn't written yet."
For a moment, neither moved. The only sound was the hum of dead machines trying to breathe again.
Then Reiji lunged.
His blade cut through air — and through illusion. The figure dissolved into static, leaving behind nothing but a lingering voice through the speakers:
> "You can't kill what's already a memory."
The tunnel lights flickered violently. From every direction, recorded whispers began to echo, overlapping until the corridor itself felt alive — every voice he'd silenced, every target he'd erased.
Reiji turned off his commlink and stood there in the dark. For the first time in years, the silence he sought refused to come.
---
By the time he resurfaced, dawn had already touched the skyline. Kaede waited near the elevator shaft, her expression tense.
"You're bleeding," she said.
"It's nothing."
"Reiji, what happened down there?"
He looked past her, to the city still half-swallowed in fog. "Someone else is moving the pieces. And they know everything."
Kaede's hands trembled slightly. "Then what do we do?"
Reiji's gaze hardened. "We stop whispering."
He looked back once more toward the tunnels — the place where voices of the dead still clung to the air.
"The city speaks," he murmured. "It's time someone finally listened."