Chapter 2: The Singularity Protocol
The first thing Noah noticed when he woke again was the taste of iron.
His tongue felt heavy, metallic. The air hummed faintly — not with electricity, but with data, invisible yet dense enough to taste.
The sky above was darker now, washed in bruised shades of violet and gold.
And floating there, high above the clouds, was a jagged ring of broken light — a remnant of the sun's shattered shell, orbiting like a crown of dying gods.
He sat up slowly. His shadow didn't move with him.
It lagged — a second behind, like a corrupted file struggling to render.
"What… the hell?"
[System Synchronization: 23%]
[Cognitive Lock Stabilized.]
The words came again — not through his ears, but directly in his mind.
They weren't just thoughts; they replaced thoughts, slipping into his consciousness like they belonged there.
Noah took a shaky breath and looked around.
The observatory was gone. What remained was a cracked foundation half-sunk in molten asphalt. Trees floated several inches above the ground, their roots dangling like nerves.
And then, movement.
A figure stumbled from the haze — Aisha.
Her lab coat was torn, her skin burned in strange geometric patterns, like someone had traced code across her arms with fire. But her eyes… her eyes glowed faintly blue, lines of data flickering in her pupils.
"Noah?" she whispered. "Is that really you?"
He ran to her, grabbing her shoulders. "You're alive. Aisha, what—what happened to—"
She flinched. His touch made the ground tremble.
The space between them warped, pulling her a few centimeters closer without either of them moving.
[Protocol Surge Detected.]
Warning: Physical contact may destabilize local gravity field.]
Noah froze. The air shimmered around his hands. Pebbles lifted.
He released her instantly, stepping back in horror.
Her expression softened — fear, but also recognition.
"I think we're infected," she said quietly. "Or… evolved."
"Evolved?" Noah repeated. "Aisha, the entire magnetic field collapsed! This isn't evolution—it's corruption!"
She looked at the floating trees, the flickering sky.
"Maybe both."
Then the sound came.
A low, grinding hum that grew until the ground itself seemed to snarl.
From the far side of the ruins, a wave of darkness rolled across the landscape — not shadow, but pixels, black squares devouring everything they touched.
The Entropy Zone.
Noah could feel it coming. The gravitational field bent inward, pulling, consuming, rewriting.
"We need to move!" Aisha screamed.
But the Zone was faster.
It hit like a tide of smoke and static, swallowing the remnants of the observatory.
Noah grabbed Aisha and ran, the weight of space itself collapsing behind them.
Every instinct screamed to survive. Every rational thought screamed that this was impossible.
The ground vanished beneath their feet. They fell — into light.
And for a brief instant, he saw something in the heart of the distortion:
A shape. Human. Floating at the center of the entropy storm.
Eyes like twin suns.
It looked at him — and smiled.
[New Entity Detected: Fragment Host "Erevos" — Entropy Core: 81%]
[Host Power Conflict Predicted.]
Noah's scream was swallowed by the collapsing sky.
End of Chapter 2.