The corridor stank of ozone and scorched metal. Shattered steel doors hung limp on twisted hinges, half-swallowed by rubble. The air shimmered with residual energy, the kind that made skin crawl and nerves twitch. Emergency sirens howled like wounded animals, and medical units scrambled through the smoke, dragging stretchers and barking orders over radio static. Blood stained the floor in angry streaks, half-washed by extinguisher foam and broken coolant lines.
Chief Aomorii stood amidst the wreckage. She was stoic, arms crossed, her expression carved from stone. Her uniform was flecked with ash, yet pristine in posture, radiating a calm that demanded obedience. Deputy Haturii lingered beside her, murmuring into his comm, his gaze never resting, always scanning like a falcon on the edge of flight.
Footsteps approached fast—too fast. Two figures emerged from the haze.
Orenji skidded to a stop, breathing hard. "We came as soon as we heard."
Yukira stormed in after, eyes glowing a not-at-all-subtle angry green. "What the hell happened here?"
She was fire incarnate—tense, sharp, and already mentally reenacting the boss fight she missed.
Orenji, on the other hand, was cataloging exit routes, damage zones, and probably how much this mission would drop their Academy rankings. Because clearly, there was a rubric for disaster.
Haturii didn't bother with pleasantries. He pointed.
"An anomaly broke containment."
Yukira's gaze sharpened. "What classification?"
"Category 2," he said, grim as a narrator doing a last-time recap.
"Volatile-Class," Orenji echoed. "Creatures with unpredictable behavior. That's bad, but not this level of bad. Right?"
"No," Aomorii said. "It's worse. Volatile usually means erratic, unstable, but oftentimes containable with the right protocols in place. This one broke pattern."
She gestured to a half-collapsed corridor where reinforced alloy had been peeled back like paper. "The structural damage alone—it's bordering on the Cataclysmic."
"Cataclysmic-Class anomalies are capable of leveling entire districts." Yukira muttered, clearly remembering every textbook she ever skimmed five minutes before a test.
Orenji's face paled. "And if it continues to grow…"
Before the silence could deepen, a new presence cut through it like a razor through silk. Ganymede, the Regional Director of the ARGUS Foundation, strode toward them, followed by Dr. Rhys Stane. She walked like someone who'd never known defeat—and didn't plan to. Her long coat flared behind her, spotless despite the chaos, her heels clicking against the scorched floor in perfect rhythm.
"Chief," she said, nodding once. "Status report?"
Aomorii briefed her quickly. Ganymede listened, jaw tight.
Then her eyes landed on Yukira and Orenji.
"These ones... These are the assets the Academy sent?" she asked, dry as sand.
"We're Claive candidates," Yukira snapped. "Top of our year."
Claives were simply the state's living weapons. An elite force serving directly under their nation's command, much like the old-world shinobi or the Kingsglaive of ancient Lucian history. They served governments, not villages, acting as sanctioned weapons deployed against threats that couldn't be fought with conventional forces. When diplomacy failed and technology broke down, Claives were sent in. Not to negotiate. To neutralize.
Claive candidates, like Yukira and Orenji, were academy-trained operatives in the making. From a young age, they were taught to obey, to fight, and to sacrifice if necessary. They studied anomaly classifications like doctrine, drilled in combat against simulated breaches, and learned to manipulate Taiji—the spiritual force that fueled their abilities.
Becoming a full Claive wasn't about passing tests. It was about surviving them.
And Yukira and Orenji? They weren't just surviving. They were dominating. Mostly. Kind of. Depends who you ask.
"You're children."
"And yet, we're standing in a crater you yourself failed to contain."
Orenji winced. "Yukira…"
Ganymede raised an eyebrow, but didn't rise to the bait. Veteran move. "Haturii, walk with me. Bring the hotheads."
As they followed her into a reinforced briefing chamber, the lights buzzed faintly. Half the grid had been drained by the breach. Screens flickered to life, pulling up a containment profile labeled RS-07. The walls were steel-clad, thick with shielding tech, and yet the tension inside felt like walking into a war council moments before the first shot.
"It broke containment two hours ago," Ganymede began. "Breached three security zones in under ninety seconds. Our highest-level dampeners failed. It absorbed the EMP countermeasure and redirected it."
She tapped a screen. A seismic graph spiked off the charts.
"That... was new."
Orenji's eyes narrowed. "It's adapting."
"Fast," Ganymede confirmed. "This isn't just a Volatile-Class breach anymore. It's Cataclysmic, bare minimum."
"Thing's got main villain pacing." Orenji chuckled, though unregarded by anyone.
A new display appeared. A quarantine category projection, pulsing red.
"And if our estimates are correct in terms of anomaly classifications, it's on track to breach the Quarantine threshold within 48 hours."
Yukira's expression flattened. "Which would force the Foundation to lock down an entire city. No entry points. No exit."
"No hope," added Orenji, probably wishing he'd brought snacks.
"And if the anomaly persists beyond quarantine boundaries…" Ganymede paused, then tapped once more.
A new file opened—stamped OMEGA in blood-red letters.
All-caps. All-bad. Styled in red like every end-of-season cliffhanger.
The glow bathed their faces in silent dread.
"Extinction protocol," Orenji whispered. "Full total annihilation."
Humanity didn't bounce back from that.
Orenji looked around. No one's theme music played. That's how serious it got.
Ganymede continued. "Which is why we're initiating a full-scale recovery operation. You two—like it or not—are part of it."
Yukira scoffed. "You didn't even want us here."
"I still don't," Ganymede replied, with the emotional range of a brick. "But we're out of options."
"Great vote of confidence," Yukira muttered.
Orenji leaned toward her, lowering his voice to a calm, steady murmur. "Let it go."
"I am letting it go."
"You're never letting it go."
She opened her mouth to argue. So he did what every exasperated partner does in tense, possibly world-ending moments.
He clamped a hand over her mouth.
"Let. It. Go."
She bit him. Not hard. Just… enough to be petty.
"Every damn time," he muttered, nursing his hand like this wasn't their fifth mission with surprise dental engagement.
The tension between them hung thick in the air when Haturii cleared his throat softly, breaking their charged exchange.
"Can I speak with you privately?"
His voice was measured but carried an unmistakable edge of urgency.
Orenji blinked. "What? Why? I'm not in trouble, am I?"
Yukira rolled her eyes and elbowed him. "Come on, genius," she grumbled, yanking his collar like a dogwalker. "It's less soul-crushing over there than it is in here anyway."
As the door clicked shut behind them, Yukira tossed a casual middle finger over her shoulder.
Ganymede didn't blink. Aomorii's lip twitched. Possibly respect. Possibly gas.
Outside, the hum of auxiliary generators filled the silence.
"Hey," Orenji said finally. "I didn't understand half of what they said until they said Omega. I'm not dumb, right?"
"Don't push your luck," Yukira replied, her arms crossed.
They stood in the hallway like anime protagonists too young to save the world, too stubborn not to try.
And somewhere, someone definitely started cueing the opening theme.