Veil of Aether

The tournament pressed on as eliminations echoed across the battlefield. Amunar’s Recruit Class had secured the lead among their tier, while India held dominance in the Soldier Class cultivation section. As expected, Jerusalem sat comfortably in first place for the Specialist Class.

Spectators filled the viewing platforms, cheering for their kingdoms, their voices a sea of hope and pride. The various Kings and Queens watched in silence—some faces glowing with pride, others tight with disappointment. But for most, this tournament wasn’t just about performance—it was about scouting.

Dozens of participants across the classes stood out—talents who left more than just a good impression. These weren’t just prodigies; they were future powerhouses. And that made them a threat. Even if no official words were exchanged, a shared understanding passed through the minds of the watching rulers.

These individuals must be watched.

And if necessary—neutralized.

Plans quietly began to form. Strategic marriages. Unavoidable alliances. Preemptive containment. Not out of cruelty, but necessity.

The tournament continued as normal. The skies were clear. The cheers continued. The tension built quietly.

And then—without warning—

It hit.

Everyone on the tournament platform, every spectator in the arena, every civilian in far-off cities—even those hidden in underground temples or locked within secluded cultivation chambers—felt it.

A single, shuddering pulse of something that bypassed space and time.

A tremor that didn’t shake the ground… but their souls.

The world itself had just flinched.

And no one knew why.

Not yet.

All anyone knew was that the system had suddenly opened—unprompted, urgent, and glitching violently before their eyes.

Red-text error messages blared across their vision. Code distorted. Prompts flashed in and out of existence. The interface warped until it became utterly unreadable.

To the more perceptive individuals—those who had spent time analyzing the system, pushing its boundaries—something became terrifyingly clear.

The system was afraid.

It wasn’t just malfunctioning. It was panicking.

And more than that… it was crying.

The air grew still as everyone looked around, wide-eyed, searching for confirmation that they weren’t the only ones experiencing this surreal collapse.

They weren’t.

Every participant. Every spectator. Every cultivator or monarch, no matter how powerful—they all saw the same broken screen. The same frightened system. Whatever was happening, it wasn’t local. It wasn’t regional.

It was global.

No—it was cosmic.

And still, that wasn’t the whole truth.

The scope of the system's failure wasn’t confined to the tournament platform—or even the world itself. It extended beyond perception. Beyond time. Beyond the very edges of reality.

Even in the modern day, far from the tournament’s stage, the ripple struck.

On Earth, the lucky few who had received their systems before the First Trial ended stared at their distorted interfaces in alarm. They had no idea what was happening—only that something had gone terribly, inexplicably wrong.

In the Expanse, within the first trial, the effect was just as pronounced. Participants froze mid-battle, blinking in confusion as red-text errors flashed across their vision. Timer bars glitched. Notifications looped or vanished entirely.

“What's wrong with this thing?” Nox muttered, glancing sideways at his translucent system panel as it fizzed with static.

A massive lion roared beside him.

Without missing a beat, Nox tilted back and casually slashed with his basilisk longsword, severing the beast in a clean arc that sprayed blood across the dark cavern floor.

He exhaled.

"Man… this world is really weird," he said to himself, wiping the blade against his cloak before turning toward the horde of creatures looming just ahead. His body tensed—not from fear, but from habit.

Then—he charged, ready for more.

But on the larger stage—

Where divinity reigned—

Across the multiverse, in realms where gods waged wars and cosmic titans collided—

they too felt it.

The cost was far steeper.

Deities who had ascended to the divine realm—beings worshipped across countless star systems—fell in staggering numbers. Cultivators who had broken past mortality and entered godhood, once thought invincible, were struck down mid-battle as the system stuttered.

Their divine protections blinked for only a moment.

But a moment… was all it took.

Exploited without mercy, they were erased from existence—some by rivals who had waited centuries for the chance, others by fate itself twisting in the chaos.

It was a massacre not born of strategy, but of pure, systemic collapse.

A single error.

A crack in the uncrackable.

And while gods perished in droves—

It was all it took for divinity to crumble.

Even Supreme Gods, beings who had transcended the limits of force and form, now convened in an emergency assembly, their expressions grim and voices laced with rare dread.

“It has to be that title,” boomed the Supreme God of Fire, flames rolling from his voice alone.

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“That cursed thing has been far too active lately,” added the Supreme God of Steel. “We’ve searched for it across aeons—and now it stirs again.”

“Not just stirs,” muttered the Supreme God of Wind. “Someone acquired it. And it’s not bound to one time. It’s present in the modern timeline—and now… again in the past. I can’t lock onto its coordinates.”

“You think the bearer’s inside an active temporal dungeon?” asked the Supreme God of Anatomy.

“Who knows where that title is… or what it’s doing,” said the Supreme God of Mentality. “It’s the only thing known to override the system. Whoever holds it—must be just as monstrous.”

They weren’t alone.

As more and more Supreme Gods arrived—crossing galaxies in mere strides, reality folding beneath their feet—they gathered in silence at the base of a towering celestial rise.

Atop that vast elevation, far above where the others now stood, four thrones loomed—each one woven from the essence of its dominion.

Time.

Space.

Creation.

Destruction.

There sat the four Supreme Gods respectively—eyes closed, unmoved by the chaos that stirred the rest into panic. While others whispered theories and blamed the glitch on ancient titles, they remained still—untouched, undisturbed.

They were not calm.

They were beyond the need for concern.

And behind them stood a fifth throne.

Unmarked.

Unclaimed.

Only Nothing.

There was no name, no aura, no sense of waiting.

Only Nothing.

It did not radiate power—because power recoiled from it. It did not draw reverence—because reverence feared it. And though no one sat upon it, every Supreme present knew…

That throne was not empty.

It simply belonged to Nothing.

And only Nothing would ever sit upon it.

The very fact they were now all gathered, so troubled, all because of a single title, would’ve terrified the lower realms.

But what would terrify these gods—

What none of them realized—

Was that their entire assessment was wrong.

It wasn’t the title causing the glitch.

It was the bearer.

And that bearer…

Stood mid-air—silent, unmoving.

A breeze stilled around him. Not a dramatic gust—just the soft whisper of wind, as if trying to wake a forgotten soul.

His mask cast a shadow over his face. But beneath it, his eyes radiated a hollow, empty white.

Blank.

Void.

Silent to the world.

Detached from meaning.

No rage.

No sorrow.

No resolve.

Just nothing.

Not numb.

Not shattered.

Not even lost.

Empty.

Kei Y simply stood in the air—motionless, weightless, hollow.

He was a boy again. Alone in a locked room. No one knocking. No one listening.

No one caring.

A child stripped of worth. Laughed at. Ignored. Forgotten.

Erased.

And now—he didn’t feel anything.

His power surged anyway, rising of its own will. An avalanche with no emotion behind it.

Across existence—

Systems screamed.

Realities convulsed.

Time faltered.

Because the boy without purpose… without feeling…

was the anomaly that should never have existed.

And now, the System—the very thing meant to command order, enforce structure, contain reality—

was afraid.

Not confused.

Afraid.

Because it didn’t know what Kei Y had become.

Or worse—

And Kei Y—for his part—simply stared at the person who brought these emotions out of him. The one who stirred thoughts he hadn’t touched in a long time. Words from a past he’d tried to bury. Words that echoed from the mouths of those who had held him captive since the moment he was born—repeated daily like scripture.

From the days when he couldn’t even understand the sounds they were making…

To the days when he began to pick up fragments of meaning…

And finally, to the day when he understood it all—every word, every insult, every accusation.

But even when he understood their language, he never understood their hatred. Why they loathed him. Why they feared him. Why they believed he would become a calamity.

And most of all, why—if they truly believed that—why did they never just kill him?

That question lingered, unanswered, even now.

He stood mid-air as the insults continued—words he had long drowned out suddenly resurfacing.

The person berating him was Queen Thalia’s daughter, Dione—the leader of Greece’s Recruit Class team. At some point, she had managed to catch up to Kei Y again. But with Silvie close by, she knew she couldn’t risk attacking him directly.

So she resorted to words. Spiteful. Vulgar. Petty.

And at first, they were just that—noise. Arrogance from someone less talented.

Until she said it.

“You’re a mistake that should’ve never made it past birth. Every breath you’ve taken has been a waste—of space, of time, of mercy. You don’t just lack purpose—you drain it from others. If there was ever a life more meaningless than yours, I haven’t seen it. The world would be better if you were erased, not just forgotten.”

Those words didn’t just land—they pierced.

Despite his usual aloofness… despite the masks he wore… despite the casual, teasing persona he often displayed…

That hit him.

Deeper than any attack could.

Deeper than any weapon ever had.

His friends—scowling at the insult—felt the shift instantly. They turned to Kei Y, concern etched into their expressions, each of them certain that those words had struck him.

As the others continued to descend the pyramid, Kei Y remained still—suspended in the air—locked in eye contact with the Greek princess, who herself hadn’t noticed she had stopped falling.

Her expression radiated scorn. Pride. Superiority.

So wrapped in her tirade—mocking his mother, scorning his defiance—she didn’t even notice she’d stopped falling.

Kei Y just looked at her.

Didn’t speak.

Didn’t react.

He simply nodded.

And then—

He resumed falling.

The moment he did, the system stabilized. The glitches vanished. Reality rebooted. It was as if existence itself let out a breath it had been holding—relieved that Kei Y had moved on.

He rejoined the others in silence.

Despite their calls, their questions, their worry—he didn’t respond.

Not a word.

Not a nod.

Nothing.

The silence worried them far more than any scream would have.

One by one, they turned back to glare at the Greek princess. They didn’t say it out loud, but they all thought the same thing:

She doesn’t deserve mercy.

Part of them wanted to eliminate her then and there.

But something held them back. A quiet, almost primal instinct.

They realized…

Kei Y hadn’t forgotten.

Kei Y hadn’t forgiven.

And whatever fate awaited her… it was his to deliver.

That thought made them all uneasy.

Because whatever was coming for her—

It would be worse than anything they could ever imagine.

And so, they turned away.

They continued the tournament.

But none of them forgot the look towards Kei Y.

Or the feeling that, somehow, something irreversible had just begun.

And the title the Supreme Gods were so convinced had caused the entire phenomenon—the one they feared more than anything—remained utterly still.

No blinking.

No flickering.

No response.

It sat in the void, silent.

Not like a predator lying in wait—but like a friend, quietly watching someone unravel, knowing there was nothing they could do to help.

So it stayed silent.

Back on Earth, buried deep within the planet’s core, there existed a facility hidden from every living soul not directly involved with it. Not even Aegis, despite all their history and global reach, had any idea it was there. Not even Ren Sui, for all his capabilities, would ever have imagined such a place existed—let alone nestled at the center of the planet.

Back then, after Kei Y was born, something impossible happened.

Even those within the facility—some of the most paranoid and well-shielded minds on Earth—couldn’t explain how a woman had found them.

She arrived alone. Standing directly above their hidden compound, on the surface.

Wearing a long dress adorned with sakura blossoms, blood still dried along the inside of her legs from childbirth, her frail body trembling just to remain upright. No system. No support. Just a mother.

And she stood there.

For years.

In that same spot.

Singing lullabies to the child they had taken from her.

She never saw him again. She never even made it inside.

But she sang until her voice failed.

Until her body gave out.

Until she passed away… still singing.

No one ever figured out how she found them.

Or why she didn’t leave.

But none of them forgot her.

Now, in the present, the facility stirred again. The ones maintaining it could only sigh at the recent activity. Strangely, none of them had systems. Not a single person in the entire structure had ever received a prompt, a screen, or an error message.

And yet—they all knew the moment it happened.

They didn’t need the system to tell them.

They just… felt it.

Some stood before an empty room—the room where Kei Y had once been kept.

They stared in silence, each trying and failing to put their emotions into words.

The child they had confined.

Was gone.

Truly free.

Had been for years.

They even knew where he was at all times, his exact location and actions. But they left him to be free.

And because he was free, the universe had begun to fracture.

And they knew.

This was only the beginning.

Their gazes remained locked on the room, burdened by unspoken thoughts. But not everyone felt the weight of it.

Unbothered, a janitor casually swept the hallway floor nearby. An old man. The same one who’d occasionally visited Kei Y during his years of confinement. Brought him snacks. Told him jokes. Sat beside him in silence.

He seemed completely unaware of the existential dread gripping the rest of the staff.

"You lot seem more stressed than usual," he chuckled, not looking up.

The others didn’t reply.

They just rolled their eyes and went quiet.

Because deep down… they all knew:

He was the only one who ever treated Kei Y like a person.

And whether or not Kei Y remembered—

That kindness might be the only thing left standing between them… and oblivion.