The streets below were chaos wrapped in a pattern. Fires flickered along side alleys, factions collided in bursts of confusion, and yet… every misstep, every hesitation, every overconfident lunge formed a rhythm I could read.
Drip… hum… distant crash…
I perched above it all, a ghost tracing the choreography of panic. Rei's words echoed faintly, a memory sharpened by timing: "Make him blink." Not instructions. Not demands. Just a whisper of what could be, if only the pieces were nudged right.
Metal grated beneath my boots as I stepped closer to the railing, eyes scanning the skirmish. A supply runner veered too far left, a lieutenant miscounted his men, and the hum of the Veins beneath the city thrummed like an accomplice. Opportunity.
Clank… distant shout… metallic scrape…
A false breadcrumb. Subtle. A misdirect in the form of a half-burned ledger tucked under a crate that shouldn't exist. Any sharp eye above or below could see it, and the Architect would notice. If he blinked. If he reacted.
I smirked. The beauty of it: chaos looked the same to everyone else, but to me, it was a game I was already winning. Every ripple of fear, every split-second misjudgment, every whispered panic became a note in a symphony I conducted with no baton.
Soft footfall… muffled thud… low hum…
I traced movements, cataloging micro-patterns. Who hesitated, who overcompensated, who betrayed instinct for pride. All of it mattered. All of it was data. All of it was leverage. Rei had taught me one thing that still stung in its simplicity: make the stronger player flinch first.
A distant explosion rattled a window frame, dust falling in a soft, lethal rain. The lieutenant closest to the breach cursed under his breath, fumbling, panicked. Perfect. My breadcrumb waited like a lit fuse, and soon enough, the sparks would travel where I wanted them.
I leaned back, letting the chaos wash over me like a tide I could control. Above the city, my shadow stretched along the conduits, the pipes, the faint electric arcs. All of it a map, a web, a reflection of the control I wielded quietly while everyone else screamed.
Drip… whir… flicker…
The Architect might be watching. He might be thinking he orchestrates it all. Cute. Let him blink first. Let him misstep, overreach, and reveal a fracture I could exploit.
I exhaled slowly, savoring it. Not a hero. Not a villain. Just a hand in the dark, flipping pieces across a board no one else realized existed. And when the first real move landed, I'd already be two steps ahead.
"Blink first," I whispered to the Veins beneath me, voice low, sardonic. "Or don't. It's hilarious either way."