Inside Nexacore's secret lab, everything gleamed as if it had been sterilized a million times over. White light from rows of monitors reflected across the room, painting it in cold, surgical sheen. Medical machines hummed at steady intervals—each pulse confirming the fragile heartbeat of the boy lying motionless on the bed.
A man stood behind the control panel, gaze locked on the child's body. He didn't move, not even a twitch—a man without a pulse.
Kieran.
Two years on ice—a genius flavor boxed and stored in Nexacore's freezer.
Alpha Core would never function without three keys. Darius and Claire had already jammed themselves into the system uninvited. That left Kieran—the only one with enough power to rewrite the game. And he was also the easiest piece to sacrifice.
"…Is this really what has to be done?" the man whispered, though the question was more ritual than doubt. He knew by now—questions never changed the outcome.
"You have to be reset. I'm sorry, Kieran." His voice was cold enough to kill the truth itself.
It's just wiping a hard drive clogged with viruses called feelings. Better you don't carry this weight at all.
His finger pressed the command. Blue radiance coursed through neural threads, flooding the boy's system. The memory wipe began—clinical, merciless. No ceremony. No sympathy. Just deleting a file called past from the operating system of a child.
—
Weeks later—
Kieran's eyelids twitched. Slowly, they lifted. His vision swam, unfocused. "…Where am I?" His tone cracked, throat parched.
Memory? Nothing. Except his name.
The door slid open with a soft hiss. A man in a black suit entered, face blank as stone. He leaned over, staring at the boy, and spoke with a synthetic calm.
"Welcome to Nexacore Corporation. From this day forward… you're under our care."
On the other side of the two-way mirror—the side no one could see through—the Founder of Nexacore watched. Hidden in shadow.
He studied the boy's awakening—a scene he'd watched too many times before. Not for entertainment. For certainty. For control.
"You are the future," he murmured, cold and absolute. "You don't need the past."
Words sharp enough to erase history—not just for Kieran, but for anyone who got in the way.
Kieran, Zoe, Hanna, Claire, and Darius stood in a rough circle, not allies, but a crew of engineers wrestling with IKEA furniture minus the manual.
The fractured Alpha Core blueprint hovered between them.
Kieran dragged his finger across the holographic display, trying to reconnect the broken lines—but nothing worked. The labyrinth was already moving, the map couldn't stabilize while the system itself kept shifting.
Darius threw out dumb theories. Claire and Hanna tried their angles. In the end, they all hit a wall.
Zoe straightened to her full 148 centimeters, hands on her hips.
"Ugh, useless. Guess it's on me—again."
She drew a deep breath, chest rising. "Watch carefully, 'cause miracles don't happen twice."
Silence. Hanna and Claire studied her—a puzzle piece that refused to fit.
"Try living up to that big mouth of yours," Darius sneered. His tone said pink hair doesn't fix broken systems.
Zoe tossed her head back as if she was stepping onto the finale stage of some talent show.
Then Reset began.
Her toes didn't quite touch the floor. A soft aura radiated outward, scattering petals of light that drifted and curled around her. A hush of wind stirred, data motes floated upward, reassembling into glowing geometric fragments before slotting back into place.
Kieran froze, wide-eyed. It looked like magic under a microscope. But that wasn't what rattled him most.
Her hands were trembling. Sweat beaded down her temples, clinging to strands of pink hair.
Power like that… it's not for show. And she'll never admit it—even if it's killing her, she'll just laugh it off.
The blueprint shone again. Lines reconnected. The structure was back—imperfect, cracked in places—but solid enough to move forward.
A chime echoed: ping. Alpha Core's new position appeared.
Heads snapped toward Zoe as though she'd just turned water into wine.
She wiped her sweat, casual as ever. "See? Impressed yet?"
"Not bad. Guess you're useful after all," Darius muttered, arms crossed.
Zoe opened her mouth to clap back—
—but Hanna cut in, shooting a sidelong glance at Darius. "Useful. More than I can say for some people."
Darius's jaw tightened, teeth grinding. His fist curled until veins bulged, one step away from cracking skulls.
Claire laid a hand on his shoulder. A subtle shake of her head—calm down.
Hanna's smirk widened as she brushed a finger against her weapon, ready to draw in a heartbeat. "Don't forget—she just saved your ass. Maybe try thanking Claire for keeping you alive."
—
The makeshift alliance gathered in a dim, flickering chamber, emergency lights strobing across rusted steel. An old metal table became their war council.
Kieran and Zoe sat back, apart from the others. Darius stood at the head, reminiscent of a general no one asked for, but everyone had to endure.
"I'll use Copy to create a mimic device. That'll bypass Alpha Core's security protocols."
Hanna leaned back in a rickety chair, spinning it lazily. "A copy's still a copy. Fake is fake. Best case—it fails. Worst case—it makes everything worse."
His glare snapped to her. "Got a better plan?"
Claire remained motionless, serene, as if she was calculating five moves ahead.
It's not the mission that keeps me here, she thought. It's him. Kieran. He's the only shot I have left to make this right.
Kieran leaned toward Zoe, breath low. "They don't exactly trust each other, do they?"
She nodded slowly, gaze sweeping the group as though a spectator waiting to see who'd crack first.
Minutes ticked by.
Finally, Zoe stood, stretching with the drama of someone terminally bored. "Seriously? All this talk? Just run through the damn maze already. Overthinking's how you all die of old age. I'm out—bye~"
She spun on her heel and started walking, zero cares given.
The others stared after her.
Then Hanna broke into unexpected laughter. "Hah. You know what? I'm starting to like this kid." She elbowed Kieran. "What do you think?"
He glanced at her, wary. Said nothing. He hadn't figured out which side Hanna was really playing for.
Beneath the armor of the Queen of Killers, Hanna had once been nothing more than a small girl—a child who didn't even have the right to dream.
She grew up in an alley where hope never reached. A slum people pretended didn't exist. Garbage cans were supermarkets. Houses stacked on broken tiles.
Her parents vanished when she was young, leaving her with a chronically ill sister in the dark. No books. No lessons. Just hunger as the only teacher.
Hanna walked barefoot every day, digging through the scraps behind restaurants. Sometimes she'd find leftovers. Sometimes nothing. All she wanted was to bring back enough so her sister wouldn't cry herself to sleep.
One evening she came home with stale bread and half a cup of soup in a cracked foam box. She never knew that day would rewrite her entire life.
The shop owner—filth in human form—had laced the leftovers with something. Whether by accident or malice, nobody ever cared to ask.
Her sister ate it.
That night, the little girl stopped breathing.
Hanna sat beside the body until morning, in a silence heavier than any grave. No tears left—burned away with the first "I'm sorry" she whispered to someone who could never answer back.
At dawn, she walked back to the shop. Not for revenge. Just for an answer.
"What did you put in the food?" Her voice trembled.
The man laughed. He spat in her face, boot connecting hard with her ribs. The red-haired girl hit the floor and stayed there, breathless and small. "Just a bit of rat poison. Now she'll never be hungry again. You gonna thank me, worthless brat?"
He didn't realize he was speaking to someone who had just lost everything… someone about to become the nightmare this world would never forget.
From that day on, Hanna never cried again. In a city ruled by hollow coins, she chose to become a blade. Because the world had taught her—
If you're not strong enough to kill what killed you… you don't deserve to live.
And every time she saw Zoe—that pink-haired brat who laughed too loud, rebelled too much, feared no one—Hanna saw another face flicker behind her.
The image of the sister who never got the chance to grow up.
If my little sister were still here…
It was a sentence she would never finish.
Only those who have lost everything know how wide that gap truly is.
"I heard that!" Zoe yelled over her shoulder, not even turning around.
Hanna let out a faint smile, glancing at Kieran. "Well… since we're risking our lives together, might as well be formal. Name's Hanna. Consider this my official introduction." She spoke with a strange calm—almost relaxed.
Kieran's focus tightened. One thought cut through his head uninvited:
Is this really the same woman from fifteen minutes ago?
The maze loomed ahead.
Machinery groaned in the distance. Lights flared through the fog. Heavy shadows moved closer, slow but deliberate.
Guardian Bots.
They gleamed with the luster of polished ivory, joints rotating on full hydraulic mounts. Each arm bristled with high-energy laser cannons, thermal sensors tracking even a fraction of a degree. Every step was a warning: danger was already here.
"We've got a problem!" Claire shouted.
Then the attack began.
Lasers seared the air. Sensors detonated. A hail of gunfire tore forward without leaving room to breathe.
Kieran stepped out front without hesitation. His armguard blazed neon-blue—Undo unleashed. The bots staggered back, movements rewinding, every strike undone frame by frame. But the cost showed in his expression—pale, slick with sweat, eyes haunted by a nightmare on endless repeat.
"You holding up?" Zoe asked, moving closer.
He nodded. Because even if he wasn't, he'd never admit it.
The truth? She knew. He knew. We knew. Everyone just pretended not to.
Then—
A whisper in his skull, 'Kieran… I'm sorry, son.'
Flash—memories collided, jagged shards tearing at him. His brain was on fire, his chest a collapsing cavern.
A bot's cannon locked on his head—
And Hanna was there. Delete tore from her palm, severing the beam into smoke. She yanked him out of the line of fire, snapping, "Get it together! You're gonna get us all killed!"
Claire rushed in, cool and steady. "I'll take care of him. You two handle the machines!"
Hanna hesitated, stealing a look at Kieran… then gave a curt nod and dived back into the fight.
Claire crouched low. "Listen to me. You're not fighting alone." Her presence reached through the chaos as if a hand pulled him up from the undertow.
Meanwhile—
Zoe and Hanna tore into the bots. Pink hair flashed. She ripped off an arm and smacked the bot with it—discipline, Zoe-style. Hanna's Delete carved through another, erasing it down to scrap, not even recyclable.
And on the far edge of the battlefield—
Darius. The man with the sharpest suit and the sharpest ego… slipping quietly into the shadows.
His hand dipped inside his jacket. Out came a wafer-thin device, slid into a hidden panel. His fingers danced across a hologram, data streaming virtually floodwater.
Beep. Beep. Beep.
The progress bar climbed. His smile curled—smooth, smug, the kind only a conman wears after tricking his relatives out of ten million.
But Hanna saw.
She lunged. "What the hell are you doing?"
"Stay out of it!" His voice was all iron.
"You're running something behind our backs, aren't you?" She shoved closer, close enough to smell the artificial tang of his hair gel—the same kind of cheap polish that reminded her of the bastard who poisoned her sister.
Darius exhaled, harsh as the brakes of an eighteen-wheeler.
"It'll make us faster—"
She didn't wait. Her hand cut through the device. Delete flared. The screen died.
"You crazy bitch!" His roar echoed off steel walls.
"I don't trust that thing… and I trust you even less." The look she gave him could've slit his throat without staining her hands.
An instant later, Alpha Core map glitched—paths scrambling as though a puzzle were thrown against a wall.
Claire let out a sigh heavy enough to crush mountains.
"Enough. Now we start over. You just cost us precious time."
Zoe crashed the last Guardian Bot with a final, cocky flourish, then sprinted back to Kieran. He sat slumped, drenched in sweat, trembling—electric shock in human form.
"Rest, will you? You look worse than a guy who just got fired." She placed a gentle hand on his shoulder. "And FYI, I'm not carrying you if you pass out."
He forced himself upright, breath thinner than his pride. "I'm fine."
"Yeah, and I'm the Queen of England. You're shaking like a puppy dumped in an ice bath."
He ignored her, eyes fixed on Hanna, who kept glaring daggers at Darius. "I don't trust people easily either. But right now… we've got one goal."
Claire nodded. "He's right. If we splinter now, we'll never reach Alpha Core."
Hanna was silent, weighing something heavy in her chest. Then she exhaled, slow, shoulders dropping. "…Fine. I'll let it slide. For now."
Her gaze snapped back to Darius, sharp enough to flay him where he stood.
"Between you and me… this is gonna get ugly."
Two Months Earlier.
Inside Nexacore's control chamber, the walls pulsed with glow from colossal holo-screens. A world was forming line by line—quantum threads weaving into cities, rivers, skies. The illusion was so real that if a pebble hit your forehead inside it, you'd probably flinch and curse.
A man stood there, motionless, eyes cold as steel. His hair, once midnight-black, was now snow white—not from age, but from the sheer hubris of a human who believed he could write a new reality.
And all of it—every rule, every breath—would soon be uploaded into a single human mind.
"You really pulled it off," Hanna said, stepping beside him. She stared at the screen for a moment, then back at the man she once knew. He no longer looked human, a natural disaster wearing skin.
"Yes," he replied, sharp enough to freeze lava. "Not just a virtual world. A new law of reality."
His hand brushed across the console. The projection zoomed in, peeling back layers no different from a model home revealing its hidden basement.
"This system… Quantum Neural Network. It mirrors the real world down to every particle. And powered by Alpha Core, we can rewrite physics at will. And that's not even the limit."
On-screen, a test subject sat at a mountain made of donuts, casually copying them into infinity—a human who thought liver disease was a myth.
Her breath hitched, shoulders tensing. "Wait… that's—"
"Exactly. The system doesn't just pull them in. It amplifies their power."
"Power?"
"Undo. Replace. Delete. They aren't random quirks. They're projections of who these people really are. Their true selves, reflected in code." His gaze lingered on the screen as if a sculptor falling in love with his creation.
Hanna crossed her arms. "So basically—superpowers. Cute. But how are they even inside this place?"
He chuckled, low and knowing—the kill-switch given human shape. "Simple. Think about it. What does every single person on Earth have under their skin now?"
Her pulse spiked. She already knew the answer. "Vanta Q… quantum chips."
"Correct." He nodded slowly. "That free upgrade everyone was so eager to take? That was the doorway."
Her voice dropped, trembling despite herself. "So you planned this from the start?"
"Not the start…" He leaned in, a crooked smile thin as a razor. "Before the start. Synaptic Link has already tethered every human brain to this system. Every sensation, every temperature, even pain—all real."
Hanna clenched her teeth. "Pain? And if someone dies in there…?"
The white-haired man pressed a key. The screens shifted, displaying an algorithm labeled in cold, sterile letters:
[Reality Protocol]
"One press," he whispered, "and their heartbeat in the real world… just stops. No Reset. No Checkpoint. Just goodbye."
Even Hanna—the Queen of Killers—was silent.
"When I unlock Alpha Core," he continued, a fire flickered behind his stare—half divinity, half damnation, "this world will stop being a simulation. No one will know the difference. And when that day comes…"
The city on the screens shimmered—heaven and hell collapsed into one.
"…I will be God of this world."