Kael realized something was wrong when the city stopped responding to his intent.
It wasn't immediate.
There was no alarm, no sudden pressure crushing his mind, no sharp awareness of being watched. Instead, it was subtle—so subtle that he almost dismissed it as exhaustion.
Almost.
He stood at the entrance of a transit station he'd used dozens of times before, staring at the automated gate as it blinked red.
ACCESS DENIED
Kael frowned.
He checked the card in his hand. Same one. Same faint scratch along the edge. He swiped it again.
ACCESS DENIED
Behind him, people shifted impatiently. Someone cleared their throat. Another stepped around him and passed through the gate without issue.
Kael tried a third time.
Nothing.
A station attendant glanced at him, then looked away too quickly—like her eyes had slid off him without meaning to.
"Excuse me," Kael said, keeping his voice calm. "There's a problem with the gate."
She hesitated before answering, her brow furrowing. "Gate's fine."
"…It's not letting me through."
She looked at him again, more carefully this time.
Not confused.
Uncomfortable.
"I don't see your entry logged," she said after a pause. "You'll need to step aside."
Kael opened his mouth to argue, then stopped.
Her tone wasn't hostile. It wasn't even dismissive.
It was procedural.
Like he'd already been categorized.
He stepped away from the gate, letting the flow of people continue uninterrupted. The crowd swallowed the space he'd occupied without slowing down.
Kael stood there for several seconds, unmoving.
Then he turned and left.
Outside, Argentinis carried on as if nothing had changed. Vehicles glided past. Screens flashed advertisements. Vendors shouted over one another.
Life, uninterrupted.
Kael walked for nearly an hour, testing small things as he went.
A public terminal refused to register his ID.
A café claimed they were out of stock—of everything.
A public archive terminal failed to load when he touched it, then worked perfectly when someone else stepped in.
Every system had a reason.
Every failure was clean.
Isolated.
Explainable.
Together, they formed a pattern.
"They're not blocking me," Kael muttered. "They're… excluding me."
The realization settled cold in his chest.
He wasn't being chased.
He wasn't being observed directly.
He was being removed from relevance.
Kael ducked into a side street and leaned against the wall, closing his eyes for just a moment. He focused inward, carefully, deliberately.
Threads surfaced.
But not like before.
Where the city's structure had once felt interconnected—dense, layered, alive—now certain pathways simply didn't acknowledge him, nor respond to his intent. As soon as his awareness brushed against them, it slid away, as if he lacked the permission—the authority—to exist there.
Locks.
Again.
Only now, they weren't just on his power.
They were on the world.
Kael opened his eyes slowly.
"So this is what secondary means," he whispered.
Not important enough to pursue aggressively.
Not dangerous enough to eliminate immediately.
Just… inconvenient.
Something to be handled quietly.
As he pushed off the wall, a ripple brushed past his perception.
Not pressure.
Not attention.
A classification ping.
Brief. Mechanical. Gone almost instantly.
Kael stiffened.
Someone—or something—had just checked him.
He walked on, pulse steady despite the tightness in his chest.
The pendant remained silent.
That scared him more than any warning.
By evening, the weight of it became undeniable.
People didn't look at him the same way anymore.
They didn't avoid him.
They forgot him.
A man bumped into Kael hard enough to nearly knock him over, muttered an apology, then paused mid-step.
"…Wait," the man said, turning around. "Did I—?"
His eyes drifted past Kael.
He shook his head and walked away.
Kael stood frozen.
That wasn't perception manipulation.
That was priority suppression.
His existence was being deprioritized by the systems people relied on—both technological and cognitive.
He wasn't invisible.
He was unimportant.
Kael laughed quietly, the sound sharp and humorless.
"This is worse," he said under his breath.
Night fell over Argentinis in layers of light and shadow. On the edge of the lower districts, Kael climbed the fire escape of an abandoned residential block and sat on the rooftop, legs dangling over the side.
He didn't reach for the threads.
He didn't test the pendant.
He just watched the city breathe without him.
Somewhere far away, in a room without windows, a conversation concluded.
"Primary target status remains unchanged," a voice said calmly. "However, secondary variable behavior has stabilized."
Another voice responded, colder. "Meaning?"
"Erasure protocols are viable."
A pause.
"Proceed carefully," the second voice said. "We don't want another anomaly."
Back on the rooftop, Kael finally felt it.
Not observation.
Not pressure.
A decision being made.
He closed his eyes and inhaled slowly.
If this continued, he wouldn't be hunted.
He wouldn't be killed.
He would simply stop mattering.
Kael opened his eyes.
"No," he said quietly.
For the first time since morning, the pendant stirred—just slightly.
Not in power.
In agreement.
Kael stood, rain beginning to fall around him, and looked out over the city.
If the world was trying to erase him…
Then he would have to become something it couldn't ignore—control, or shape.