The Citadel changed the moment Kade sat on the throne.
Not violently. Not with alarms or shaking walls. But with a deep, wordless acknowledgment—like the system had taken a breath for the first time in years. The silence wasn't empty anymore. It was listening.
Beneath his hands, the armrests were warm, humming with ancient power and memory residue. Ghosts of commands flowed beneath his skin—orders written by his former self, long before he'd understood the weight of kingship.
Behind him, Marei stood still. Watchful. Maybe afraid.
"You feel that?" he asked, not turning.
"I feel everything," she said. "And so does the System. You've just awakened a tier of access buried beneath every known protocol. It's rewriting around you."
He leaned back. "Then let it."
The spires of Citadel Zareth shimmered, vanishing into mist as the environment changed. The throne chamber bled into a different space—a high observatory of cracked glass and hovering panels, showing Earth not as it was, but as it had once been.
Lush. Blue. Alive.
"This is a projection," Marei whispered, stepping closer. "The system's rendering the last clean image of Earth before the Fall."
Kade reached toward the panel. The moment his fingers brushed the image, it fractured.
Images flooded in.
Not shards. Not fragments. Whole memories, raw and furious, slamming into him like a storm. He saw battles he hadn't fought yet. Cities still standing. People alive who should be dead. And at the center of it all—himself. Crowned. Worshipped. Hated.
He pulled back, breath shaking.
"It's not just memory," he said. "This throne… it's predictive. It's running simulations. Seeing every timeline I could choose."
"And some you shouldn't," Marei said.
He glanced at her. "What happens if I pick the wrong one?"
"You won't die," she said. "But the world might."
The chamber trembled. A new alert flared on the nearest panel. This time, no simulation. A real-time signal.
**Breach detected. External gate compromised.**
Marei's head snapped toward the sound. "We've got movement outside. Someone's coming in hot."
Kade stood from the throne. The moment he moved, the Citadel shimmered again—armor sliding across his limbs like living steel, forged from command protocols and legacy coding.
Marei tossed him a sidearm from her harness. "Guess your coronation isn't going unnoticed."
"How many?"
She tapped her lens. "Unconfirmed, but it's organized. Maybe a warband. Or worse—Remnants."
Kade walked toward the elevator shaft that would take them to the Citadel's western corridor. "Good. Let them come."
At the doors, he paused. His hand hovered over the control.
"Kade," Marei said. "If we do this… it's war. The Citadel isn't just a symbol. It's a declaration. The moment we defend it, the enemies you forgot will remember you."
"Let them," he said.
Then he pressed the control.
The doors slid open with a hiss, revealing the passage beyond. Shadows moved at the edge. Weapons gleamed. Voices murmured in a tongue the system had long redacted.
And somewhere in the dark, a voice called out—a woman's, fractured by radio static, but clear enough to burn.
"Kade Fallon," it said. "You don't belong on that throne."
Marei lifted her weapon. "That voice—"
He stepped forward. "I know who it is."
The corridor exploded into fire and steel.
And the true Reset began.