The Box: Fate
Chapter 61 — Traces in the Code
The grand plaza outside the Liya Hunter's Guild was completely silent. Gideon the Ash-Bringer stood before the stone steps, his massive crimson greatsword planted firmly into the ground. Even without active intent, the sheer density of his natural spiritual pressure warped the air around him, causing a visible heat haze to rise from the cobblestones. The local hunters watched from a safe distance, their eyes filled with absolute awe. He was, without a doubt, a towering pillar of the High Kingdom's military might—a native force that did not need numbers or system screens to prove its absolute dominance.
"The rifts are tearing the north apart," Gideon muttered, his amber eyes scanning the darkening sky before he looked back at the three teenagers. "I will fortify this city as the High Council commanded. But if what you say about the capital is true, you three need to move. Aethelgard is a viper's nest, and your silver-eyed leader is walking blindly into a trap."
Zanaki didn't give the elite hunter a second glance. He turned on his heel, his sapphire eyes flashing. "Axel, Sharky. Pack light. We're heading straight for the Grand Astral City."
***
The journey across the vast, rolling plains toward Aethelgard was brutal and fast. For hours, the three vanguards pushed their bodies to the absolute limit, eating up miles of terrain beneath a bruised, purple sky.
As the sun began to dip behind the jagged peaks of the western mountains, the frantic pace slowed. The rhythmic thud of their boots on the grass became the only sound in the twilight. Zanaki slowly fell silent, his usual arrogant grin completely vanishing from his face. He trailed a few paces behind Axel and Sharky, his hand unconsciously touching the area over his heart where the Dragon Sovereign's power was fused into his soul.
A massive burst of blue static rippled from his chest. The space beside Zanaki distorted, and Azureus materialized in his humanoid form, walking silently alongside his young vessel. The Dragon King didn't look at the horizon; his vertical slitted eyes were locked entirely on Zanaki's pale face.
"You are shivering, boy," Azureus spoke, his voice a low, rumbling resonance that only Zanaki could hear clearly. "And it is not from the chill of the evening wind."
Zanaki didn't look up. "It's nothing, snake-eyes. Just thinking."
"Do not lie to a primordial," Azureus countered, his silver hair catching the fading twilight. "Our souls are bound. When you looked back at the city of Liya, your heartbeat spiked. Your mind drifted into a corridor of fog. I saw the fracture in your memory, Zanaki. I saw the girl."
Zanaki stopped walking, his boots digging into the dirt. Axel and Sharky kept moving ahead, their voices fading into the distance as they discussed the capital's defense lines.
"You saw her?" Zanaki whispered, a cold sweat breaking out on his forehead. "Then you know I'm not crazy. In the old world... in that ordinary hotel room before all of this. She was sitting right across from me. I can remember the way her silk hair moved, but every single time I try to look at her face... it's just gone. It dissolves into white, burning static."
Azureus narrowed his eyes, his draconic blood pulsing with deep, unsettling confusion. "A memory covered in glass. It is not a natural affliction of the human mind, boy. Someone didn't just make you forget; they completely purged the visual data from your consciousness. But that is not what truly terrifies you, is it?"
"No," Zanaki muttered, his hands trembling as he stared down at his palms—hands that were now capable of summoning a literal god of storm and lightning. "It's the link. The WhatsApp message I sent to the Akatsuki group."
He looked up at Azureus, his eyes wide with a sudden, horrifying clarity.
"I dug deeper into the memory, Azureus. I didn't find that link on a sketchy website. It didn't come from anyone on my contact list. It came from an Unknown Number—a string of digits that didn't even have a country code. And the notification... it didn't just pop up on my phone screen. It felt like the device vibrated directly inside my brain."
Azureus stood completely still, his majestic posture hardening. "A foreign command."
"I'm a joker, a nerd, a complete idiot sometimes," Zanaki whispered, his voice cracking. "But I would *never* send a suspicious, unverified virus link to the only real friends I had in the world. I loved those guys. But in that moment... it was like someone else took control of my body. Someone else moved my thumb. Someone else forced me to hit 'Send' to the group chat."
He looked toward the western horizon where Aethelgard lay.
"Our arrival here wasn't a freak accident or a random system glitch," Zanaki said, his breath hitching. "The sixteen of us were hand-picked. The Akatsuki group wasn't a random chat—it was a target list. And the person who sent that link... is the one running this entire circus from the outside."
Azureus remained silent for a long moment, his ancient mind processing the terrifying weight of the revelation. "If your memories are being manipulated by the creators of this world, then your silver-eyed leader is in grave danger. The King they seek to meet is merely a puppet of the interface."
***
Meanwhile, inside the glittering white spires of **Aethelgard: The Grand Astral City**.
Kataki led the larger faction through the towering, vaulted corridors of the royal palace. The walls were lined with thousands of high-ranking royal knights, their silver armor polished to a mirror shine, their eyes tracking the Sovereign Vanguards with intense suspicion.
Kataki walked with absolute calm, his twin fangs humming faintly beneath his cloak. Beside him, Vahn kept his hand resting on his sword hilt, his eyes burning with a decade of hatred as the heavy golden doors of the throne room swung open.
At the far end of the hall, sitting upon a throne woven from solid starlight, sat **King Sharon** His expression was unreadable, his eyes cold as he looked down at the teenagers who had rewritten the balance of his continent.
"Welcome to Aethelgard, Outworlders," King Sharon's voice echoed through the marble hall, carrying a weight that felt heavy, yet artificially hollow. "I have been waiting for you"