The corridor stank of ozone and scorched metal. Shattered steel doors hung limp on twisted hinges, half-swallowed by rubble. The air shimmered with residual energy, the kind that made skin crawl and nerves twitch. Emergency sirens howled like wounded animals, and medical units scrambled through the smoke, dragging stretchers and barking orders over radio static. Blood stained the floor in angry streaks, half-washed by extinguisher foam and broken coolant lines.
Chief Aomorii stood amidst the wreckage. She was stoic, arms crossed, her expression carved from stone. Her uniform was flecked with ash, yet pristine in posture, radiating a calm that demanded obedience. Deputy Haturii lingered beside her, murmuring into his comm, his gaze never resting, always scanning like a falcon on the edge of flight.
Footsteps approached fast—too fast. Two figures emerged from the haze.
Orenji arrived first, his breath ragged. Sweat clung to his temples despite the corridor's unnatural chill. "We came as soon as we heard."
Behind him, Yukira's eyes glowed an angry green as they swept across the devastation. "What the hell happened here?"
She was fire in human form: tense, alert, already assessing danger with instinct honed by hundreds of simulations. Orenji, at her side, was all quiet calculation, his eyes moving in deliberate patterns, noting exit points, structural integrity, and movement patterns in the rubble but even he faltered at the scale of destruction before them.
Haturii didn't greet them. He simply pointed.
"An anomaly broke containment."
Yukira's eyes narrowed. "What classification?"
"Category 2," he said grimly.
"Volatile-Class," Orenji echoed. "Creatures with unpredictable behavior. That's bad, but not this level of bad. Right?"
"No," Aomorii said. "It's worse. Volatile usually means erratic, unstable, but oftentimes containable with the right protocols in place. This one broke pattern."
She gestured to a half-collapsed corridor where reinforced alloy had been peeled back like paper. "The structural damage alone—it's bordering on the Cataclysmic."
Yukira's voice dropped. "Cataclysmic-Class anomalies are capable of leveling entire districts."
Orenji's face paled. "And if it continues to grow…"
Before the silence could deepen, a new presence cut through it like a razor through silk. Ganymede, the Regional Director of the ARGUS Foundation, strode toward them, followed by Dr. Rhys Stane. She walked like someone who'd never known defeat—and didn't plan to. Her long coat flared behind her, spotless despite the chaos, her heels clicking against the scorched floor in perfect rhythm.
"Chief," she said, nodding once. "Status report?"
Aomorii briefed her quickly. Ganymede listened, jaw tight.
Then her eyes landed on Yukira and Orenji.
"These ones... These are the assets the Academy sent?" she asked, dry as sand.
"We're Claive candidates," Yukira snapped. "Top of our year."
Claives were simply the state's living weapons. An elite force serving directly under their nation's command, much like the old-world shinobi or the Kingsglaive of ancient Lucian history. They served governments, not villages, acting as sanctioned weapons deployed against threats that couldn't be fought with conventional forces. When diplomacy failed and technology broke down, Claives were sent in. Not to negotiate. To neutralize.
Claive candidates, like Yukira and Orenji, were academy-trained operatives in the making. From a young age, they were taught to obey, to fight, and to sacrifice if necessary. They studied anomaly classifications like doctrine, drilled in combat against simulated breaches, and learned to manipulate Taiji—the spiritual force that fueled their abilities.
Becoming a full Claive wasn't about passing tests. It was about surviving them.
And Yukira and Orenji? They weren't just surviving. They were dominating.
"You're children."
"And yet, we're standing in a crater you failed to contain."
Orenji winced. "Yukira…"
Ganymede raised an eyebrow, but didn't rise to the bait. "Haturii, walk with me. Bring them."
As they followed her into a reinforced briefing chamber, the lights buzzed faintly. Half the grid had been drained by the breach. Screens flickered to life, pulling up a containment profile labeled RS-07. The walls were steel-clad, thick with shielding tech, and yet the tension inside felt like walking into a war council moments before the first shot.
"It broke containment two hours ago," Ganymede began. "Breached three security zones in under ninety seconds. Our highest-level dampeners failed. It absorbed the EMP countermeasure and redirected it."
She tapped a screen. A seismic graph spiked off the charts.
"That... was new."
Orenji's eyes narrowed. "It's adapting."
"Fast," Ganymede confirmed. "This isn't just a Volatile-Class breach anymore. It's Cataclysmic, bare minimum."
A new display appeared. A quarantine category projection, pulsing red.
"And if our estimates are correct in terms of anomaly classifications, it's on track to breach the Quarantine threshold within 48 hours."
"Which would force the Foundation to lock down an entire city," Aomorii added. "No entry. No exit. No survivors."
"And if the anomaly persists beyond quarantine boundaries…" Ganymede paused, then tapped once more.
A new file opened—stamped OMEGA in blood-red letters.
The glow bathed their faces in silent dread.
"Extinction protocol," Orenji whispered. "Full total annihilation."
Yukira said nothing. For once, no fire. Just stillness. Her eyes remained fixed on the screen. Wide. Unreadable.
She knew what Omega-Class meant.
You didn't bounce back from it.
Ganymede continued. "Which is why we're initiating a full-scale recovery operation. You two—like it or not—are part of it."
Yukira scoffed. "You didn't even want us here."
"I still don't," Ganymede replied, unflinching. "But we're out of options."
"Great vote of confidence," Yukira muttered.
Orenji leaned toward her, lowering his voice to a calm, steady murmur. "Let it go."
"I'm just saying—" she started, ready to fire back another sharp retort.
But before she could finish, he clamped a firm hand over her mouth, his fingers pressing lightly but insistently. "Let. It. Go."
Annoyed but defiant, she bit at his hand lightly, a quick, playful snap of teeth that earned a weary sigh from him. "Every damn time…" he muttered, shaking his head.
The tension between them hung thick in the air when Haturii cleared his throat softly, breaking their charged exchange.
"Can I speak with you privately?"
His voice was measured but carried an unmistakable edge of urgency.
Orenji blinked. "Wait, what? Why?"
Yukira rolled her eyes, shooting Orenji a sharp elbow in the ribs. "Come on, genius," she muttered under her breath, grabbing the collar of his shirt and pulling him away from the noisy crowd. "It's way better over there than it is here anyway."
As the door shut behind them, Yukira extended a casual middle finger back toward the room. Ganymede didn't react—her expression unreadable. But Aomorii's lips tightened, if just barely.
Outside, in the quiet hum of the auxiliary hallway, Orenji exhaled.
"Hey… I didn't understand half of what they just said until the end. I'm not dumb, right?"
"Don't push your luck," Yukira replied, crossing her arms.
They were equals, yet opposites. Orenji the tactician, quiet and sharp. Yukira the wildfire, reckless and brilliant. Both forged for battle, but neither ready for what waited in the dark.