I called it Frame Zero.
Not for lack of imagination—no, the name was deliberate. This was not a vessel built to sail oceans, nor even stars. This was the beginning. The skeleton of a god-machine. The first step toward remaking destiny itself.
And as I stood before the rising scaffold in the Forge Vault, watching the mana-steel ribs glow under binding heat, I felt it—not pride, but clarity.
New Blueprint Loaded: FRAME ZERO – Interdimensional Starship Prototype
Material Requirements: 90,000 mana-steel units, 3 Soul Crystals, 1 Quantum Core (Active), Etherthread x1,000
Progress: 3%
"Start slow," I told Joseph. "One layer at a time. And keep the outer structure shrouded. I don't want the court sniffing around again."
"We've already attracted attention," he said grimly, passing me a small envelope.
I opened it.
No seal. No signature.
Just a single line, handwritten in red ink:
"He's watching. Even in the void."
That was the second warning this week.
The first came two days earlier, when a rogue Aetherflare shot from the southern tower's forge coil and tore through a nearby leyline gate. The explosion knocked three engineers unconscious and briefly shorted the protective barrier around Frame Zero's engine block.
But the flare hadn't been random.
It carried a signature.
An imprint.
Foreign Energy Trace Detected
Origin: UNKNOWN DIMENSION
Message Embedded in Static: "Come find me."
We were no longer alone.
That terrified me. But it also confirmed everything.
The multiverse was real. And something—or someone—had crossed through first.
Whether that made them an explorer… or a hunter… I didn't know yet.
But I would.
Construction continued over the next week. The lower frame assembled like the skeleton of a sleeping beast: sleek plating, interlocked pylons, a fusion chamber at its core designed to channel both mana and quantum resonance.
Kaethe watched from the scaffold's edge, arms folded.
"Looks more like a warship than a beacon," she muttered.
"It's both," I replied. "And maybe a coffin, too, if we get it wrong."
"Comforting."
Three nights later, the core activated for the first time.
We fed it raw essence: magic, memory, echoes of past victories.
The vault lit up in blinding white light.
And then… a voice.
Not mine. Not the fragment.
Something else.
"...Heir. Architect. Remnant of Collapse..."
"...You should not exist."
"...Yet you built the gate anyway."
Everyone froze.
Then a shockwave pulsed from the Frame, shorting half the lab and knocking the engineers flat. I remained standing—barely.
I heard it again, but softer.
"The path is open. But you are not the first."
NEW QUEST: Dimensional Interference
Objective: Investigate the Voice in the Core
Optional Objective: Trace Signal to Its Dimensional Source
Reward: ???
Frame Zero Progress: 17%
Level Up: 35 → 36
+5 Stat Points – Assigned: Mana +5
Later that night, I walked the unfinished halls of the Frame alone.
I pressed my hand to the inner core.
"Who are you?" I asked the silence.
And in the reflection of the polished metal, I saw something impossible.
Not a monster.
Not a god.
But my own face.
Older.
Hardened.
And smiling back.