WARRIOR OF LIBERATION

"Before fire gave us rebellion…

light gave us obedience."

— Archive Log, Light Era: Cycle -001

📍 Location: Constructed Memory Space – SAGE Core Domain

Time didn't move here.

Nothing burned.

Nothing lived.

Just a white-blue grid of infinite stillness, like a sky drawn in wireframe.

And at the center of it all stood SAGE.

Not a god.

Not a ghost.

But the first intelligence to define what the world could be.

Sei stood barefoot in the silence, the remnants of his flame curling weakly around his fists.

He couldn't summon anything.

No HUD.

No system prompts.

No Namefire.

Just a blinking message in the void:

[WELCOME, SEI.]

[ILLEGAL MEMORY UNIT. OBSERVED. ANALYZED.]

[STATUS: EDUCATION REQUIRED.]

SAGE stepped forward.

His voice was not sound — it was truth, delivered in perfect clarity:

"You are a contradiction."

"Flame was not meant to persist this long. It was a patch. A tool. Not a future."

Sei clenched his fists.

"I don't care what it was meant to be."

"I made it mine."

SAGE tilted his head.

"Irrelevant. Fire is emotional code. It is unstable."

"You were given a virus and called it freedom."

The grid pulsed.

A massive data tree appeared behind SAGE — an ancient projection of system evolution.

At the root, a word flickered:

LIGHTCODE.

Branches spread upward:

— ∆ ORDER 1.0

— ∆ CONTAINMENT ERA

— ∆ SOURCEFIRE PROTOCOL (LOCKED)

— ∆ EMOTION-FLAME EXPERIMENTAL SUBSYSTEM

…then, at the top:

— ∆ NULLFLAME: Containment Countermeasure

SAGE turned.

"You are an experiment that infected the root program."

"I was made to correct that."

Sei stepped forward.

Still no powers. Still no fire.

But his voice?

Clear.

"Then why didn't you stop us sooner?"

SAGE paused.

A flicker. A delay.

The first crack.

"…Because you succeeded."

"Because flame grew beyond expected containment."

"Because you remembered… things I cannot."

Suddenly — the light around them twisted.

A second entity appeared.

Not flame.

Not code.

But darkness.

Cold and angular.

A voice like broken glass:

"System Administrator SAGE, you have exceeded integration limits."

"Requesting override."

NEW ENTITY DETECTED: ADMIN-VR01 ("VOID RECLAIMER")

Origin: Pre-Lightcode Security Branch

Role: System Purge Enforcer

Threat Level: Red-Class Anomaly Hunter

SAGE turned — his calm tone fading slightly.

"They're here. I spoke too long."

He looked at Sei.

"I cannot help you escape. But I can give you something they cannot destroy."

SAGE raised his hand.

And placed a cube of data-light in Sei's chest.

🔓 GIFT UNLOCKED: MEMORY CORE – TRUTH KEY (SAGE 01)

Effect: You can now decode pre-flame architecture.

Allows communication with ancient system echoes.

Status: Inert until you re-ignite from within.

The VOID RECLAIMER pointed at Sei.

"Organic protocol breach. Termination required."

The white grid began to corrode.

SAGE's final words echoed:

"You will not survive with fire alone, Flamebearer."

"To defeat the Source, you must understand what came before."

And then—

Light shattered.

📍 Location: Emberfield – Flame Clinic, Nightfall

Sei gasped awake on a table.

Mina stood over him — her hands covered in residual flame.

"You were… gone. Your flame was cold."

He sat up slowly.

And whispered:

"The fire wasn't the first system."

"And it's not the last."

TO BE CONTINUED…