The Vasena facility was never truly silent. Beneath its white walls and blurred glass, the air vibrated with machines that never slept, the faint hiss of filtration systems, the pulse of hidden circuits, the steady rhythm of ventilation that held the building in a constant sterile calm. The sound was almost gentle, but it left no space for warmth.
That morning, if it could be called morning at all, Ryu woke to the sound of his door sliding open. The panel did not knock or wait for permission. It simply decided the day had begun and acted accordingly. Someone stood in the doorway. Not Arvis. Not a staff member in uniform. Not another child. It was a woman.
Her black hair fell neatly to her shoulders, each strand arranged with a discipline that felt deliberate rather than cosmetic. Her skin was pale, her eyes sharp and focused, like a lens that had just locked onto a subject. Her movements were calm, never rushed, never slow, the measured pace of someone who expected the world to adjust to her rhythm instead of the other way around.
She studied Ryu from head to toe. His knees tensed before he could control it. The woman spoke in a soft voice that still managed to cut. "Ryu Alverion." Ryu nodded. "Yes."
She adjusted her glasses, then closed the door with a single touch. "First names are not important right now." Ryu lowered his gaze a little. "Who are you." Her smile was thin and unreadable, more like an evaluation than a greeting.
"Cassandra Nox," she said. "Analytic Investigation Division. Second Instructor of Seven." The title settled on Ryu's mind with heavy weight. Second instructor. The second deity in a structure of power he barely understood. Someone who, within the state system, might rank higher than most ministers. Cassandra stepped past him without asking permission, as if the room belonged to her more than to him. She walked to the center and stopped.
"There is a great deal we need to discuss."
She glanced at him. "Breathe. You look like a child who has just seen his own shadow move without him." Ryu stayed where he was. Cassandra tilted her head slightly.
"Arvis has examined your stability. Mental stability is not the same as cognitive stability."
Ryu frowned. "What is the difference."
"Cognition is how your mind reads the world," Cassandra said. "Stability is how your heart withstands it." She leaned in a fraction. Her voice softened, but the pressure in it made the small room feel tighter. "And you, Ryu, read the world in a way nobody trained you to."
"Walk with me."
She moved first, not looking back to see whether he followed. The corridor looked different today. Floor lights dimmed themselves to a lower intensity, and sections that were usually bright now glowed only with thin lines of white. Cassandra's steps were nearly soundless, as if the ground made room for her rather than absorbing her weight.
"You have already disrupted one state system," she said suddenly. Ryu stiffened. "I did not mean to." "There is no need to defend yourself." She lifted her hand slightly and his words stopped. "I am stating a fact, not an accusation."
Ryu lowered his eyes. "Is the machine very expensive." Cassandra stopped and turned fully toward him. "Ryu. The spiral system is not expensive. It is irreplaceable."
She closed the distance by one step.
"You halted a pattern that took a technical team three months to stabilize."
"I did nothing." Cassandra gave a small smile. "That is the problem. You did it without intent."
The words without intent echoed in his mind. They walked until they reached a door marked with a red symbol he had never seen on any of the maps Arvis showed him.
"What is this place." "Closed Observation Room D A Zero," Cassandra said. The door opened. Cold air flowed out to meet them.
The room was long and narrow, washed in thin white light from above. The walls were bare. No cameras visible. No decorations. Only a metal table, a single chair, and a large blank screen at the far end. The emptiness felt surgical, as if emotion had been cleared from the air.
Cassandra tapped the side of the table. "Sit."Ryu obeyed. She walked a slow circle around him, examining his posture, his breathing, even the way his hands settled on his knees. When she stopped, her voice dropped in volume.
"Ryu. I need you to be honest. Completely honest." Ryu gave a small nod. "What do you want to know." Cassandra stopped behind him. Her words brushed the back of his neck. "Last night. What did you see on the spiral screen."
Ryu bit down on his lower lip. The memory rose clean and sharp. Hello, Trigger. We will meet in Sector D Three. N.V. He closed his eyes. "Text. There was text." "Tone," Cassandra said. "Color. Direction." "White. Cold. It felt like writing from my own mind."
"Not from the machine," Cassandra finished for him. Ryu turned his head slightly. "You already knew." "Ryu." She tapped the metal surface with two fingers, a rhythm as precise as a metronome. "The spiral system only projects patterns. There is no text module. No communication channel. If you saw words, something else connected itself to the system."
Ryu swallowed. "Was that something human." Cassandra's smile returned, smaller and sharper. "Good question. The answer is no." Ryu felt the room tilt by a degree. "Then what was it." "An entity," Cassandra said.
She walked to the wall screen and touched a small panel. The display blinked to life, showing a dark circle. Then the recording began. Ryu watched his own test from the other side of the glass. Watched the spiral spin and then halt unnaturally, exactly at the point where the pattern should have shifted.
"This is not an error," Cassandra said. "It is an interception." "Interception of what."
"Of a cognitive network. Something broke through the machine and attached itself to your perception."
Ryu's heart pounded hard enough for him to feel it in his throat. Cassandra folded her arms. "I want to understand something."
She sat in front of him now, the table a narrow barrier between them. "Ryu. Are you afraid."
The question hung heavy. Ryu took longer than he expected to answer. "I do not know."
Cassandra studied his pupils. "You do not know," she repeated quietly. "An extremely unusual reaction." Her fingers tapped the table once. "Good. We continue."
She opened a holographic file above the table. Lines of data and brain scans floated in the air, forming complex shapes. "Do you know why we call you a Class One Subject," she asked. "Because my father registered me as one."
"No." Cassandra rotated the hologram so he could see a particular cluster. "Because your brain does not operate like a normal brain."
Ryu exhaled slowly. "I do not feel special."
"That is because you use your abilities by default," Cassandra said. "You do not activate them. They are always on."
She pointed at a highlighted region.
"This is the pattern cortex. The part of the brain that tracks rhythm, micro movements, and body language. In a typical person, it lights up when they solve puzzles or search for subtle change."
She shifted the projection. A series of green waves pulsed in continuous motion. "In you, it is active when you breathe." Ryu's eyes widened. "It means you read the world the way a system reads a data stream," Cassandra said. "Every slight change in tone, every blink, every breath, you record it all without knowing."
Ryu pressed his lips together. "Then what does that make me." Cassandra tilted her head, as if examining a rare artifact. "It makes you something Vasena never managed to create on purpose," she said. "Someone who maps reality like a living interface."
Abruptly, Cassandra shut down the hologram. The faint electric hum in the room faded. "Ryu. Repeat the text you saw last night." Ryu straightened his back. "Hello, Trigger." Cassandra nodded. "Continue."
"We will meet in Sector D Three." Her eyes sharpened. "And at the end," Ryu said quietly, "it was signed N.V."
The room fell into a deeper silence. Cassandra slowly removed her glasses. The gesture was small, but it felt like a shift in the structure of the air. "Ryu," she said in a softer tone. "Do you know what those initials stand for." Ryu shook his head. "Did Arvis tell you nothing." "No."
Cassandra slid her glasses back on and straightened her posture. "N.V. is the reason Sector D Three was erased from Vasena's records." She did not look away as she spoke. "Five years ago, there was a person who used neural patterns to penetrate state systems. He did it alone. No hardware. No interface. Only his brain."
Ryu felt his stomach twist. "His name," Cassandra said, her voice barely above a whisper, "is Nex Vanthor."
Ryu felt his blood slow inside his veins.
"Nex Vanthor is alive." "We never found a body," Cassandra answered. Ryu drew in a tight breath. "You think he wrote that message."
Cassandra did not reply. She studied every detail of his face, searching for the slightest hint of deceit or denial. Then she stood.
"Ryu. If Nex Vanthor truly is still alive."
She lifted her chin toward the white ceiling.
"Then you have just become his first communication channel in five years."
Ryu's body went rigid. Cassandra looked directly into his eyes. "And that leaves only two possibilities," she said, raising two fingers. "First, you are his target." Ryu's throat tightened. "And second."
Cassandra stepped closer. Her voice dropped until it was almost a breath. "You are the only person he can use to return to Sector D Three." The overhead light flickered once, as if something unseen were listening.