Late that evening, sleep refused to come.
Linn lay on her back, staring at the ceiling, counting seconds that stretched too long in the silence.
There was one thing bothering her most.
She was hungry.
Not the kind that could be ignored.
This hunger sat stubbornly in her stomach, sharp and insistent, as though her body had suddenly decided it had demands.
Late-night cravings.
“Unbelievable,” she muttered, pushing herself upright.
For a moment, she simply sat there, debating whether it was worth giving in.
Then she remembered—there was a cafeteria somewhere on the upper floors.
Jion had mentioned it earlier.
She slipped out of her room quietly.
The hallway outside was dimly lit and silent—the kind of silence that made it feel as though the building itself was watching.
The elevator doors slid open the moment she approached.
She stepped inside and stared at the panel.
It made no sense.
The floor numbers were there, from ground floor to rooftop, but something about them felt wrong.
Not completely scrambled, and not out of order either.
Just arranged in a way that did not feel intuitive.
“Why does it look like a puzzle?”
She tried to recall what Jion had said earlier.
Something about restricted floors.
Something about memorizing access points.
Something about the numbering system not being what it seemed.
“Of course, I wasn’t listening.”
After a few moments of staring at the panel, she pressed 26.
The doors closed.
Everything felt normal—the soft hum of the elevator ascending, the faint vibration beneath her feet.
The elevator slowed, and the doors slid open.
Cold air rushed in.
“What? But I pressed 26.”
She stepped out slowly, confused.
Her shoes met rough concrete instead of polished flooring.
It was not the cafeteria.
It was the rooftop.
She walked forward a few steps, glancing around.
“Who designs a system where 26 is not 26?”
But she lingered instead of heading back immediately.
The city stretched endlessly below her—streets threading through the darkness in glowing lines, and buildings standing like quiet giants beneath the night sky.
From this height, everything looked smaller, more manageable, and almost peaceful.
For a moment, the hunger faded into the background.
Then something caught her eye.
A few steps away, near a low concrete ledge, sat a pair of binoculars.
They were simply lying there—no case, no cover—like someone had left them behind and never returned.
She glanced around again.
The rooftop was still empty.
Curiosity won.
She walked over, picked up the binoculars, and turned them briefly in her hands before raising them to her eyes.
The world snapped into clarity.
Buildings sharpened.
Windows became visible.
Moving figures turned distinct.
It was almost dizzying how something so far away could suddenly feel so close.
“Wow. This is cool,” she murmured, adjusting her grip.
She scanned slowly at first—rooftops, intersections, passing vehicles.
Then—
Movement.
Her focus stilled.
A figure.
Down below, weaving through a lit street, moving fast—too fast to be casual.
There was urgency in the way he moved.
Precision.
Linn adjusted the binoculars slightly, narrowing her eyes.
Then she saw it.
Something ahead of the figure.
Not a person.
Not solid.
A shifting mass of smoke.
It moved unnaturally, slipping through the air as though it had no weight or form to anchor it.
It twisted, stretched forward, then recoiled and dispersed as if trying to escape.
Her grip on the binoculars tightened.
“What is that thing?”
The figure chased it relentlessly, closing the distance with calculated speed.
The smoke vanished.
Just like that.
Gone.
The figure stopped abruptly.
Still and alert, his head turning slightly as he scanned the surroundings, as though trying to track something that had disappeared into nothing.
Then—
The figure looked up.
Directly at her.
Her breath hitched.
She did not lower the binoculars.
Her grip tightened instead, instinct overriding hesitation as she adjusted the lens, pulling the image closer, sharper.
For a split second, she saw his face clearly.
Sharp features.
Cold, steady eyes.
As if he was not merely looking in her direction, but directly at her.
Through the distance.
Through the height.
Like he knew exactly where she was.
“…No way.”
The moment stretched before instinct finally kicked in.
She pulled the binoculars down, her heart racing.
“…Did that person just see me from up here?”
She stared at the empty air in front of her, then slowly stepped closer to the edge and glanced down with her own eyes.
Too far.
Way too far.
There was no way.
She shook her head lightly.
“Of course I’m overthinking.”
But something about it did not sit right.
Her brows furrowed slightly.
After a beat, she raised the binoculars again.
The street below came back into focus, but the figure was gone.
There was nothing left to suggest anyone had been there at all.
Linn slowly lowered the binoculars, her grip loosening just a little.
She glanced at the device in her hands, then back at the city.
She stayed by the ledge longer than she meant to.
The image of that figure lingered stubbornly in her mind.
The way he moved, the way he looked up, and the way he seemed to look directly at her.
But what was that thing he was chasing?
She exhaled and shook her head, forcing herself to look away.
Food.
That was the original plan.
She walked back toward the elevator and pressed the button.
Nothing happened.
She frowned and pressed it again, slower this time, as if that would somehow make a difference.
Still nothing.
“What happened?” she murmured, pressing the button repeatedly now as confusion and frustration crept in.
The panel remained lit, but the doors refused to open.
A faint click echoed from somewhere deep within the shaft.
“This does not seem broken,” she said under her breath.
Someone was controlling it.
The rooftop suddenly felt too open.
She glanced around instinctively, but there was no one—no movement or sound except the distant hum of the city below.
She stepped back from the doors, arms crossing briefly as she waited, tension coiling quietly in her chest.
“This is scaring me.”
Seconds stretched uncomfortably, the silence pressing in.
Then, without warning, a sharp mechanical click broke through the stillness.
Linn’s head snapped toward the elevator.
The panel flickered, and the doors slid open.
The moment they parted—
A figure burst out.
Fast.
Precise.
No hesitation.
Linn barely had time to react before a hand seized her arm, yanking her off balance as another arm locked around her neck from behind.
Her back slammed against the figure’s frame, the impact knocking the breath from her chest as cold metal pressed against her skin.
A blade.
Right at her throat.
Her pulse spiked instantly.
Her body froze beneath the grip restraining her from behind.
“WAIT—WAIT—PLEASE DON’T KILL ME! I’M NOT A BAD PERSON! I PROMISE!”
The words rushed out in panic as her hands lifted instinctively, palms open, careful not to make any sudden movement.
The hold remained firm, controlled, and precise.
The blade did not press deeper, but it did not move away either.
It stayed exactly where it was—steady and deliberate. Enjoying the story?
Silence followed, heavy and suffocating, broken only by the sound of her uneven breathing.
Behind her, the figure did not respond.
No warning.
No reaction.
Just stillness.
Then, a subtle shift in pressure.
Not mercy.
Not hesitation.
Assessment.
The figure adjusted his grip slightly—not loosening, not tightening, but recalibrating.
The blade remained at her throat as his attention narrowed, assessing her posture, her tone, her fear response.
She was not resisting.
No concealed weapon.
No counter-movement.
No aggression.
Just panic.
The silence stretched another second.
Then the figure finally spoke, his voice low, flat, and controlled.
“Not armed.”
It was not a question.
It was confirmation.
The blade still did not move immediately, but its angle shifted by a fraction—less threat, more evaluation than execution.
Linn swallowed hard, trying not to move her neck against the blade.
“YES! NOT ARMED! VERY NOT ARMED!”
The pressure around her neck loosened slightly, just enough to let her breathe without strain, but his arm remained firmly in place, still controlling her movement.
The stance did not relax.
Only the intent had shifted—from lethal to containment.
The figure spoke again.
“You were observing. Explain.”
Linn blinked, still frozen.
“I—I wasn’t observing anything! I was trying to get food and this building hates elevators!”
There was silence.
Then the figure finally lowered the blade and released her.
Linn stumbled forward a step before catching herself.
She immediately turned to face him, one hand going to her neck, fingers brushing the spot where the blade had been.
She looked at him properly now, taking in the same sharp features and the same cold, steady eyes that had locked onto hers from impossibly far away.
Her breath caught.
“You’re the one from earlier!”
A beat.
Then her eyes widened.
“Wait—this is a restricted area! How did you get here? Are you an enemy?! Did you come here to abduct me?!”
She instinctively stepped back, suspicion replacing confusion in an instant.
He did not react.
Instead, he raised a hand to his earpiece and spoke, his voice low and controlled.
“Flicker to Helium. Area clear. Restore elevator access.”
Linn froze at the codename.
It was Niel’s.
Her eyes narrowed slightly as realization began to form.
So this guy is one of them?
“Memorize the floor mapping. The numbers are misleading.”
He did not wait for a response.
His hand moved to the control panel with practiced ease, fingers pressing a sequence Linn could not follow.
The system responded almost immediately—a soft mechanical confirmation, followed by the faint hum of the elevator reactivating.
The doors slid open.
He stepped slightly aside, a quiet gesture rather than an instruction, making space without saying a word.
Linn was still unsure whether trusting him was the correct decision.
But the absence of an immediate threat spoke louder than anything else.
She stepped into the elevator.
He remained outside.
The air between them felt briefly suspended as she turned to face forward.
The doors began to close with a slow, controlled glide.
Just before the gap sealed completely, his voice came again—low, even, almost indifferent.
“Cafeteria is on floor 25.”
The elevator doors shut.
A faint static crackled through his earpiece as he stepped away from the elevator.
Niel’s voice followed immediately.
“I pulled the surveillance feeds from the perimeter around its last location.”
A brief pause.
Keyboard clicks were faintly audible over the line.
“Nothing registered. No thermal residue, no motion trail, no distortion spike. It’s like it never existed in the first place.”
Another beat.
“I replayed the footage from your pursuit sequence.”
Silence stretched for a fraction of a second before Niel spoke again, this time slower, curiosity cutting through his usual casual tone.
“You were chasing nothing.”