On a planet where cities never sleep and the sky pulses like a living organism, evening fractures into shards of light and lies.
Glamour. Music. Illusion.
Massive screens—like the eyes of some ancient god—broadcast dreams and wars. Commercial visions ripple in the wet sheen of asphalt, making it feel like reality itself has been folded into the scenery of the show.
High above the layered sprawl of the megapolis, in a luxurious venue suspended in air, the elite of a new era gather among bioluminescent walls and the curves of glass columns.
They are not seeking salvation. They are seeking forgetfulness.
Even for a moment.
To drown out the weight of decisions from which there is no turning back.
**
Ivor, Camilla, and Nicholas sit in the privileged zone.
The chairs embrace them.
The drinks shimmer and swirl.
The ambient light pulses in rhythm with some invisible acoustic tide.
Aromas—pheromones, spices, synthetic blossoms—swirl into a dizzying invitation to dissolve into the present.
Everything here feels alive.
Even the walls. Even the floor.
As if the building itself is rejoicing, anticipating a performance teetering between dream and reckoning.
Above the arena, the dome flickers.
At first—mountains. Cold, wild, shrouded peaks.
Then—darkness.
Replaced by stadium holograms.
An emerald arena ignites.
Armor. Blades. Light. Roar.
**
A gong strikes—and the world stills.
"Watch how they fight!" Camilla leans forward, her eyes lit with more than interest—pure, gleaming awe.
In the arena, it's not just combat.
It's an ancient dialect of power, translated into light and movement.
The gladiators collide like elemental forces.
Metal sings.
The ground trembles.
The audience consumes the spectacle like a starving church devouring a miracle.
**
Ivor says nothing.
His fingers slowly swirl the prism-colored rum in his glass.
A single drop on the rim bends the light, scattering it into a spiral of meaning.
He doesn't watch the battle—
not at first.
His thoughts drift somewhere beyond time.
Beyond the curve of evening.
Beyond the edge of choice, where even gods lose their will.
"We built the gate... But who will we let through it?"
"When will the force we awakened begin to act?"
"And will we still be ourselves if it chooses us?"
**
Nicholas watches too—
but not the arena.
In his pocket rests a data drive.
Heavy as a sentence.
Inside—every vulnerability. Every path.
He feels it:
"Soon. Very soon. One step—and that's it. No turning back."
"Curious which one of them makes it to the end," he mutters.
More to himself than anyone else.
As if hoping the answer might also give him a way to survive.
**
The final blow.
It's over.
The arena erupts in holographic fireworks.
The crowd roars, drunk on light and blood.
"Onzil advances to the next round!" The announcer's voice splits the air like a victory cry from a prehistoric beast.
Ivor takes a sip.
A faint smile touches his lips,
but his eyes stay cold.
The tension hasn't left.
It's simply gone to ground—
like a lion crouched in the brush.
**
A new pair enters the arena.
Nara—blazing-fast, a streak of fire.
Tanaun—massive, his steps thunder like hammers striking the world's armor.
Everyone holds their breath.
There will be a clash.
There will be a reckoning of forces.
**
Ivor leans forward.
His voice—barely above a whisper, but heavy, like a stone dropped into eternity:
"Today, the shield was deployed.
The platform is active.
Everything went according to plan."
Camilla nods.
For a fleeting instant, there's relief in her eyes—
but it vanishes like steam.
She knows:
"This isn't the end. This is the prologue."
"Good," she says—
her tone focused, precise, like a shot that knows its target.
A sharp glance toward Nicholas:
"Now we have to make it real. Fast."
**
Nicholas lowers his gaze.
A breath.
A pause.
A decision.
Slowly, he pulls out the drive.
The metal chills his fingertips.
"This," he says quietly.
"All the possible routes.
Every weak point.
I've checked them ten times.
But each time, I feared the eleventh would be the last."
**
Ivor takes the drive.
His eyelids tremble—
a tiny movement,
yet the weight in his palm feels cosmic.
Like he's holding a miniature universe.
Or a bomb with a ticking core.
"Let's see," he says.
And turns his gaze back to the arena.
**
There—a storm.
Blades flash like falling stars.
Nara and Tanaun spiral in a dance of death.
Their strikes speak in the language of the old world—
a world with no words.
Only combat.
Only choices.
Only will.
The music of battle.
The clink of glasses.
The breath of the crowd.
Whispers.
Light.
All of it—
a single breath.
A single nerve.
A noose tightening around the future.
**
But beneath the symphony—silence.
Taut.
Absolute.
Waiting.
Ivor, Camilla, and Nicholas no longer look at each other.
Each is alone.
Each already beyond the threshold.
And when this evening ends—
what they've lived for will finally begin.
And nothing that comes next can be stopped.