Global News Center — Paris Headquarters
Newsroom. 10:47 p.m.
The sound of keys tapping was constant, a buzzing of tireless bees under the artificial glow of the ceiling lights. Monitors flashed with real-time data, mana charts, guild activities, breaking news notifications. It was just another normal night — until it wasn't.
Sarina Carpentier, the most feared (and award-winning) journalist on the international news circuit covering the Awakened, crossed the hallway with a cold coffee in one hand and a digital notepad in the other. Her high heels echoed with authority. Her eyes were tired, her mind sharp as ever.
"Don't wake me up for anything less than a magic bomb or a coup d'état between guilds," she had said countless times.
But then... her assistant literally stumbled into the newsroom.
"S-Sarina! You need to see this!"
She stopped. She looked. She raised an eyebrow.
"If it's another fake invasion in Seoul, I swear I'll throw this coffee at your..."
"— It's not that! It's... it's a breakthrough! An Awakened One — advanced from Rank-E to Rank-S. Directly!"
Silence.
The entire room froze.
The coffee fell from her hand.
"Repeat that."
"Second Ascension! The report is preliminary, but confirmed by three guild radars. The Association is already in media blackout. They're trying to cover it up. But we have one of the mana trails pinned on the European satellite!"
Sarina spun on her heels and ran back to her glass room.
"Close the door! Bring the satellite data. I want location, growth curve, presence detection, and magic scan!"
Journalists began to move. Alarms went off. Screens lit up. Paris Central became a war center in two minutes.
Sarina sat down, throwing her golden hair back, her eyes burning with pure focus. She typed furiously.
Code: "RISING TITAN."
Subject: AWAKENED FROM SECOND ASCENSION. DIRECT ADVANCE: RANK-E > RANK-S.
Status: FIRST CONFIRMED CASE IN THE WORLD.
The graph rose on the screen. A trail of mana that started from an irrelevant point—a name that barely appeared in the hunters' records—exploding in such an absurd vertical curve that the sensors almost broke.
Sarina didn't blink.
"This... isn't an advancement. This is a rebirth. A god being born among worms," she murmured, amazed.
"Name?" she asked, without taking her eyes off the screen.
The assistant swallowed hard.
"— Seth Chambers."
She paused. She remembered. The name had already crossed her radar days ago, rumors involving high-ranking guilds, internal conflicts, assassinations of evaluators.
But now...
Sarina smiled. A smile of someone who had just found the story of the decade.
"Prepare the global special. The headline will be mine. And put it on full screen."
The screens changed. His name appeared in red letters vibrating with pulses of magical energy: "SETH CHAMBERS — THE FIRST AWAKENED OF THE SECOND ASCENSION. FROM AND TO GOD."
She leaned back, her eyes burning with adrenaline and ambition. "We have work to do! HAHAHAHAH" she laughed like a madwoman, it was her favorite pastime...
To find out more about the awakened ones.
The night was dense, perfumed with the smell of rain that threatened but did not fall. The city lights seemed to vibrate with something more than electricity—as if the world itself were on alert.
Seth Chambers pushed the terrace curtain aside with the palm of his hand, his footsteps heavy on the stone floor wet with dew. The air seemed denser, more charged. He could already feel it in his body: the world had noticed him.
He leaned on the railing and looked down.
A sea of people.
Cameras. Drones floating. Holograms from news networks spinning in the air with his name in giant letters.
Seth frowned.
"...Why are there so many people down there?"
His voice was low, but laden with disbelief. He was still trying to get used to the weight of his own name echoing across the planet.
Vixen, leaning against the doorframe, gave a slight cynical smile and raised an eyebrow. The night wind ruffled her dark hair and her open overcoat, like that of a villain too elegant to care.
"Rank-E to Rank-S, my dear..." she shrugged as if talking about the weather "...what were you expecting? A bouquet and congratulations?"
Seth gripped the edge of the railing. The veins in his arm throbbed with pure, unstable mana. He was different. He could feel it. As if the atoms in the air were reorganizing around him, respecting him.
"What a mess."
Vixen laughed, this time for real. A hoarse, amused, mocking laugh.
"Ah, but the spotlight is the least of it. You just tore apart the logic of the World Order of the Awakened. Direct advancement is very rare. That's why everyone is watching you now. Especially the big guilds... I wonder what they would think if I, a guild master, were your wife... they would be very concerned, right?"
She walked up to him and looked down at the crowd below, as if watching ants scurrying around in fear of the sky.
"This is going to be fun, seeing their reactions."
Seth looked at her. His eyes were still trying to keep up with the speed of the world around him.
"And you, will you want to recruit me too?"
Vixen smiled—not that polished guild diplomat smile, but the predatory smile, the same one she gave before crushing an enemy with a snap of her fingers. She was silent for a second, letting the question hang between them like an electric tension about to explode.
The wind blew, lifting the hem of her coat. The smell of magical ozone still lingered in the air—the echo of something that had changed the global balance that night.
She took another step until she was face to face with Seth.
"Recruit you...?" she said, almost as if savoring the words. "Please, Seth. Don't insult me."
She slowly ran her hand over his shirt lapel, her eyes fixed on his.
"You're no ordinary hunter. You're not someone who takes orders. But it's good to know that my darling is successful and can help me when something bad happens." She winked.
Seth and Vixen exchanged knowing glances—the kind of silent connection that only two dangerous forces could share. But before the tension between them could turn into something more, the terrace door burst open with a loud bang.
"You two!"
The voice cut through the air like a silver blade. Connie, the short-haired strategist with augmented reality glasses, appeared with an expression that mixed urgency and professional exasperation. She wore the tactical vest of the Free Agents — a neutral group supporting the Awakened — and held a transparent tablet with data pulsing in real time.
"Seth, Vixen. Time to leave. Now."
Vixen raised an eyebrow. "And here I was thinking the romance was just beginning. What a fucking killjoy."