The city above was still burning when Adrian finally woke.
He lay amid the ruins of the catacombs, surrounded by cracked stone and drifting motes of blue light. Every breath felt heavy, each exhale leaving trails of mist that shimmered like starlight.
[System Rebooting…][Core Link: Partial Integration — 47%][Warning: Neural feedback unstable.]
He sat up slowly, the ache in his skull pulsing with each heartbeat. The air smelled of ozone and ash. Beside him, the fractured Core flickered faintly, its glow synchronized with his own heartbeat — thump, pulse, flicker.
Lucien's spirit hovered nearby, his once-steady form now fragmented, static crawling across his edges.
"Adrian… you're alive. Barely."
Adrian's voice was calm, almost detached. "Alive is enough."
He looked at his hands — veins glowing faintly blue beneath the skin. For a moment, he flexed his fingers and the ground around him responded — stones shifting, dust lifting as if gravity itself was listening.
Lucien watched silently. "You've gone too far. The System wasn't meant to merge with a human mind."
Adrian smiled faintly. "Maybe it never had the right mind to merge with."
He stood and began walking through the shattered tunnel. The deeper he went, the more his surroundings changed — stone turning into smooth metal, ancient carvings replaced by mechanical conduits pulsing with blue light.
At the end of the tunnel was a steel door half-buried in rubble.Its surface bore an engraving — "Project A-01: The Beginning of Salvation."
Adrian brushed his hand across it.
[Access recognized.][Subject A-01 — Authorization restored.]
The door slid open with a hiss of compressed air. A corridor stretched beyond, lined with glass tubes — each one holding a humanoid shape suspended in luminescent fluid.
"Clones…" Lucien whispered. "All of them… you?"
Adrian walked past them, expression unreadable. "Copies. Failures."
Some of the figures inside the tubes had disfigured faces, others half-formed bodies, all frozen in silent agony.
[Memory fragment detected.][Play record?]
Adrian hesitated. Then: "Play it."
A holographic projection flickered to life — scientists in white coats, the same gold-armored woman from the Echo Chamber overseeing them.
"Subject A-01 synchronization incomplete. Emotional output exceeding safe limits.""The resonance is unstable, ma'am.""Proceed. We can't let morality stop progress."
The projection ended. The silence afterward was suffocating.
Lucien's voice was low. "They built the Heroic System using human souls… didn't they?"
Adrian closed his eyes. "Not souls. Lives. Over and over, until I became the one that survived."
He stopped in front of the final tube.Inside was a small boy — no older than six — pale, lifeless, with black hair and faint scars across his arms.
His own childhood face.
Lucien looked at him, then back at Adrian. "That's you… the one before regression."
The boy's eyes suddenly snapped open — glowing the same blue as the Core. The glass cracked.
[Synchronization: 50%][New Resonance Detected — Echo Protocol Activation]
Adrian stumbled back as the tube shattered. The boy stepped forward, dripping with liquid light, eyes burning with impossible clarity.
"You shouldn't have come here," the boy said — his voice a mirror of Adrian's own. "The Core isn't yours to control."
Adrian's heart pounded. "Who are you?"
"I'm what they left behind," the boy replied. "The part of you that chose to be a hero."
Adrian frowned. "Then you're already dead."
The boy smiled — sad, knowing. "You keep saying that, but you're the one who's dying. The more you fight the System, the more it consumes you."
Adrian stepped closer, power rippling beneath his skin. "Then maybe I'll consume it first."
[Command Executed: System Override – Level 2][Initiating Integration Sequence]
The chamber trembled violently. The boy screamed, his body dissolving into streams of light that wrapped around Adrian's arms, chest, and face.
Lucien shouted, "Adrian, stop! You don't know what that'll—"
Too late.The light exploded, filling the chamber.
When the glow faded, Adrian was kneeling on the ground, trembling. His reflection in the metallic floor showed glowing markings spreading across his skin — intricate runes pulsing like circuitry.
Lucien approached carefully. "What did you do?"
Adrian rose, voice low and steady."I ended the part of me that still believed in their lies."
He looked toward the cracked Core fragment behind him.
[System Override Expanded.][New Ability Unlocked: "Echo Command."][Description: Absorb and rewrite Heroic Echoes into personal will.]
Lucien's expression hardened. "You're playing with godhood."
Adrian turned toward him, eyes like shards of glass. "Gods built this world and then abandoned it. Maybe it's time someone else rewrites it."
Scene Shift — The Fallen City
Above ground, chaos reigned.Heroes across France were collapsing as their Systems malfunctioned. Streets filled with panicked civilians as holographic warnings blinked across the skyline.
[System Instability Detected.][Heroic Network: Disrupted.]
Clara awoke in the wreckage of a safehouse, coughing. The last thing she remembered was Miriel's light engulfing her.Now she was surrounded by shadows.
Her communicator crackled with static, then a broken voice came through."—Captain Clara—if you're alive… don't go back to the Citadel. They've—" static "—they've declared you a traitor."
She stared at the device, heart racing."Of course they have…"
Outside, the rain finally stopped.But the clouds above glowed faintly violet — the same hue as Adrian's new power.
Scene Shift — Adrian, hours later
Adrian emerged from the underground facility, his clothes torn and his body still emanating faint light.He stood in the ruins of what used to be the old metro, the sky glowing faintly above.
The city was silent. Not a single siren, not a single bird. Only the hum of residual energy filling the air.
Lucien appeared beside him again, quieter now."What will you do?"
Adrian looked up at the glowing clouds. "The System connected everyone to its network — heroes, villains, soldiers, even civilians. Every one of them is bound by invisible code."
Lucien's voice trembled. "And you can touch that code now."
"Yes," Adrian said softly. "And if I can touch it… I can rewrite it."
He clenched his fist, and above him, a faint aurora of blue light rippled across the clouds, responding to his will.
[System Override — Passive Expansion Active.][Influence Range: 2.3 km and increasing.]
Lucien whispered, "You're not the same man who wanted to be a hero."
Adrian smiled faintly — not cruel, not kind, simply resolved."No. I'm the man they created when they tried to make one."
He turned toward the horizon — where the Citadel's lights still flickered in the distance."Let them call me a monster. Monsters don't obey gods."
[Synchronization: 62%][Next Stage Unlocked — "Path of Reconstruction."]
Lightning flashed across the sky, painting his shadow over the ruins.For a moment, the city seemed to bow to him.
And Adrian Laurent — the Rejected Hero — walked into the storm.