Lina didn't sleep.
She lay in the dark, eyes open, heart hollow.
That note—Kid's words, the disappearing tech, the sense that she was both the hunter and the hunted—echoed inside her like a scream underwater.
She had no answers. Only growing shadows.
And a system she didn't understand.
Just as dawn broke, the familiar ping whispered in her mind.
[System Booting…]
[New Task Generated.]
Her stomach tightened.
[Situation-Based Task: "Leave No Echo"]
You're being tracked. Someone wants your name erased—or repurposed.
But your data is your power. Your life is yours.
Erase your online trail. Cover your past. Leave no echo.
[Reward: $5,000 (untraceable), Skill Boost: "Digital Camouflage"]
[Penalty for Failure: Data leak. Embarrassment. Humiliation.]
[Time Limit: 48 hours.]
Lina blinked. "Digital Camouflage?"
[A passive skill. Makes you harder to trace, track, or identify online and offline. Increased resistance to surveillance. Blocks minor social engineering.]
"…Useful."
[Highly.]
She swung her legs over the side of the bed and reached for her real phone—not the ghost tech from Kid. She opened a browser, heart racing.
Her orphanage records.
Gone.
Her name on that small theater program from four years ago?
Gone.
Social media she hadn't touched in six years?
All gone.
The System had been quietly wiping her for days.
She didn't go to class that morning.
Instead, she took a cab to a downtown café—the kind with too many plants and password-protected WiFi.
Sat near the back. Opened her laptop.
Breathed.
"System. Teach me how to hack myself."
[Affirmative. Launching protocol: Mirror Maze.]
What followed was six straight hours of commands, rerouting IPs, building shadow accounts, redirecting footprints.
Her fingers ached. Her mind burned.
But by afternoon, she had wiped herself clean—like she never existed.
The System chimed again.
[Task Complete.]
[Reward Deposited. Check Dummy Account: X-LV2056]
Lina opened the dummy banking portal. Her breath caught.
$5,000. Sitting there. Real. Transferable. Untraced.
"…How?"
[The world runs on cracks and shadows. Your System walks between them.]
She almost laughed.
Instead, she whispered, "What happens if I fail next time?"
[Then we burn something.]
"…What?"
[Reputation. Opportunity. Dignity. Or comfort. You don't get second chances. You get consequences.]
She leaned back, eyes on the gray sky through the window.
A strange calm settled over her.
She'd lost so much already. What was left to fear?
But then she remembered Kael's face.
The way he'd touched her back without hesitation. How the heat lingered.
She'd almost liked it.
And that terrified her more than any hacker or shadow.
"System…"
[Listening.]
"…If I fall in love again…"
[Yes?]
"…will you protect me?"
A pause.
[No.]
[But I will make you stronger. Strong enough to walk away. Or strong enough to stay without breaking.]
"…Fair."
Later that evening, Kael texted.
How do you feel about getting noticed?
She replied:
I feel like staying invisible.
He responded:
Too late.
The next day, she received another invitation.
No names. Just coordinates and a time.
Another elite event.
She was starting to realize—this was her life now.
Not by choice.
By survival.
As she prepared, brushing her thick black hair until it shimmered, applying makeup she barely remembered buying, the mirror caught her.
Not broken. Not lost.
Just... evolving.
The girl in the mirror was dangerous.
And maybe that was enough for now.
System Log: Lina Vale
New Passive Skill: Digital Camouflage
Balance: $5,000 USD (Clean, offshore)
Loyalty Thread (Kael): Growing
Threat Map: Expanding
Confidence Level: 41% ↑
Active Risk: 71%
Psychological Load: Stabilizing
Forbidden Curiosity: [✓] System Origin
End of Chapter 12