21:16.
Ethan Cole stood before the floor-to-ceiling window of the office tower, watching the city lights flicker on one by one.
It was an ordinary night. Painfully ordinary.
Traffic lights cycled with mechanical precision. Pedestrians flowed along the sidewalks. In the distance, the highway stretched like a river of molten gold.
No emergency alerts.
No breaking news.
No warning signs.
And yet, something felt wrong.
Not fear.
Something heavier.
As if the world itself was holding its breath.
21:17.
The lights across the entire city flickered.
Not a blackout.
Not a power surge.
A synchronized error.
Brief. Impossible.
Ethan frowned and instinctively glanced at his watch.
Then the dizziness hit.
It wasn't mild.
It was violent.
He braced himself against the glass as a low-frequency hum filled his ears — not quite sound, not quite vibration. Something moving through the air, but belonging to no known spectrum.
On the street below, people stopped mid-step.
Some grabbed onto lampposts.
Some collapsed outright.
And then—
The screaming began.
At the street corner, a man convulsed violently. His body arched backward, tendons straining beneath his skin. A guttural noise tore from his throat — something that resembled language only in shape.
The whites of his eyes flooded with dark red veins. Beneath his skin, blood vessels bulged as if something inside him was pushing outward.
Then he lunged.
Not in anger.
Not in panic.
In hunger.
He tackled the nearest person and tore into them with animalistic precision.
The crowd shattered.
Phones dropped. Shoes scattered. People ran without direction.
Ethan's phone vibrated in his hand.
The screen lit up.
But there was no familiar interface.
No signal.
No notification icon.
Only text.
Cold. Clean. Detached.
[Threshold Breached]
[Consciousness Integrity: Preserved]
[Status: Adapting]
[Warning: Your current zone has entered High-Risk Phase]
Ethan did not move immediately.
He took a slow breath.
Outside, the city was unraveling.
Sirens wailed in the distance.
Metal crunched somewhere down the block.
Crying. Running. Tearing.
Same city.
Same minute.
Same event.
The world had not ended.
It had simply stopped waiting.
Ethan turned away from the window and headed toward the emergency stairwell.
From this moment forward—
Every choice would be irreversible.