Prologue｜The Dying Breath of Gods

The Stormcrow—a freighter held together by rust and defiance—shuddered as sulfur waves clawed its hull. Hayate, a courier who traded memories for survival, locked his mag-boots to the deck. His right eye ignited into a galactic vortex, the Stardust Engine beneath him screaming like a dying star. The reactor burned compressed time crystals, blue flames licking the air with the stench of ozone and burned childhoods.

Three stolen seconds bled into his vision:

Gears choking on black-market lubricant;

Cryopod locks fracturing like fragile bones;

Twelve mech-hounds—their steel ribs branded with the Arbitrator's glowing hex codes—awakening.

"Damn it!" Hayate's wrench smashed the reactor core. The haunted nanoweave bandages on his arm hissed, devouring the shockwave—each strike erasing another memory. Mother's lullaby faded, replaced by the Paradox Pirate flag's whisper: "A lie here becomes a blade there."

The cryopod exploded.

Frozen air reeking of burnt circuitry and synthetic blood flooded the bay. Inside floated moray eels—their scales hid spinal micro-cannons, the Arbitrator's favorite spies.

"Collateral-On-Destruction run," Hayate spat, the contract term tasting like ash. Payment only if you live. Stardust armor shattered into existence over his limbs, plates crystallizing from rage and starlight. A blade of compressed supernova erupted from his wrench, bisecting the first mech-hound into screaming halves that dissolved into quantum static.

The Arbitrator's voice sliced through static: "Submit, courier. Or become another scar on my code."