Seven days. That’s what the signal had said. Seven days until the Gate opened. Whatever that meant. Kingsley stood alone in the operations room of the Black Apex Tower, one of the most secure private intelligence hubs on Earth, built under his direction within thirty-six hours of acquiring the property.The screens around him glowed with live feeds: markets, surveillance satellites, dark web chatter, and the encrypted activities of organizations that were supposed to not exist. Aya hadn’t spoken since the warning. Evelyn hadn’t left his side.And Kingsley hadn’t slept in two days. He wasn’t afraid. He was calculating. And as he stared at the data streaming around him, a pattern began to form. Not in code. But in behavior. Power was moving. And it wasn’t moving toward him. It was running away.Four hours later, Kingsley’s private Gulfstream landed in Geneva. He was greeted by a caravan of armored vehicles, each belonging to leaders of multinational consortia, crypto-billionaires, and c

Kingsley stood in the upper chamber of the Avalon Tower, overlooking the skyline. The digital storm had passed, but the real world was shifting beneath his feet. In just five days, the Gate would open, a doorway to power and destruction, depending on who stood on the threshold.Aya’s voice filtered softly through the chamber. “Your mind survived the Bridge, but your body must now follow. You have five days to become something no one can stop.”He clenched his fists. “Then show me.”Aya emerged in her full projection, not just a floating interface, but a near-humanoid form rendered in light and energy. Her eyes shimmered like stars coded in ancient language.“I’ve unlocked the Ascension Protocol. It’s a neural-body training system designed by the original creators, used only once, centuries ago. It rebuilds you from the inside.”Kingsley stepped into the chamber’s core as pillars of golden light rose around him. “Every second inside here,” she continued, “compresses a day of real-time

The rain pelted the ground like falling glass.Kingsley stood frozen, his chest rising in sharp, heavy gulps as the man before him stepped into the flickering firelight. The wreckage of the exploded crate smoldered behind them. Evelyn was unconscious on the ground. Drones hovered in formation around the perimeter, their lenses glowing crimson.But none of it mattered. Because Kingsley was staring at a ghost. “Kenechi...” His voice cracked, barely a whisper. The name slipped past his lips like it didn’t belong there anymore.The man smiled. Older. Broader. Hardened. His Syndicate armor bore a gold insignia Kingsley didn’t recognize, something between a scorpion and a crown. But the eyes. Those were still the same. “Hey, little brother. You’ve grown.”The silence stretched like a chasm between them. Kingsley’s fists tightened. “You died. I buried you.”Kenechi chuckled. “You buried an empty coffin. They staged the wreck, remember? You saw the footage they gave you. What you didn’t see w

Kingsley didn’t remember hitting the ground. All he knew was the metallic taste of blood in his mouth and the feeling of gravity betraying him. The wind roared past as he fell, no, was pulled through the circular Gate behind Kenechi. And just before he lost consciousness, he saw it:A city suspended in digital twilight. A skyline of black towers woven with living cables. A blood-red sky where the stars pulsed like eyes. This was the other side. The True Core.He woke to silence. No rain. No drones. No Evelyn. No Aya. Just the hush of air that wasn’t quite air, and the odd sensation that the world was bending at the edges of his vision.He staggered to his feet. Everything felt lighter, but also wrong. His hands shimmered when he moved them too quickly. Data flickered along his skin like electric tattoos. A voice crackled in his ear distorted, low. “—ngsley—... do you copy?”He tapped the side of his head. “Aya?”“—e link... unstable... can't hold...”Then silence. He was alone.The gr

The knock still echoed, even after the door had split open. But the moment Kingsley laid eyes on what stepped through, his breath caught in his throat. It was him. Exactly him. Down to the last scar on his knuckles, the slight burn mark above his collarbone, born from a childhood accident with boiling soup. Same eyes, same voice.But something in its presence felt… wrong. The other Kingsley smiled a slow, patient curve of the lips that never quite touched the eyes. “You finally made it,” it said. “Took you long enough.”Kingsley stepped back instinctively, the Core reacting to his unease. The floating data nodes rippled like disturbed water, blinking red. “What are you?” he demanded.The doppelgänger didn’t flinch. “A consequence,” he said. “You think you were the only version the system built? Every time you made a choice, it forked the simulation. Every time you hesitated, another path splintered off.”He gestured at the door behind him, still cracked open. “I’m the Kingsley that ch