PAIGE
The journey to Apex Innovations felt like moving through a dream, the silent, car a bubble carrying us through the heart of a city that was both hauntingly familiar and utterly alien. My own reflection in the tinted window was a stranger—a woman in a power dress, her hand held by a king, on her way to negotiate the fate of the empire that had cast her out. The surrealness was a constant, low hum under my skin.
When we pulled up to the Apex building, it was a monolith of shimmering steel and glass, a testament to Kenji Soma's unique brand of power—both corporate and otherwise. And standing there, as if he'd been waiting for this moment his entire life, was Yamada Fujii.
My breath hitched. He looked so much like Denki. The same sharp, handsome features, the same impeccably conservative suit, but where Denki's eyes held a constant, simmering resentment, Yamada's were… calm. Calculated. Like a deep, still pond that gave away nothing of what lurked beneath.
