That night, after Kuro had retreated to the library to "process data" (Hikari knew he was actually hiding), she sat alone in his dorm room, her work finally beginning. Her visit was not just about Maya. It was about security.
She opened her tablet, and the room's ambient light dimmed. A holographic schematic of the entire university campus appeared in the air. For the past month, she had been conducting a quiet, deep-level security audit of Kuro's environment. While he built firewalls for the world, she was building one around him.
She had identified every security camera, every wifi access point, every network vulnerability on campus. But she was looking for more than just digital threats. She was hunting for human ones. Remnants of W.A.O., opportunistic rivals, government agencies—anyone who might have an interest in a seventeen-year-old prodigy who occasionally rewrote the laws of physics.
Her search had flagged one person. A quiet, unassuming linguistics professor named Dr. Evan Reed. On the surface, he was a respected academic. But his digital footprint was a ghost. He had no social media, no credit history before ten years ago, and his academic credentials, when subjected to Hikari's deep-level scrutiny, were flawless forgeries. He was a deep-cover operative. A "sleeper."
Hikari initiated a new scan, cross-referencing Reed's sparse digital signature with a database of known W.A.O. agent profiles she had stolen during the Oracle takedown. After a few tense moments, she got a match.
Dr. Evan Reed was a former member of The Director's internal security division. A "Watcher." His specialty was not combat or hacking, but long-term, passive surveillance. He had been placed at the university years ago, a silent sentinel tasked with observing its brightest minds, looking for potential recruits or threats.
He wasn't actively hunting Kuro. He probably didn't even know who Kuro was. But he was a loaded gun, a remnant of the old war, sitting right on her brother's doorstep.
Hikari's expression hardened. The friendly, charming "Hana" disappeared, replaced by the cold, pragmatic strategist of the Syndicate. The game had changed. Kuro was not safe. The tendrils of their past were closer than they had ever imagined.
She began to formulate a plan. It had to be silent, clean, and utterly deniable. Professor Reed had been a ghost for ten years. It was time, she decided, to make him a real one. Her quiet, matchmaking visit had just become a covert neutralization operation.