In the dim interior of an abandoned roadside motel on the outskirts of a ghost town, Li Chu sat on the edge of the bed, unmoving.
Her fingertips trembled over a cracked ceramic teacup, untouched for hours. Across the room, a spider web of shattered glass spread from the mirror—fractured not by force, but by a single moment of truth.
Her memory had begun to awaken.
"Blood. A cold table. Wires—so many wires. A boy screaming. My hands restrained. They made me watch."
Each fragment arrived like a migraine wrapped in static, too sharp, too loud.
"And then... silence. A boy with silver in his eyes. His name was—"
She clutched her temples.
"Lin... Chen…"
Her voice broke on the name.
It had come to her not as a fact, but as a feeling—like a scar she didn't know she carried until someone touched it.
The wall-mounted television suddenly flickered, snapping her from the moment.
Another pirated rebroadcast. She didn't need to guess what it was—the world had seen it by now.
Lin Chen's declaration.
The broadcast had torn through every firewall, crashed every newsfeed. His name was no longer a whisper—it was a revolution.
And when he appeared, glowing with stormlight and fury, Li Chu hadn't seen a stranger.
She had seen someone she had forgotten she loved.
[System Sync Detected: Emotional Trigger Node — Subject 00 Sync Rate: Rising]
A sudden flash erupted across her vision—a full neural echo.
The motel dissolved. In its place: a laboratory bathed in red warning light.
Her child-self floated, suspended in liquid. A heart monitor flatlining.
Then—he appeared.
A boy, barely older than her, dragged across the floor, half-conscious.
Their eyes met through glass.
And for a heartbeat, both monitors surged.
"Subject-01 and Subject-00 resonance spike — anomaly forming emotional tether."
Then the flash vanished.
She gasped, falling to her knees.
Her system, dormant for years, now lit up like a reawakened star.
[System Core: Reactivating — Salvator Companion Link Detected][Emotional Sync Threshold: 87.3%][Warning: Identity Memory Recovery at 2% — Core Personality Unstable][Initiating Containment Protocol Y]
But the damage was done.
She remembered enough.
And her name? It wasn't just Li Chu.
"Zero.""Prototype Emotional Core for Salvator-01.""Designated 'Trigger.'"
And they had planned to erase her.
To remove her as a "risk."
Meanwhile, miles away, Lin Chen stared at his system's live data feed.
[Target Identified: Subject 00 – Vital Signs Active][Location: Pingdi District — Industrial Fringe][Sync Rate: 91.2% — Stable][Memory Recovery Threshold: 2.4%]
He stood slowly from his perch atop the datacenter tower.
Eyes focused. Energy calm but razor-sharp.
"They'll come for her now," he muttered.
And he was right.
Far beneath the surface, deep within the Erebus Control Network, multiple AI-driven alert nodes flickered red.
A voice echoed across the subterranean chambers.
"Zero Sample is active.""Target 00 and Target 01 may reunite. Elevate threat status to Omega.""Deploy remaining S-tier Executors. Intercept before Link reaches 100%."
Back in the motel, Li Chu opened her eyes. For the first time in years, they gleamed—not with confusion or fear, but purpose.
She knew what was coming.
And more importantly—she knew who she'd fight beside.
"Wait for me, Lin Chen."
She picked up the ancient wrist-terminal from the drawer.
[Manual Override — Reactivating Salvator Subsystem 'Zero'][Mode: Companion Sync | Target: Salvator-01][Initializing — 3.2% complete…]
And just like that, the girl the world had forgotten—the one they tried to erase—was waking up.