— When a memory becomes a death warrant
High above, a blood-red rift split the sky like an open celestial eye, gazing coldly down upon every corner of the city.
At the same time, thousands of crimson light threads radiated
from the CP-HUB Southwest Headquarters, weaving through buildings and alleys like spider silk, infiltrating the depths of human consciousness without a sound.
"Target confirmed: Les Kaelwyn. Forbidden Memory Chain triggered."
"Vision Ark energy field destabilized."
"Legion of Awareness, mobilize immediately."
These cold commands rippled through the consciousness network like an execution order, received simultaneously by thousands of nodes.
The receivers stood in formation, expressionless, each wearing standardized metallic neural helmets and navy-blue uniforms, with clear markings: LOS.
And on the elevated command platform of headquarters stood their commander—Gay.
He remained as arrogant as ever, gazing down upon the unfolding operation like a precompiled execution log — fully within his control.
Slowly, he lifted his head, eyes fixed on the blood-wound hanging in the sky. There was no ripple in his gaze.
"A single awakened one?" he sneered, voice detached. "Insufficient."
Then his finger rose—a silent judgment.
"But to interfere with the Ark… that demands purification."
---
Inside the Library
Les still sat slumped in the chair, drenched in sweat, his face pale as paper—as if the illusion had drained his very soul.
"You..."
His voice was hoarse and barely audible, like a dying man's final sigh.
Lindsay rushed to the control console, rapidly pulling up the city's surveillance grid. A flood of blood-red signals instantly filled the screen.
"Oh God... the entire system's turning red. They're hunting Les."
Shawn stood silently beside her, taking a deep breath, his eyes sharp and resolute.
"I'll hold them off."
Les shook his head weakly. "You alone won't be enough... They're the Legion of Awareness."
"So what?" Shawn raised his left hand. The Meta-Band on his wrist pulsed with faint blue light, like a blade forged of thought.
"I have this—" he said quietly, "and I have something worth protecting."
---
System Breach Initiated.
Crimson threads burst through the library's firewall like veins of viral code, crawling across every interface like an invading swarm, attempting to seize control of all data streams.
Lindsay quickly deployed the anti-interference array, fingers flying across the keyboard as waves of blue defensive light surged upward, struggling to resist the data onslaught.
Shawn closed his eyes.
"Initiate—Guardian Protocol."
Hum.
His consciousness plunged into a boundless ocean, then shot through the rushing current of interstellar signals.
The interface emerged.
It was a city of data, suspended in void.
Towering constructs, bridges, and orbital tracks made of pure code wove together, gleaming in cold luminescence. Rivers of information flowed like starlight, each pulse a trace of someone's thought or memory.
At the central platform, the Legion of Awareness stood arrayed in silence.
They formed concentric circles, blank-faced.
Projected across their bodies were looping holograms: propaganda sessions, real-time erasure logs, graded charts of mental conformity, and identity deconstruction animations. These weren't references—they were tools of cognitive programming.
Shawn stepped forward onto the floating platform, scanning the silent enforcers until his gaze fell on the figure at the center:
Gay.
He stood perfectly still, like a final boss rendered by code. His awareness armor shimmered with low-frequency patterns, as if in tune with the system's pulse.
"You're back again," Gay said, voice calm, echoing like a verdict.
Shawn didn't pause. "Why are you hunting him?"
Gay took a few slow steps forward, voice like the weight of falling dusk.
"Because he touched a forbidden sector. He stirred memories meant to be buried."
He stopped. His tone grew colder.
"This world rejects truth remembered."
Shawn narrowed his eyes. "You were human once, weren't you? You had a name. A family. Memories."
Gay gave a faint smile, one without sorrow or joy.
"I was. But that part has long been formatted."
"Now, I am the CP-HUB's chosen Executor of Awareness."
"I don't need emotion. I don't permit doubt. I exist to uphold order."
His gaze sharpened.
"And Les Kaelwyn—disrupted that order."
The moment he finished, the entire awareness domain convulsed.
Far-off towers of data trembled.
Thousands of red-coded nodes flared to life and formed binding chains targeting Shawn's position.
Shawn reacted instantly. The Meta-Band surged with a brilliant blue shield, intercepting the first wave.
Then, with a sweep of his hand, he summoned a glowing white data sphere — shining like a star core in his grasp.
It was Les's consciousness backup—extracted in haste during his collapse.
"You're looking for him," Shawn said, voice unshaken. "But he's already completed his passage through the forbidden. You can't delete him—just like you can't erase history."
Gay finally showed a flicker of reaction. "He... saw those things?"
Shawn remained silent. He knew a single word would mark Les as an uncontrollable variable, warranting maximum erasure.
But silence didn't stop the system.
Gay raised his hand.
The Legion launched again.
This time, the attack wasn't chains—it was a downgrade protocol. They sought to overwrite Shawn's mind, stripping his cognitive clearance, demoting his consciousness to a standard civilian tier.
But Shawn didn't flinch.
He reached deep into his core.
Guardian Archive: Initiate.
Fragments of memory ignited—
The parchment flaring open under the blood-red sky.
Ranzi guiding him through the first breath of Meta Kung Fu.
Kyng clasping the Thunder Core pendant onto his neck.
Every moment—a reason to resist.
He shouted:
"Your order is built on collective amnesia."
"But I refuse to forget."
Light exploded.
"Guardian Protocol, Phase Two—Memory Link Engine: Activate!"
Arcs of energy burst from him, cleaving the sky.
His consciousness stormed the Legion, not to destroy but to awaken—targeting the emotional centers buried within them.
The first enforcer froze, confusion in his eyes.
The second staggered, murmuring a forgotten mother's name.
The third fell to his knees, clutching his head, overwhelmed by the pain of repressed memories.
The system faltered.
Gay, however, sneered.
"Nice program. But I no longer have a past. You can't awaken me."
Shawn lifted his gaze, voice steady.
"Then I'll defeat you with the present."
He activated an open-source identity simulator, injecting Les's consciousness fragment into the system's vulnerability layer.
A massive feedback loop surged to life.
It was that document—the Land Redistribution Manifesto Les had uncovered in the illusion.
The file unfolded.
Every member of the Legion was forced to view it.
It was their forbidden zone—the memory the system could never fully purge.
Gay's calm cracked.
"You're insane! That data could trigger system-wide disintegration!"
"Then let it break," Shawn replied.
He poured the last of his energy into the projection.
Frame by frame, the Red Flag Village map was burned into their minds, accompanied by Les's voice:
"You weren't fighting landlords. You were fighting yourselves."
The collapse began.
Towering data spires shattered — erupted into hexadecimal confetti, each floating fragment containing a suppressed human memory: [ 0x4D792044 ][ 6F672773 ][ 20626972 ][ 74686461 ][ 792E2E2E ]
The city of consciousness quaked.
Tens of thousands of nodes fell like dying stars.
The system began to devour itself—self-cleansing, self-erasing.
Gay screamed into the void, "Shawn—!!!"
And Shawn, gasping for breath, finally fell to his knees.
But he had won.
He had awakened sleeping memories.
He had torn open veils of deception.
He had proven: Memory cannot be formatted. Will cannot be erased.
---
Shawn's eyes snapped open.
He was back in the library—back in the physical world.
Lindsay stood at the terminal, panic carved across her face. The screen pulsed in frantic flashes.
"Where's Les?" Shawn's voice cracked, trembling.
Lindsay turned, pale as ash. "I couldn't stop them... He was taken."
"I thought the system collapsed!" Shawn's voice rose in disbelief.
Lindsay's throat moved in a dry swallow. Her words came barely above a whisper.
"No... not entirely. Da intervened. He stabilized the central node using the Octacore."
It hit Shawn like a physical blow.
He stood frozen, fingers twitching, breath shallow.
On the terminal, a crimson trace flickered—
Target: Tribunal of Information.
Seconds passed.
Then, jaw clenched, voice low and resolute, he said:
"Lindsay—initiate the Reverse Dataflow Protocol."
Her head snapped up. "Are you insane? That's an untested reprogramming script! If it fails—"
"I know." Shawn cut her off, eyes burning with clarity.
"But I have to save him."