The drawer clicked open with a faint metallic sigh.
A black sleeve sat within—silent, but far from dormant.
He held in his hand the clothbound gauntlet, which wrapped around his forearm like a second skin. The vessel of Lightning flexed faintly, as if waking, and for a moment, Shin swore the veins of divine energy etched inside it pulsed. Waiting, or perhaps, expecting.
He held it up and murmured, "You've been asking for this, haven't you?"
The sleeve responded—softly. A pulse. An echo.
"…Fine," he muttered, slipping it on. "You've earned it."
The artifact rippled—not in shape but in pressure—as if it exhaled, waiting for acknowledgement.
He paused, then gave the name gently, as if signing a pact.
"Thunderclaw."
The artifact settled on his arm, the pulse fading like a sigh of satisfaction.
But Shin could feel the attention shift.
He turned, reaching for the sword leaning against the wall—curved, light, finely balanced. It had never asked for anything. Not pride, not reverence. It simply waited to be wielded.
But now?
"You too?" he asked, almost amused.
The blade didn't answer—but the faint static of divine presence said enough.
He gave a slight shrug. "Windpiercer."
A whisper of wind curled around the blade, as if it scoffed.
Still, it accepted the name. Proudly.
An hour later, Shin stepped out of a tram station three districts over, blending into a stream of early traffic. A black mask covered his face—not to hide who he was, but to make it easier for people not to ask.
The black market district wasn't really hidden. It was just... inconvenient. Folded into the industrial zone where old tower survey buildings had been abandoned, then reclaimed. Steel shutters turned into stall awnings. Offices gutted and rebuilt into private booths. No names needed. No cameras watching.
The scent of soldered wiring mixed with tower dust and fake incense.
He wandered slowly. Purposefully. Eyes always scanning.
Most stalls held junk—glowing beads, stone-fruit with faint sparkle, twisted metal pieces that pulsed for no reason. One vendor swore he was selling eggs from a "Dajin-born raven."
Shin paused at a table where a half-melted goblet, crusted with silver, was on display. It had no divine pressure but a faint hum of altered conductivity—not magical, just irradiated.
He looked up. The vendor grinned with too many teeth.
"Real artifact, friend. Smuggled straight from Tower Sector Fourteen."
"Right," Shin murmured, stepping on.
He wasn't searching for items. He was reading the room.
He paid once—a folded bill slipped to a local contact named Riven, an ex-merchant with good ears and a habit of not embellishing.
They sat beneath a deactivated stairwell.
Riven leaned close. "You feel the shift?"
Shin said nothing. Riven answered anyway.
"First Wave killed. The second gave power. The Third? That's when we stopped pretending this wasn't normal."
"How many towers now?" Shin asked.
"Thirty thousand, give or take. Only a few thousand accessed. Maybe a few hundred cleared. But more pop up every month. You see one open near a hospital last week?"
"No."
"Exactly. They're everywhere."
Riven scratched his jaw. "Most aren't dangerous. Some don't even react unless you've already bonded. Spirits are barely coherent. That's why people think there are levels."
"Levels?"
He nodded. "Tower types. Some brutal. Some simple. And the dajins? Maybe they're different species. Some seem intelligent. Some talk like glitchy AIs. Others don't talk at all."
"Origin theories?"
Riven smirked. "Take your pick: alien programs, god fragments, quantum evolution, Earth defense system. I heard one guy swear they're memory vaults from a dead civilization."
Shin filed it away silently.
Useful? No. But it told him where people's minds were—and how little they knew.
Riven leaned back against the cracked stairwell.
"But it's not just where they came from. It's what they are."
"How do you mean?" Shin asked.
"There are types," he said, counting on his fingers. "Spirits, beasts, weird ones that talk like people. Some call 'em echoes. Though no one agrees on what that means."
"Echoes?"
"That's what people call the human-looking ones. They talk like people and look almost right, but something's always off. Extra arms, too-smooth faces, no pupils. Some look like witches out of a storybook. Others, like they got stuck halfway into a dream. But they talk. Usually."
Shin stayed silent.
"They're the easiest ones," Riven continued. "Most successful clears are Echo towers. Beasts fight. Spirits judge. But echoes? They… negotiate. Or toy with you."
Shin didn't speak, but he made a mental note.
Echoes. Beasts. Spirits. I've only seen spirits until now. So that's why there are so many vessels now—they were not fighting gods. They were talking to shadows.
Later, deeper in the market, he stepped through a side corridor and approached a section labeled only with a red stripe on rusted signage.
He moved past a display of dull gem fragments, more of half-burnt herbs. Then came to a man standing still in front of a blade rack.
Wearing a plain mask. Red stripe sewn into his sleeve.
Shin said nothing. But he turned to a different vendor nearby—a quiet broker leaning against a crate of shellfruit.
"That one," Shin said, nodding slightly. "Who is he?"
The vendor followed his gaze. "Kairox. Top three hundred, maybe. Cleared a tower up in the Balkans. People say it was fire-based. One of the tougher ones."
"He's masked."
"Everyone knows him here. Masks aren't for vanity. It's protection."
"From?"
The man leaned closer. "Governments. Recruiters. Black lab projects. You clear a real tower? They watch you. Sometimes, you vanish."
Shin's eyes rested on Kairox for another moment. The man stood sharp, shoulders squared—a fighter—but also a performer.
"If that's top-tier," Shin thought, "then the world still has a long way to go."
But he said nothing.
He moved on.
The tower site wasn't public.
It was locked behind fencing, cameras, and concrete barriers. Drones circled in loose grid patterns. A small government ops team manned a field post nearby, dressed in plain utility gear—not military, but not unarmed.
Warning signs were posted in five languages:
HAZARD ZONE – STRUCTURAL INSTABILITY – DO NOT APPROACH
But the tower still pulsed.
To most, it would look like a warping heat mirage—invisible, intangible.
To Shin, it was clear: a twisting core of folded divine pressure, dormant but alive.
He crouched a hundred meters away behind a decommissioned substation. Mask on. Pressure contained.
Wind coiled tightly around him—a silence field, a ripple of light-bending distortion. He inhaled once, then blurred.
No motion sensors triggered.
He moved like a thought.
Slipped past the first barrier.
Slid across broken gravel.
Dodged a turning drone with a quiet pivot under scaffolding.
No alarms. No glints. Just dust in motion.
He reached the tower—and passed inside before anyone saw a thing. The interior was surprisingly vast.
A circular stone hall, sand-coated and dimly lit by ambient dust glow. Pillars marked each direction. The entrance sealed behind him.
Then—a pulse.
The floor shifted.
Six spinning platforms rotated across a sand pit, each shaped like a ring of linked stones. One had to step in exact rhythm, adjust to the counterweight, and predict the tilt to pass.
Shin read the pattern in two seconds and breezed through.
Not even a breath wasted.
On the second floor, he found himself in a mirrored room, where reflections of himself appeared just like in Lightning's tower. But they were inferior. The trick wasn't to attack, but to stop attacking. Every move he made, the illusions copied. One mistake, and they'd collapse inward.
Shin stopped himself and disappeared, just as the illusions rushed toward him. The illusions run into themselves and collapsed.
He passed untouched to the next floor.
The third floor was different. It was no longer just traps. This time, two humanoid constructs rose from the walls—tall, narrow, and faceless. Each carried a short spear and a shield—puppets acting like ancient warriors.
He met their blows calmly.
He ducked, parried, stepped between them like water. Then struck once with Wind-enhanced speed.
They scattered.
He reached the fifth floor, and this time he was sure. This floor was the final chamber before the core.
Twelve floating discs, each holding a symbol. The floor was a circle of interconnected runes. In the center: an orb glowing with sand-colored light.
The task was obvious: align each disc in the correct sequence and match vibration resonance to trigger the path forward.
It would take time. Focus.
He could do it.
But he didn't want to.
Shin narrowed his eyes.
"Enough."
He activated his battle form.
The change wasn't loud—it was immediate. The wind thickened. The air sharpened. His hair deepened into black. His coat extended into white silver. His eyes glinted with silver clarity.
He lifted a single hand.
A spiral burst of wind surged forward—and crushed half the discs.
The floor shuddered. But then accepted the "completion."
Might makes right after all.
He stepped into a smooth circular space of glimmering sand, and a presence stirred.
From the ground, a figure rose—composed entirely of sand. Its shape resembled a cloaked man with no feet. His voice was soft and sifting.
"Are you the vessel chosen by the Wind?"
Shin stopped.
"You recognized it?"
"All of us do. Some deny it. Others obey. But Wind… is not like us."
"You're a spirit?"
"A lesser one."
"What is there above you?"
The dajin's eyes were empty—but reverent.
"There are orders. Those like me—lesser spirits—are fragments. Shaped forces of nature with sentience. Above us are the minor spirits: whole thoughts, full identities. And above them… are the Elementals. We sometimes refer them as the grand spirits."
"And Wind?"
The figure gave a pause.
"Wind is not simply a creator. It is the breath between beginnings. The one that kept watching even when the elementals slept."
Shin held its gaze.
"I came for power," he said.
The spirit tilted its head.
"I cannot give you a vessel bond. Your body would not hold another—not now. Even if it did, my power would be insignificant before you who hold the power of our creators."
"Then why allow me here?"
"To acknowledge."
The spirit extended a thread of sand, like mist.
"You crushed the form. But you endured the path. That is enough."
Shin stepped forward.
The thread coiled into his chest—a flicker of energy, nothing dominant. Just a shard of alignment. Something half-real, not artifact, not bond.
"You may call me if the moment matches," it said.
Then it paused.
"One last question?"
"Yes," Shin said. "Do you know Lightning?"
The dajin stilled.
"No. That name holds no place among us."
So Lightning is not known even to their kind.
Is it buried? Or forbidden?
Then the figure dissolved and the tower collapsed.
Shin reappeared outside—light formed around his frame as dust scattered into the wind.
Alarms were already blaring.
Agents sprinted across the far lot. Drones turned sharply. Orders were shouted.
But he vanished into the wind before they could see him, and disappeared like a myth.