The basement was flooded with a blinding gold radiance. Subject Zero stood there, his presence so stable it felt like a heavy anchor in the shifting code of the room. In his hand, the golden dagger didn't pulse or glitch; it hummed with a perfect, terrifying frequency .
"You keep calling her 'the girl'," Jin growled, stepping between Zero and Mi-na . He could feel the silver veins on Mi-na's neck vibrating, her "Living Glitch" status reacting to the proximity of the System's perfect puppet . "Her name is Mi-na. She's my sister. And she isn't a piece of data for you to collect" .
Zero tilted his head, his golden eyes scanning Jin's green-circuit veins. "Brother, you still don't understand. She is the 'Sick Soul' data-set . Leaving her in your hands is like leaving a virus in the heart of a city. I am not here to delete her; I am here to integrate her into the High-Tower, where she can finally be 'fixed'."
"Fixed?" Mi-na's voice echoed with a digital resonance that made the screens around Rin explode. She stood up, her electric blue eyes glowing with a raw power she had never shown before. "You want to turn me back into a prisoner of the code! I'm not a file! I'm alive!".
Rin, the mechanic, shouted from behind her monitors: "Jin! His dagger is a 'Reality Lock'. If he touches her with it, he'll wrap her in a golden cage that even your 'Delete' command won't break!"
Jin didn't wait. He lunged, combining Phase Shift with his Level 45 agility. He didn't just move; he flickered through the air like a broken video frame. His obsidian Glitch Dagger met Zero's golden blade in the center of the room.
The impact was silent. No sound, just a wave of pure static that turned the floor into a void. Jin's black mana began to bleed into the golden light, fighting for control.
"Mi-na, the Central Tower's backup!" Jin roared, his muscles straining against Zero's overwhelming strength. "Link with Rin! If we can't beat him here, we'll hack the city's power grid to blow his connection!"
As Jin and Zero are locked in a struggle of blades, Mi-na places her hand on Rin's main server. Her silver veins turn a deep, pulsing red. For a second, every neon sign in Tokyo flickers with a single message: [REBOOTING_REALITY_INITIATED].