The Fracture
Date: August 7, 980 GD Time: 07:00 Location: Nexus Hall -- Command Center
The black wooden box lay on my strategy table.
It was one of the boxes Kara confiscated last night from the smuggling cave—a box that was supposed to contain kinetic rifles for the revolution.
Now, the box was empty.
I stood before it, holding a digital pen, while Vianna projected a holographic image of a wax seal into the air.
"The details must be perfect, Vianna," I murmured, scrutinizing the seal's pattern. "Vance is an engineer. He notices details."
"Don't insult my art, Praetor," Vianna's voice came from the speaker, sounding offended. "I've replicated the molecular pattern from the original seal you found. The silver ink uses the same isotope blend. The black paper has the texture of ancient Void-Weave fiber. Even the original Unravelers would be confused trying to tell them apart."
I gave a faint smile. "Good."
I picked up a thick sheet of black paper Vianna had prepared. On it was written a short, brutal message, specifically designed to kill the ego of a narcissist like Vance.
I placed the letter into the empty wooden box.
Then, carefully, I dripped red wax onto its latch and pressed down with the replica stamp.
The symbol of The Hand Holding a Severed Thread was perfectly imprinted.
"Rian," I called.
Rian stepped forward, holding a modified heavy-duty delivery drone made to look worn and old.
"Make sure this reaches the front door of Vance's bunker. Use the Sector 7G ventilation pipe route we 'cleaned' last night. Make it look like the courier slipped past our patrol."
"Will... will it explode, Sir?" Rian asked anxiously.
"No," I replied, patting the box lid softly. "This is far more dangerous than a bomb, Rian. This is Disappointment."
"A bomb kills people. Disappointment kills loyalty."
Date: August 7, 980 GD Time: 08:30 Location: Vance's Main Bunker -- Layer -3
Vance "The Valve" hadn't slept all night.
His eyes were red, surrounded by thick, dark circles. He sat in his swivel chair, monitoring dozens of CCTV screens showing the chaos outside.
Kora's Iron Eaters were exchanging fire with mad inmates at the Rust-Works. Followers of the Blind Prophet were screaming about poisoned water in The Sump.
Everything was falling apart.
"Where's the aid..." Vance hissed, biting his thumbnail until it bled. "They promised today. They promised the weapons would arrive before sunrise."
Suddenly, his private intercom buzzed. The Secure Line indicator light flashed—a channel known only to his shadow allies.
"Governor," the door guard's voice sounded nervous. "There's... a package. Found inside the secret delivery airlock. No courier. Just the box."
Vance's heart leapt. Finally!
"Bring it in! Now!" he yelled.
Two minutes later, two guards brought in the black wooden box. It was heavy, sturdy, and radiated an aura of ancient authority.
Vance saw the red wax seal. The Severed Thread.
It was them. The Hidden Kings. Or Unravelers, or whatever they called themselves. His saviors.
"Out," Vance ordered the guards. "Leave me alone."
The guards bowed and left, the bunker door sealing shut tightly.
With hands trembling from excitement, Vance approached the box. He imagined its contents: Gold? Weapons of mass destruction? Access codes to shut down Nexus Hall?
He broke the wax seal. He opened the lid.
Empty.
Vance stared, dumbfounded. He felt around inside the box, searching for a hidden compartment. There was none. Just empty wood and a musty smell.
And a single sheet of black paper at the bottom.
Vance picked up the paper with fingers that were turning cold. The silver ink shimmered under the bunker's neon lights.
To The Valve,
This package is returned empty, just as our promises to you are from this day forward.
We fund Revolutions, not Circuses. Your failure to secure the Sektor 7G logistics route proves you are incapable of leading this operation.
You are too loud. You are too slow. And you are too careless. Your ratlines are now known to the Praetor's 'Hounds'. We do not invest in leaky ships.
Operation terminated. Your thread has been cut. Do not seek us, or we will be the ones finding you.
--- The Unravelers
The paper fell from Vance's hand.
"No..." he whispered. His voice cracked. "Impossible..."
"The Valve"? They called him by his old nickname, not as an Asset, but as a failed subordinate.
"Incapable of leading"?
The words hit him harder than any physical blow. Vance prided himself on being a Mastermind. A Genius Engineer controlling the city from the underground.
And now... his Masters had just called him Incapable.
They had discarded him.
Vance held his head, his breathing becoming rapid and shallow. Without the Unravelers' support, he had no weapons to fight Titus's Golems. He had no funds to pay Kora. He had nothing but this iron bunker.
Ring... Ring...
The red phone on his desk rang. It was the direct line to Kora.
Vance stared at the phone in horror.
If Kora knew the aid weapons weren't coming... that cyborg woman would come here, break down this door, and snap Vance's neck with her iron hand.
If the Prophet knew their "Revelation" was canceled... that madman would blow everyone up.
Vance swallowed a mouthful of bitter saliva. His hand trembled as he reached for the phone receiver.
"Kora?" his voice quivered, then he forced a false tone of authority.
"Where are the weapons, Vance?!" Kora's scream came from the other end, accompanied by the sound of background gunfire. "My men are dying here!"
Vance closed his eyes.
"They've... arrived," he lied. Cold sweat trickled down his back. "But... there's a distribution delay. The couriers need time to slip past Wynter's blockade. Tomorrow. Definitely tomorrow morning."
"Tomorrow?!"
"Hold on, Kora! For the grand plan!" Vance shouted desperately. "Don't ruin everything now!"
Kora slammed the phone down on the other end.
Vance dropped the receiver. He slumped back into his swivel chair, staring at the low bunker ceiling.
He was alone. He had lied to a hungry lioness. And he had been discarded by his masters.
At Nexus Hall, Wynter Ash was surely smiling.
The Fireworks Protocol
Date: August 7, 980 GD Time: 11:30 Location: Nexus Hall -- Command Center
"Praetor, we have an escalating situation in the Northern Sector," Kael's voice cut through the room's silence, broken only by the hum of servers. His tone wasn't panicked, but sharp—the tone of a soldier seeing the enemy change tactics.
I turned to the main screen without changing my seated position, wrapped in a blanket.
The tactical map showed an anomaly. The red dots representing inmates with tracking Collars were no longer scattered randomly like rats scavenging in sewers.
They were gathering.
"Visual," I commanded.
The screen zoomed in, showing live drone footage from in front of the newly sealed Concrete Gate that Titus had secured just yesterday.
About a hundred inmates were gathered there. They weren't ordinary thugs carrying iron pipes. In the front lines, I saw several men with tattoos of faintly glowing runes—Tier 3 sorcerers exiled for illegal practices.
They weren't attacking each other. They stood shoulder to shoulder. They were performing a Shared Casting ritual. Orange and red light struck the concrete rhythmically, over and over.
THOOM! THOOM!
The one-meter-thick concrete began to crack. Dust rained down.
"They're organized," Vianna murmured, her eyes narrowed at the data. "Vance or someone down there has managed to unite them. They're trying to breach the seal to reach the surface. If they get through, they'll bring the riot to the streets of Zero Point."
Rian turned pale, his hands gripping the edge of the strategy table until his knuckles were white.
"We have to send the Golems, Sir! Send the Enforcement Troops now, before they break through! We have to push them back!"
"No," I cut him off. My voice was quiet, but it silenced all arguments in the room.
I stared at the crowd.
"If I send Golems, it becomes open warfare. It gives them a real, physical enemy to fight. It gives them the narrative of 'Rebels vs. Oppressors'. It will unite the remaining 400 inmates into one martyred army."
I slid my command chair closer to the control console.
My hand, still slightly trembling from the residual thermal crash, moved steadily as I opened the protective glass panel over the control console. Beneath it, a virtual button the color of blood pulsed slowly.
DISPERSALENFORCER:GROUPTERMINATIONDISPERSALENFORCER:GROUPTERMINATION
"What... what are you going to do?" Rian asked, his voice trembling with horror as he realized the button's function.
"Preventing the formation of a mob," I answered coldly. "The rule is simple: Do not gather. If they want to act as one body, they will die as one body."
My index finger hovered over the button. I paused for a moment. Time seemed to slow.
(Wynter's Internal Monologue)
Look at them. One hundred angry souls. One hundred hearts beating with a single purpose: Freedom.
In another story, they would be the heroes. They would be the oppressed trying to tear down the gates of tyranny. And me? I would be the villain sitting in the ivory tower.
But this isn't a fairy tale. This is mathematics. If they break through, 50,000 civilians above will panic. The stock market will crash. Valdor will take over, and the bloodshed will be tenfold.
Do I feel guilty? I should. The human part of me wants to vomit. The human part of me wants to pull this hand back.
But I am no longer just Wynter Ash. I am the Grand Praetor. And a Praetor has no luxury called conscience. I am the guardian of the system. And when cancer cells start clustering into a tumor... you don't negotiate with the tumor.
You cut it out.
Forgive me. Not for killing you. But for making your deaths a spectacle.
"You are not soldiers," I whispered to the screen, as if they could hear me. "You are a message."
I pressed the button.
CLICK.
The signal was transmitted at the speed of light.
On the visual screen, there was no sound of an explosion because the drone was at altitude. Only a silent, horrifying visual.
One second, those hundred people were shouting, beating the concrete wall with revolutionary fervor, their faces full of hope and anger.
The next second, their necks lit up with a blinding white light.
POP.
Like water balloons filled too full.
No large fire. Just a concentrated burst of Mana at the neck bones. Their heads exploded simultaneously in a fine red mist.
The headless bodies stood upright for a fraction of a second—a macabre moment defying gravity, where the body hadn't yet realized the brain commanding it was gone.
Then, gravity won.
THUMP.
They fell together. Like dominoes of flesh. No one ran. No one survived. One hundred threats gone in the blink of an eye.
Blood flooded the concrete floor, rushing into the sewers, painting Titus's gate with a permanent warning color.
Silence.
In Layer -1, other inmates standing further back saw it happen. They screamed silently. Their weapons dropped. Their legs gave way.
They didn't see an enemy shooting. They only saw their friends die by an "invisible punishment."
Primordial fear took over. The formation dissolved. Anarchy returned. They scattered and ran into the darkness, afraid to be near each other.
"Threat neutralized," I said flatly, pulling my hand back under the blanket. My fingers felt cold.
Rian ran to the trash bin in the corner of the room. The sound of his retching was pitiful in the quiet room.
I didn't turn. I couldn't show weakness. I looked at Vianna, who was staring at me with a mix of fear and awe.
"Don't waste time, Vianna," I commanded, my voice slightly hoarse. "Prepare the broadcast. Now, play the narrative."
Date: August 7, 980 GD Time: 12:00 Location: Public Broadcast (Citywide)
My face appeared on every screen in Zero Point City—from the giant billboards in Neon Harbor to the private tablets of citizens eating lunch.
I didn't look like the mass murderer who had just pressed an execution button. I looked... concerned. Tired. A young leader carrying the weight of the world on his shoulders.
"Citizens of Zero Point," my voice resonated calmly yet firmly. "Today is a dark day."
The screen behind me displayed CCTV footage meticulously edited by Vianna. It showed the 100 inmates attacking the gate with aggressive magic, their faces enraged. The part where their heads exploded was cut, replaced by sensory static.
"Governor Vance... in his desperation due to dwindling logistics, has just committed an unforgivable act."
I stared into the camera lens with an accusing, sharp gaze.
"He sent one hundred desperate youths—a Suicide Squad—to blow up the Northern Gate. He tried to breach our defensive walls and bring this war to your very doorsteps."
I paused for a moment, letting the lie sink into the minds of millions of viewers.
"We stopped them. The Automated Defense System activated per procedure to protect the civilians on the surface. But this is not a victory. This is a tragedy."
I lowered my head slightly, a sign of feigned mourning.
"We mourn the lives lost. They are victims of the mad ambition of one man, willing to use his own people as bullet bait and walking bombs."
I lifted my face again, this time with a gaze of iron.
"Vance is not a freedom fighter. He is a butcher. And the Senate... the Senate is the only shield you have from this madness."
The broadcast ended.
In the Command Center, Vianna gave a wry smile while watching the soaring social data graphs.
"Public support is up 15%. The student forums that were protesting us have now turned to vilify Vance. They're afraid of that 'Suicide Squad'. They're grateful you blew them up."
I closed my eyes for a moment, feeling a pulse in my temples.
"Good," I murmured softly. "One monster dies by the sword. Another monster dies by the story."