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Prologue: No Light After War
The city burned in silence.
Kurosawa Aki sat in the remains of an underground command center, its walls caved in, its monitors cracked. Sirens no longer screamed. The satellites had gone blind. No one was coming. They were already gone.
The floor around him was soaked in water, ash, and blood. The screen in front of him still flickered dimly, reflecting in his dull grey eyes. On it, a string of code ran endlessly — the final sequence. The purge.
He had done it.
In the end, it hadn't taken courage. It had taken emptiness.
He had no country left to betray. No comrades left to protect. No reason to exist except to make sure the world that murdered billions collapsed with him.
Aki exhaled.
He pressed the final key.
Far above, in the dying sky, the satellite known as Seraphim-7 opened its burning eye.
Light bloomed. Not salvation. Just fire.
And then—
Nothing.
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Chapter One: The Hollow Arrival
Pain.
But not the sharp, clean kind.
This pain was cold. Wet. Smothering. Like drowning in rot.
Aki opened his eyes.
A dark ceiling loomed overhead — not steel or rubble, but old stone, carved with runes that pulsed with golden light. The air reeked of incense and sweat.
He was lying on a stone altar. His arms and legs were bound in thick leather straps. His shirt was gone. His chest was bare, exposed — and something burned there, as if a brand had been carved into his flesh.
Around him stood robed figures. Their eyes glowed faintly. Their mouths moved in chant.
He understood none of it.
A fat priest stepped forward, clutching a ceremonial dagger with a blade of crystal.
"May the Soulless One feed the gods," the priest said.
The crowd responded as one: "Praise the House Divine."
Soulless?
Aki looked down. His skin was pale. His hands were thinner. Younger?
No — not younger. Reborn.
This wasn't Earth.
The priest raised the dagger. "Let the purge begin."
Aki didn't move. Not out of fear. Out of awareness. He could feel it.
There, pulsing on his chest — a black sigil.
No ordinary symbol. It was alive.
It was speaking.
> "Do you seek vengeance?"
The dagger plunged downward.
Aki smiled.
> Yes.
The sigil flared, burning with lightless flame. The priest screamed — but not because the dagger missed.
His arm was gone.
No, not severed — erased, as if it had never existed.
The altar cracked. The chains snapped. Aki stood.
The sigil on his chest writhed — seven jagged arms of a broken circle, glowing with ink-dark magic. The priests ran. They didn't make it far.
Aki whispered.
> "Null Invocation: Black Wake."
The world around him shivered.
A ripple of void spread from his feet. Stone melted. Symbols shattered. Gold turned to ash. The entire temple chamber caved inward, swallowed by a storm of anti-light.
When the dust cleared, only Aki remained.
Standing.
Alone.
Alive.
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He looked at his hands, then to the sky.
> "So this world has gods too…"
He clenched his fists. The sigil pulsed once, eager, hungry.
> "…good. I'm still in the business of killing them."
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