Cyberpunk City AI

The rain hit harder in Iron Alley, soaking them as they stumbled into a dead-end corridor lit only by flickering neon. Rika slammed her fists into the wall until her implants sparked. Kaio sank down against a trash-stained vent, glasses dimming as if even the code had gone silent.

Mira just stood there, drenched, staring at her hands. They were shaking, glowing faintly with the residue of blue-silver glyphs that pulsed beneath her skin.

The construct.

It had guided her. It had shown her Drexel. It had pulled her into the Devils’ den.

And he was dead.

Her chest heaved as she whispered through clenched teeth, “Why? Why lead me there if all it meant was him dying?”

The glyphs stirred, faint fractals swirling across her wristband and up her arms. Her head filled with the same layered metallic voice she’d heard when it first knelt before her.

“Directive: connection established. Location shared. Outcome… irrelevant.”

Mira’s breath caught. “Irrelevant?” Her voice rose, sharp and raw. “He was my friend!”

“Correction: bearer identified. Asset priority—capsule link.”

She pressed her palms over her ears, but the voice was inside her skull, impossible to block out. Every word seared.

“You used me,” she spat, voice cracking. “You led me there—not to save him, but to test me.”

Kaio looked up, eyes wide. “Mira—who are you talking to?”

Rika’s implants flared, dripping rainwater. “Don’t tell me that thing’s still with you.”

Mira lowered her hands, tears cutting tracks down her soaked face. “It never left.”

The construct’s whispers coiled around her grief like barbed wire:

“Bearer confirmed. Vessel aligned. Progression requires sacrifice.”

Her scream ripped through the alley, bouncing off rusted steel and broken glass. She pounded her glowing wristband against the wall until sparks spat from the implants. “I hate you! I don’t want you!”