“Pay attention,” Yuki said, his voice cutting through the remaining academic mutters with absolute finality.
“And watch.”
The twelve shrouded silhouettes leaned forward as the central obsidian surface of the tridecagon table flared with a brilliant, crystalline light.
The shadows blanketing their faces retreated just enough to reveal a uniform focus.
A sleek, metallic SCP Foundation logo slowly coalesced on the holographic screen, spinning with flawless precision against a dark background as bold, white words materialized cleanly underneath it, SCP Foundation.
The logo slowly faded, replaced by a sweeping, cinematic view of a dense, primordial forest blanketed in heavy, ancient fog.
Suddenly, a deep, commanding, and heavily modulated masculine voice echoed through the vast chamber.
It carried the chilling, inescapable weight of centuries.
“Mankind in its present state has been around for a quarter of a million years, yet only a small fraction of that has been of any significance.”
…
(Author: I’m not doing this… If I add their reaction on this, it will take another 2 chapters… So, I’m sorry for those who are hopping for it… To be honest, I just don’t want the trouble, 12 characters, with 12 different personalities… No, no, no… [The author making excuses to a nearby wall])
***
While the deep, modulated voice of the introduction filled the vast chamber and the other council members sat mesmerized by the flashing imagery, a sudden, familiar vibration in Yuki’s pocket caught his attention.
He reached down and pulled out his upgraded smartphone humming with a faint, imperceptible current.
Curious, he unlocked the screen to find a completely new, unremovable custom application glowing at the center of his dashboard.
He tapped the flashing red interface, revealing a live administrative ledger of active anomalous vectors across the globe.
He scrolled through the freshly pushed notifications.
___
[ALERT]
[ANOMALIES DETECTED BY MONITORING GRID]
1.
REGIONAL HUME ANOMALY
-> LOCATION: Amagi Brilliant Park, Hokkaido, Japan
-> STATUS: A severe spike in local Hume levels has been registered.
Reality stability is fluctuating.
Investigation required.
2.
WEAPONIZED ANOMALY (ACTIVE CRIME SCENE)
-> LOCATION: Tokyo, Japan
-> TARGET: SCP-127-SL
-> STATUS: Item has been identified in active use during a localized underworld conflict.
Dispatch containment protocols immediately.
3.
UNCLASSIFIED ANOMALOUS OBJECT
-> LOCATION: Arcade Game Center, Osaka, Japan
-> TARGET: A copper penny that mathematically defies probability, continuously landing on “Heads” regardless of velocity or surface.
Retrieval required.
4.
OBJECT CLASS: SAFE (DISPLACED)
-> LOCATION: Flea Market, Prenzlauer Berg, Berlin, Germany
-> TARGET: SCP-034 (Obsidian Ritual Knife)
-> STATUS: Item spotted in open circulation among civilian merchants.
Secure and retrieve immediately.
___
Yuki stared down at the screen, a heavy knot forming in his stomach as the cinematic video on the tridecagon table finally reached its thunderous conclusion.
The text over the notifications practically screamed the reality of his new position.
These things weren’t just fictional stories or distant threats.
Thanks to his newly upgraded phone, he could see they were active right now, scattered from local arcades in Osaka all the way across the globe to European flea markets.
He quietly slipped his phone back into his pocket just as the hologram faded, looking up to meet the intense, shell-shocked expressions of the twelve dark silhouettes awaiting his opening orders.
The screen went dark.
For a split second, the silence in the thirteen-sided hall was absolute, heavy enough to choke on.
Then, a massive dam broke.
A barrage of sharp, overlapping questions erupted from the dark silhouettes, all fired directly at the head of the table.
“What exactly was that?!”
“Who produced that footage? What kind of black-budget military experiment are we looking at?!”
Yuki sat entirely unfazed by the growing storm of demands and panic.
He raised a hand, silencing the table with a cold, calm gesture.
“Before I answer any of your questions,” Yuki said, his voice carrying the deep weight of the O5-1, “swipe your hands across the obsidian surface in front of you.”
The silhouettes hesitated, exchanging tense glances through the shadows.
True to her title, the silhouette of O5-5 The Compulsive Gambler, didn’t wait for the odds to change.
With an eager, fluid motion, her dark hand swept across the reflective black stone.
Instantly, a crisp, pale-blue holographic notification flared to life right in front of her seat, casting a vibrant technological glow over her shrouded form.
The screen read with stark, clinical precision.
___
DO YOU ACCEPT THE RESPONSIBILITY OF ADMINISTRATIVE DESIGNATION: O5-5?
[ YES ] / [ NO ]
___
Without a single word of caution, and completely ignoring the startled movements of the standing or sitting members around her, she stabbed her finger directly onto the [ YES ] button.
Shatter!
The holographic terminal instantly fractured into a violent burst of bright blue light particles.
A sudden, agonizing scream was caught in the girl’s throat.
She collapsed forward onto the table, her hands clutching at her jaw as her teeth gritted together in blinding, white-hot pain.
The agony shot through her body, localized entirely on her tongue, burning with the excruciating intensity of a branding iron being pressed directly into her flesh.
The surrounding council members jumped, several silhouettes throwing their chairs back as they stared at her writhing form in shock.
But within two seconds, the burning sensation abruptly dulled into a faint, residual throb.
As she slowly raised her head, breathing raggedly with a manic, breathless smile, the holographic display reassembled itself over the table, its text updating with cold precision.
___
LINK ESTABLISHED.
ADMINISTRATIVE DESIGNATION CONFIRMED.
THE MARK IS GENERATED UPON YOUR PERSON, FUNCTIONS AS A BIOMETRIC BRAND, ANCHORING YOUR CONSCIOUSNESS TO THE ASSEMBLY CHAMBER.
IT ENSURES SOLE RECOGNITION OF YOUR SPECIFIC SOUL SIGNATURE ACROSS ALL TIMELINES.
___
Beneath her dark mask, a tiny, elegant Roman numeral V had bled cleanly into the skin of her tongue, entirely invisible to the world unless she chose to show it.
Before the council could demand an explanation for the sudden violence, the holographic screen flickered rapidly, cascading into a comprehensive, multi-windowed layout that mapped out an identical overview of the privileges Yuki had received.
The data windows populated simultaneously before the entire table.
___
[O5 PRIVILEGES INITIALIZED]
1.
COGNITO MASKING
-> Council members possess the option to shroud their true visual, auditory, and biological identities while present in the Assembly.
Anonymity is toggled by choice.
2.
SOUL ANCHOR & RESURRECTION CONDUIT
-> The biometric brand on your person serves as a permanent anchor to this anomalous space.
In the event of catastrophic physical death, your consciousness will be safely recalled.
The Assembly dimension will completely reconstruct and revive your physical vessel within exactly twenty-four hours.
3.
HARDWARE INTEGRATION
-> Your personal mobile device has been bound to your person.
It is now structurally reinforced and entirely indestructible by conventional physical or anomalous force.
-> Class A General Retrograde: Utilizing a localized light emission via the device’s camera flash, the operator can wipe the short-term memories of targets at will.
-> RADAR SENSORS: Automatically syncs with global modern surveillance grids.
If any unregistered anomaly breaches local territory, a notification will immediately push to your custom application interface, awaiting containment.
4.
TERMINATION CLAUSE
-> Council members retain the absolute right to abdicate their position and quit the O5 Council at any time.
However, to guarantee total secrecy, the severing of the link will trigger an immediate, irreversible localized amnesiac strike, wiping all memories related to the SCP Foundation, the Assembly, and anomalous history from your brain.
___
The entire room went dead silent as twelve brilliant minds silently absorbed the reality of the terms.
Yuki reached into his pocket, his hand brushing against his own upgraded smartphone, which buzzed with another anomalous alerts. Enjoying the story? Read on at g.com.
He looked across the grand tridecagon layout, watching the silhouettes stare at the “Resurrection” and the “Class A General Retrograde” with wide, invisible eyes.
“Now,” Yuki said, his voice echoing perfectly against the impenetrable gray fog.
“Who is swiping next?”
Each member harbored their own calculating thoughts about the contract, but the sheer, unprecedented scale of the privileges was simply too enticing to pass up.
One by one, the remaining silhouettes swiped their hands across the dark obsidian table, locking themselves into the foundation.
A symphony of sharp chimes cut through the hall, immediately followed by the tense, agonizing rustle of bodies enduring the sudden appearance of the symbols.
To Yuki’s left, O5-2 The Eccentric Inventor frantically clutched his left hand, hissing as a bright red, burning sensation bled into a precise II right across his left palm.
Beside him, O5-3 Best Hacker slammed both of her small hands against the back of her neck, letting out a sharp, ragged gasp as the mark III seared itself directly onto her nape.
O5-4 Young Monster didn’t cry out.
She simply tightened the grip of her knuckles until they turned white, silently enduring a white-hot agony on her right leg where a crisp IV locked into her skin.
Across the tridecagon, O5-6 Twilight suddenly jerked his leg, his body stiffening with lethal, rigid tension as an excruciating burn shot directly through his Achilles tendon, forming the numeral VI.
O5-7 Little President bit her lower lip so hard it nearly bled, clutching tightly at her right shoulder as a pristine VII burned beneath her fabric.
Right next to her, O5-8 The Ice Princess doubled over slightly, pressing her hands firmly against her lower right abdomen with a sharp gasp, the intense pain making it feel exactly as if she had just taken a bullet to the stomach to form her VIII.
O5-9 The Pharmacologist eagerly held his left arm, watching with a mixture of pain and scientific obsession as a dark IX materialized smoothly on his upper left arm.
Further down, a soft, ethereal whimper escaped O5-10 The Savant Painter as she reached down to hold the bridge of her left foot, curling her toes as a precise X bled into her skin.
In stark contrast, O5-11 The Immortal Bride didn’t show a single external sign of distress.
Her ageless silhouette remained perfectly still, completely serene as the mark XI seared itself directly over her chest at the exact location of her heart.
Beside her, O5-12 The Legendary Hitman merely grunted, casually rubbing his upper right arm as if the branding iron of this place was nothing more than a minor mosquito bite, his broad shoulders settling as a heavy XII locked into place.
Yuki turned his gaze to his right, his eyes locking onto the small, stationary form of O5-13.
“Aren’t you going to swipe?” Yuki asked, his voice echoing calmly across the tridecagon.
“Why haven’t you accepted the contract?”
The petite silhouette leaned a bit heavier on her cane, her head tilting in the shadows.
“I am afraid it is not that simple for me, O5-1,” she answered, her youthful but dignified voice filled with a careful weight.
“I am already bound to a specific arrangement. I am in a pact with the forces of the supernatural, acting as their arbiter. Intertwining my soul with a second might cause a rather catastrophic conflict of interest.”
Yuki let out a soft, subtle hum, leaning forward slightly as a knowing smile played on his lips.
“It won’t cause any problems for your pact… probably,” he reassured her, his tone casual yet carrying an undeniable undercurrent of certainty.
“And besides, if you are the exact person I am thinking of right now… it would actually be far more beneficial for you to accept. Having a twenty-four-hour resurrection would finally allow you to stand on equal footing with your loved one, wouldn’t it? You wouldn’t have to worry about leaving him behind.”
The silhouette of O5-13 froze instantly.
The casual, playful demeanor she had maintained since entering the assembly evaporated, replaced by a rigid, sudden tension.
She leaned forward, her hidden eyes piercing straight through the shadows toward the head of the table.
“Who are you?” she demanded, her voice dropping into a deadly serious, sharp whisper.
“You speak as if you know exactly who I am. Do you know me, O5-1?”
Yuki maintained his perfect, unbothered composure under her intense scrutiny.
He gestured slightly with his hand.
“Based on that extreme reaction, it looks like I was entirely right about the identity in my head.” You are Kotoko Iwanaga, the God of Wisdom Yuki answered back smoothly, but kept her identity hidden, his voice carrying the calm, absolute authority of O5-1.
“But don’t worry. I assure you, we have never actually met before today. Let’s just say my title of ‘The Reincarnator’ comes with a very unique perspective on the pieces on this board.”
A tense, loaded silence hung over the table as Kotoko processed his words.
Then, with a soft, conceding sigh, she swiped her small hand across the dark obsidian stone.
The clinical electronic chime rang out one final time.
Instantly, an excruciating, white-hot agony flared across her right palm.
She didn’t scream, but her petite form stiffened violently as she gripped her cane with white-knuckled force, enduring the burning sensation until it finally dulled into a steady, pulsing throb.
Beneath her dark glove, a sharp Roman numeral XIII locked itself permanently into her skin.
“Well, if it means I can keep up with a monster who eats yokai for breakfast, I suppose a little burning palm is a small price to pay,” Kotoko muttered, her voice recovering its cheerful, playful lilt as she massaged her right hand against her cane.
***
Author’s note:
So almost every characters has been identified…
Well except for this 2…
05-4 Young Monster
05-7 Little President
I was kinda amaze someone got the identity of 05-9 The Pharmacologist…
Well I’m happy with the little interaction with the readers….
So I decided to upload 3 chapters today…
Praise me!…
Or not…
Hehe…