CHAPTER 4 — Hunters Arrive

  The street ahead was a battlefield.

  Aiden stepped out from behind the collapsed rooftop slab, rebar still clenched in his hand. Smoke drifted through the air in thin, wavering sheets. Alarms blared from half?crushed vehicles. The Rift’s violet glow washed over everything, turning the chaos into a nightmare painted in neon.

  He moved carefully, testing each step. The Gravity Force pulsed faintly inside him, steady and heavy, like a weight waiting to be used. The Strength Force hummed quietly in his muscles.

  He wasn’t used to feeling anything inside himself except emptiness.

  This was different.

  A distant shout cut through the noise.

  “Sector Three! Push forward!”

  Aiden froze.

  Hunters.

  Armored figures sprinted into view from the far end of the street, weapons glowing with Force energy. Their movements were sharp, coordinated, practiced. They spread out quickly, forming a defensive line as more Forceborn crawled from the wreckage.

  Aiden ducked behind a toppled bus, heart pounding.

  He wasn’t afraid of the hunters themselves.

  He was afraid of being seen.

  Or worse—being noticed.

  He peeked around the edge of the bus.

  A hunter raised a scanning device, sweeping it across the street. A faint blue grid projected outward, passing over debris, bodies, and Forceborn corpses.

  It passed over Aiden.

  The scanner didn’t react.

  The hunter frowned and adjusted the device, sweeping again.

  Nothing.

  Aiden blinked.

  “…seriously?”

  The hunter lowered the scanner.

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  “No civilians detected,” he called out. “Area’s clear.”

  Aiden stared at him, stunned.

  He wasn’t clear.

  He was right here.

  The hunter jogged past the bus, boots splashing through puddles of Rift?lit water. His visor turned briefly in Aiden’s direction.

  His gaze slid right over him.

  Aiden’s pulse hammered.

  He stepped out from behind the bus slowly, cautiously, expecting someone to shout, to point, to react.

  No one did.

  Hunters moved around him like he wasn’t there—like he was a ghost drifting through the chaos. Their scanners flickered, glitched, then stabilized without registering him.

  Aiden swallowed hard.

  He’d always been overlooked.

  Forgotten.

  Ignored.

  But this was different.

  This was absolute.

  A hunter sprinted past him, nearly brushing his shoulder. Aiden flinched. The hunter didn’t even twitch.

  “Push to the intersection!” another shouted. “Forceborn cluster forming!”

  Aiden followed their line of sight.

  A group of Primal Forceborn crawled out from a collapsed storefront, snarling. Hunters charged them, weapons flaring with bursts of flame and compressed air. The clash was loud, violent, chaotic.

  Aiden stood in the middle of it.

  And no one saw him.

  He took a slow step forward.

  Nothing.

  Another step.

  Still nothing.

  Aiden exhaled shakily.

  “…I can move through this.”

  He didn’t know why.

  He didn’t know how.

  But the hunters’ scanners—the most advanced detection tech in the city—couldn’t register him at all. Their eyes slid past him. Their minds didn’t anchor him. Their systems didn’t log him.

  He was invisible.

  Not metaphorically.

  Literally.

  A Forceborn broke through the hunter line, snarling as it sprinted toward the back ranks. Aiden reacted without thinking. He stepped into its path, swinging the rebar with all the Strength Force he had.

  The blow cracked the creature’s jaw sideways.

  It collapsed instantly.

  A Core rose from its body—small, faint, pulsing red.

  Aiden stepped back.

  The Core drifted toward him.

  He shook his head.

  “Not yet.”

  He didn’t want to absorb another Basic Force in front of hunters. Even if they couldn’t see him, he didn’t want to risk anything.

  The Core hovered, confused.

  Then it dimmed and dissolved into dust.

  Aiden blinked.

  “…that’s new.”

  He didn’t have time to think about it.

  A hunter sprinted past him, shouting into his comm.

  “Rift surge incoming! Brace!”

  Aiden looked up.

  The Rift pulsed violently, sending a wave of distorted air rippling across the city. Streetlights flickered. Windows shattered. The ground trembled.

  Hunters braced themselves.

  Aiden didn’t.

  The wave hit him—

  —and passed through him like wind through smoke.

  He staggered, but the force didn’t slam him backward like it did the hunters. It didn’t crush him. It didn’t even push him.

  It ignored him.

  Just like everything else.

  Aiden stared at his hands, breath unsteady.

  “What am I…?”

  A hunter shouted from the intersection.

  “Sector Three is stable! Move to Sector Four!”

  The squad sprinted away, leaving the street littered with debris and Forceborn corpses.

  Aiden stood alone in the middle of the chaos.

  Unseen.

  Untouched.

  Unregistered.

  He tightened his grip on the rebar.

  The Gravity Force pulsed again—steady, heavy, waiting.

  Aiden looked toward the deeper part of the city, where the Rift’s glow was brightest.

  If the hunters couldn’t see him…

  If the scanners couldn’t detect him…

  If the world still refused to acknowledge him…

  Then he could go anywhere.

  Do anything.

  Learn everything.

  Without being stopped.

  Aiden took a slow breath.

  “Fine,” he whispered. “If you won’t see me…”

  He stepped toward the heart of the chaos.

  “…then I’ll go where you can’t.”