They didn't know his name.
Not yet.
But the walls did.
The chain-scored concrete of Sector 7 whispered strange things now. Things that didn't sound like orders or system relays. Echoes that pulsed at the wrong time. Drones that paused mid-route. Lights that flickered not from failure but from hesitation.
Raifu had inverted the grid three hours ago.
And already, it was spreading.
Somewhere in the lower silos, beneath the labor pits, a boy felt his breath align with something that wasn't his heartbeat.
A cleaner drone whirred past him—and stopped.
Its sensors blinked, confused.
It didn't scan him.
It just rotated once…
And moved on.
That was the first sign.
The rhythm had changed.
In Sector 7-G, a collapsed girl with soul fever opened her eyes during lights-out. She didn't cough. Didn't cry. She just tapped her fingers against her leg.
Three. Two. One. Pause. Repeat.
No one taught her the pattern.
She'd heard it in her dreams.
They were starting to emerge.
The Broken Ones.
The ones the system couldn't fully map.
Too fractured.
Too irregular.
Too alive in ways the rhythm couldn't hold.
And now?
They were waking up to the rhythm Raifu had broadcast.
He stood in the upper relay hall, the heart of Sector 7's hijacked pulse system. The Wolf Spiral had rendered half the security tempo blind, and now his movements were written into the surveillance as default behavior.
He was the beat.
Raifu accessed a relay panel and scanned the broadcast range.
[Reach: 24% of Sector]
[Signal Strength: Weak Echo]
[Unbound Candidates Detected: 4]
Would you like to initiate Thread Call?
He stared at the screen.
This wasn't planned.
Not yet.
But this was how cults started. Not with lies. Not with declarations.
With recognition.
With someone far away, curled in blood or shadow, whispering—
"I'm not alone."
Raifu touched the command glyph.
Thread Call: Broadcast Begun.
A pulse left the panel.
Low. Deep. Intimate.
Not a siren.
Not a signal.
A hum.
Somewhere far below, in the generator maze, a girl's hand snapped upward as if caught by an invisible chord. She sat bolt upright. Her pulse accelerated.
She wasn't just listening.
She was matching.
Somewhere else, an old man cracked his knuckles. He hadn't fought in decades.
But his fingers knew that beat.
He'd trained with it before.
Even if he'd never heard it until now.
Raifu stepped back from the panel.
He didn't smile.
But his eyes were calmer than they'd been since he died.
Then—
He heard a different sound.
A foreign beat, clashing with his. Faint. Shaky.
But hostile.
Ping Detected
Unauthorized rhythm signature approaching from south corridor
Name: Enforcer-V Command Line
Class: Tier IV
Alignment: System-Aligned
Pattern: High-speed precision tempo
Threat Level: Elevated
Raifu flexed his hand.
Felt the shockfork still humming on his hip.
No more hunters.
This was a cleaver.
Not a man built to mirror rhythm, but to obliterate it.
A rhythm immune to elegance.
Only speed.
Only power.
Only brute tempo.
Raifu turned slowly.
His eyes narrowed.
"You sent the song," said a voice.
It echoed from down the hall like a hammer falling on steel.
The air tightened.
"Now I bring the silence."
The air tensed.
It wasn't fear.
It wasn't heat.
It was the sound of a rhythm that didn't listen.
Raifu had known beats like this before—on Earth, in the ring, when brute fighters didn't wait for timing or style. They didn't feint. They didn't pivot. They swung like hammers, convinced that pressure would erase elegance.
This one wasn't a man.
It was a reset function in human form.
The hallway flickered.
Lights rippled in time with Enforcer-V's approach:
Thud. Pause. Thud-thud. Drag. Thud.
The tempo wasn't beautiful.
It was deliberate dissonance.
A marching beat designed to jam all rhythm recognition.
Raifu's breath hitched.
His body didn't want to match that pattern.
It wanted to reject it.
Then he saw him.
Nine feet tall.
Shoulders built like prison gates.
Hands wrapped in mana-seared gauntlets etched with system law sigils.
No eyes—just two slits of white rhythm-suppression glow across the front of a helmet.
Enforcer-V.
Not a soldier.
A living subroutine.
System Manifested.
"You are out of sync," the thing said.
"You are unregistered, unratified, and unrepeatable."
Its voice wasn't a voice.
It was a mechanical verdict.
Raifu said nothing.
He bent his knees slowly.
Centered his weight.
Right foot slid a half-step forward—barely touching the edge of the grid.
He didn't summon mana.
He withdrew it.
Focused on breath.
This fight wasn't about power.
It was about surviving someone who didn't care about the music.
The giant moved.
Step One.
A forward leap. Too fast. The floor broke.
Raifu sidestepped.
Just in time.
Shockwave behind him.
Debris scattered.
Step Two.
Raifu spun left, slicing a ghostloop mid-turn.
The echo flickered toward Enforcer-V—
Blocked. Crushed. Ignored.
Step Three.
Palm feint. Duck. Backstep.
Enforcer-V advanced again, arms swinging like pendulums.
Every movement deleted the air around it.
Rhythm wasn't bent.
It was scrubbed.
I can't match his tempo, Raifu thought.
I have to make him chase one that doesn't exist.
He shifted tactics.
Moved not in sequence—but in broken spirals.
Used half-steps. Stutters. Off-beat slides.
Created a dance made from glitches.
His body pretended to be flawed.
But every flaw was a trap.
Enforcer-V overcommitted—twice.
Once during a downswing.
Once during a stomp.
Both times, Raifu responded—not with full attacks, but with inserts.
Insert One: Echo Delay Pulse
➤ Slipped under the Enforcer's left arm
➤ Left behind a rhythm-weak spot
➤ Delayed activation
Insert Two: Thread Lag Hook
➤ Touched the Enforcer's boot edge during a feint
➤ Planted a vibration-skip
➤ Awaited friction activation
He circled again.
Breath now rhythmic.
Energy low—but tight. Clean. Managed.
This was the new Raifu.
Not fighting to win.
Fighting to exhaust the rhythm killer.
Then—he struck.
Triggered Insert One.
The echo pulse detonated behind Enforcer-V's left shoulder.
Just a second's hesitation.
Raifu took it.
Step Four.
He dove forward—shoulder into hip.
Not to topple.
To embed rhythm.
Step Five.
He slid underneath.
Twisted upward.
Shockfork out.
Crack—
Right behind the knee.
Sparks.
Enforcer-V staggered.
It didn't cry.
Didn't groan.
But it slowed.
Just enough.
[Mana Efficiency Triggered – Echo Loop Restoration: +1 Mana]
[Agility +1]
Raifu's motion reached phase tempo.
Raifu raised his hand.
Fingers formed the spiral again.
Not five beats.
Just one.
"Wolf Spiral."
The floor rejected the Enforcer's left foot.
His momentum turned against him.
The rhythm fractured.
The system feed glitched.
The machine-man fell.
Not shattered.
Just out of beat.
And the system hated that more than death.
Raifu stepped back.
Didn't finish the kill.
He didn't need to.
That silence he brought?
It was already broken.
[Thread Count: 6]
[Named Combo Used: Wolf Spiral]
[Soul-Link Event Triggered – Unbound Candidate Approaching]
Raifu turned slowly as he heard the footsteps behind him.
Light.
Measured.
Wrong.
Wrong, but trying.
She was young.
Wearing a cracked slave collar.
One eye swollen.
But her footsteps tried to match his beat.
Not perfect.
But close.
"Did you… did you send it?" she asked.
He nodded once.
"Then… I think I'm supposed to follow you."
END OF PART II (Can I get some stones?)
Her steps were uneven.
Not from pain.
Not from fear.
From trying too hard to move right.
Like someone humming along to a song they didn't know the lyrics to but still needed to sing.
Raifu turned to face her fully.
She looked maybe fifteen. Hair shaved in patches from collar maintenance. Dirt lined her jaw where the chain-collar chafed. Her brand still pulsed, but it was dull, flickering like it no longer agreed with itself.
But the rhythm inside her?
It was struggling to sync.
"Who are you?" he asked, voice calm, low.
She stood up straighter than her body wanted to.
"N—Nisha."
A small tremble in the "N." Not weakness. Just the memory of silence.
"I used to… clean terminals. Then I started hearing things that weren't there. The lights. The drones. My feet."
She looked down at them, embarrassed.
"They wanted me to stop tapping. Said it disturbed grid flow. Said it… wasn't mine to hear."
Raifu stared at her.
Then slowly stepped forward.
He knelt, placing one hand gently on the metal floor between them.
"Can you hear it now?"
She nodded, once.
"It's quieter here. But… thicker. Like honey on glass."
He tapped once.
Just a fingertip on iron.
Thum.
She jumped.
Then… blinked.
Her eyes lit slightly.
And she matched the second tap perfectly.
Raifu felt it.
Not just mimicry.
She had rhythm sensitivity.
Her tempo was messy, but alive. She felt beats in instinct, not thought.
A rhythm child.
Untrained.
But real.
"You're not like the others," she said softly.
"You don't move like pain is waiting at the end of each step."
He looked at her for a long moment.
"You followed the hum?"
"I didn't mean to. My fingers just started copying. Then my feet. I had to hide it. But it wouldn't stop. Not after I slept. Not after the shock chair. Nothing could make it stop."
Raifu nodded once.
Then stood.
He walked past her.
She hesitated—then followed.
No words exchanged.
But her steps began to mirror his more closely with each meter.
They passed the shattered Enforcer-V, its helmet still flickering. The system hadn't tried to reclaim it. The rhythm was too corrupted here now.
The system didn't see Raifu anymore.
It was starting to fear him.
They reached the central relay again.
The lights flickered, then stabilized.
Raifu placed his hand on the relay console.
Nisha stepped closer, then stopped.
"Is this what you're doing to all of it?" she asked.
"Making it hear you?"
Raifu stared at the pulsing console lights.
"I'm making it remember."
"Remember what?"
He looked at her.
His eyes didn't blink.
"That we moved before we were measured."
[Soul Resonance Detected – Nisha: Thread Potential = YES]
Role Assigned: Pulse Anchor
➤ Raifu gains +5% Mana Regeneration when near Nisha
➤ Echo loop fluctuations stabilized within 12 meters
➤ Cult Presence: 1 Confirmed
She didn't feel stronger.
But she felt needed.
They moved again.
This time, not away.
Deeper.
Final Message Logged (Sector 7 Grid):
"Unknown anomaly restructured the rhythm web. Pulse behavior now semi-organic. Soul brands misaligning. Correction teams neutralized.
We are losing tempo."
Chapter: 4
Level: 3
Thread Count: 6
Stat Points Earned: +2
Points Allocated: +1 Mana, +1 Agility
New Passive: Pulse Anchor (Nisha)
New Named Combo: Wolf Spiral (Previously Unlocked)
New Status: Cult Presence Initiated (1 Follower)
Combat Style Used: Broken Step Asymmetry + Inversion Counter
Notable Event: Enforcer-V defeated; Nisha joins as follower; first rhythm transmission impacts non-combatants
🧠 Real-World Etymology Note:
"Cult" – from Latin cultus, meaning "care, cultivation, worship."
Originally, cultus meant tending to the sacred—a gardener of divine rhythm.
Raifu's followers are not zealots.
They are caretakers of a sound the system forgot it once belonged to.