Aiden knew something was wrong the moment the system woke him.
Not with pain.
Not with alarms.
With silence.
The black interface hovered above his vision, motionless. No warnings. No numbers. No containment status pulsing reassuringly at the edge of his awareness.
Just a single line of text.
[Phase Two Initiated.]
His breath caught.
Phase One had been observation. Testing. Measurement.
Phase Two, by implication, meant escalation.
The containment room's lights dimmed as the walls shifted, panels sliding apart to reveal a deeper chamber beneath the facility. Aiden felt the pressure in his chest tighten, the Fragment responding instinctively.
Not aggressively.
Curiously.
The elevator descended without sound.
Hana stood across from him, arms crossed, jaw tight. She hadn't spoken since they'd entered. That alone told him everything he needed to know.
"This wasn't scheduled," Aiden said quietly.
"No," she replied. "It wasn't."
The platform slowed. Stopped.
Before the doors opened, Hana finally looked at him. Really looked at him.
"Listen carefully," she said. "Phase Two removes artificial restraints. Not the system's containment but the environmental ones."
Aiden frowned. "Meaning?"
"You won't be in a simulation," she said. "And you won't be alone."
The doors slid open.
The chamber beyond was vast far larger than any training facility Aiden had seen. The ceiling stretched upward into darkness, illuminated only by floating rings of containment light. The floor was scarred, cracked, layered with old mana residue.
This place had been used before.
And not gently.
At the center of the chamber stood three figures.
Not Hunters.
Prisoners.
Each was bound by heavy suppression collars, their eyes dull, bodies marked with scars that glowed faintly with unstable mana. Failed Rankers. Overloaded awakenings. People who had lost control and survived the consequences.
Aiden's stomach twisted.
"You're using them?" he asked.
The director's voice echoed through the chamber. "They volunteered."
Aiden didn't believe that for a second.
"They will be released," she continued. "One at a time. Your objective is not to defeat them."
"Then what?" Aiden demanded.
"To endure," she said. "To suppress yourself while exposed to uncontrolled power."
The system pulsed for the first time since waking.
[Environmental Restrictions: Lifted.]
[Power Output Limit: 0.05%]
Aiden's heart slammed against his ribs.
That was five times more than before.
Still nothing.
Still catastrophic.
The first collar disengaged with a sharp hiss.
The man screamed.
Mana erupted from his body in violent waves, cracking the floor beneath his feet. His eyes locked onto Aiden instantly drawn, magnetized.
"YOU," the man roared, voice distorted. "YOU'RE THE REASON".
He charged.
Aiden didn't move.
The pressure inside him surged violently, the Fragment reacting like a predator sensing prey. Reality bent subtly around his body, the air thickening, warping.
[Threshold Warning: 0.04%]
Pain lanced through his chest as the system tightened containment.
Don't react. Don't react.
The man's attack slammed into an invisible field inches from Aiden's face. The shockwave blasted outward, shattering containment lights, slamming Hana back against the barrier.
Aiden staggered.
Not from impact.
From restraint.
"Control it!" Hana shouted.
"I am!" Aiden snapped back, teeth clenched.
The man attacked again. And again. Each strike forced Aiden's power inward, compressing it further, tighter, denser. The Fragment screamed silently inside him, furious at being denied.
[Output: 0.05% — Maximum Allowable]
Aiden dropped to one knee.
The floor beneath him cracked not outward, but inward, as if gravity itself bent toward his presence.
The man froze mid-motion.
Not stopped.
Pinned.
He collapsed, gasping, blood streaming from his nose as the pressure vanished.
The system pulsed.
[Containment Stable.]
Aiden barely heard it.
The second prisoner was worse.
Her power manifested as distortion space folding unpredictably, tearing chunks from the chamber walls. Aiden felt it immediately. Not as threat.
As resonance.
The Fragment surged violently, responding to something familiar.
[Authority Fragment Resonance Detected.]
Aiden screamed.
Not aloud.
Inside.
Images flooded his mind fractured worlds, collapsing skies, laws unraveling. His vision blurred as the pressure spiked uncontrollably.
[Emergency Containment Engaged.]
Pain exploded through his nervous system, sharper than anything before. He collapsed fully, convulsing as the system forced his power down.
The woman screamed too, her distortion imploding as the pressure rebounded.
Both of them fell silent.
The chamber was still.
Aiden lay on the floor, shaking, lungs burning.
Hana was shouting his name, but it sounded distant. Muffled.
The director's voice cut through everything.
"End Phase Two."
The final collar disengaged.
And then,
Nothing happened.
The third prisoner didn't attack.
He simply looked at Aiden.
And smiled.
"You feel it too," he whispered. "Don't you?"
Aiden's blood ran cold.
The system screamed.
[UNAUTHORIZED INTERACTION DETECTED.]
The man's body disintegrated instantly erased, not destroyed.
Silence followed.
Hours later, Aiden sat alone in containment again.
No cuffs.
No restraints.
Just the system.
[Phase Two Complete.]
[Authority Fragment Growth: 0.12%]
[Psychological Stability: Degraded.]
Hana stood in the doorway, face pale.
"They didn't tell me about the third one," she said quietly.
Aiden didn't respond.
He was still hearing the man's voice.
You feel it too.
"What was he?" Aiden asked finally.
Hana hesitated. "A failed anomaly candidate."
Aiden laughed weakly.
"So… me. If I fail."
She didn't deny it.
That night, Aiden didn't sleep.
The Fragment no longer felt dormant.
It felt aware.
And for the first time since awakening, Aiden understood something terrifying:
The system wasn't just containing him.
It was racing him.
Because whatever he was becoming.
It was coming faster than anyone expected.