The delivery was, according to the chipped screen of my old bike-computer, for 4:15 PM. The address was a fortified townhouse on the edge of what used to be Washington Heights, now just “The Heights,” a shaky neutral zone between the Bronx ruins and the Van Der Wyck family’s claimed territory.The package in my courier bag was light, about the size of a book, wrapped in plain grey polymer-foil. The client, a reclusive alchemist who paid in real calories canned goods and clean water had been very clear.“Do not open it. Do not let the Astor patrols scan it. Do not be late. The dampening field on the foil lasts precisely one hour.”I checked the time. 4:02. I was cutting it close.I weaved the reinforced bicycle through a canyon of shattered concrete and twisted rebar. Three years since the Great Resonance, and New York was a patchwork quilt of the modern, the medieval, and the monstrous. Vines with a faint electric glow crawled up the sides of bank buildings.The air hummed, a constant

I needed real food, and I needed it soon. The System might keep my skin from getting cut, but it wouldn’t stop me from starving.There was only one option left. The Scrip Market.The market wasn’t a place, not really. It was a time and a signal. Two hours after nightfall, in the loading dock of an old garment factory near the Hudson. You needed a token to get past the lookouts a chipped piece of subway tile with a specific symbol scratched on it. I’d earned mine last winter by guiding a merchant through a sewer tunnel clear of sludge-crabs.The damp night air bit at my newly-sensitive skin, each gust feeling like a whisper of information grit, salt, decay. I pulled my patched jacket tighter, the hood up. The Market was already humming with low energy. Makeshift stalls glowed with soft bioluminescent fungus or buzzing Aura-stones. People traded in shadows, voices hushed. Here, you could barter for almost anything: algae wafers, purified water, salvaged tech, rumors, and sometimes, if

>>>>>Level 1. I’d done it. Power thrummed under my skin, a resilient, unyielding force. I flexed my hand, feeling the new strength. But as the euphoria faded, a new, chilling line of text appeared, pulsing slowly in crimson.>>>I looked at the empty vial. It wasn’t just a leash. It was a tracker. Mara knew I’d used it. She knew I’d taken the bait.There was no going back now. I had power, and I had a target. Tomorrow, I would go to the docks. I would use this new sight, this new skin, and find the Astors’ poison. One way or ano

Then came the sounds. The shriek of the Sumpspawn, multiplied in fury. The shouted orders of FARC agents. The crackle of unknown energy weapons Mara’s disruptor. And rising over it all, a chorus of shrieks and howls from every direction as the corrupted fauna of the docks, driven into a frenzy by the shockwave, descended upon Pier 56.Chaos. Perfect, violent, attention-grabbing chaos.I saw FARC’s green Auras flare as they tried to set up containment, only to be swarmed by glowing-red rat swarms and something larger with wings. I saw the lilac tags darting, not fighting beasts, but heading for the regulator. A second, smaller explosion the disruptor hitting its target.Sirens wailed in the distance. More green signatures FARC reinforcements. Flares shot into the sky from the substation, a classic Astor distress signal. The family had been alerted.It was done. The secret was out, in the messiest, most public way possible. The Astors, FARC, and the shadow market were now tangled in a

As if in answer, a beam of light shot from the center of the door, scanning me from head to toe. It wasn’t cold light; it felt like being weighed by a mountain.>>>>The Line of the Unyielding. My bloodline had a name. It sounded less like a mystical gift and more like a description. A verdict.The voice that spoke next wasn’t the System’s. It was a deep, resonant, and utterly weary voice that seemed to come from the stone itself, vibrating in my bones.“Kai. Scion of broken line. You come seeking the Forge.” It was a statement, not a question.“I… I found the Key. I was told this was mine.”“Yours by blood. Not by right. Right is earned. The Unyielding does not gift. It tests.” The door didn’t move. “Your foundation is the s