Jace Varn trudged through the bay's muddy outskirts, water sloshing in his boots from the bunker flood, the hijacked elite's chip shard tucked safe in his jacket. Level 9 hit like a stim rush—HP capped at 400, mastery Lv. 2 letting him twitch player signals like puppet strings—but the weight dragged. One shard down, two left, per the fractured maps, but New Cascadia was waking meaner. Blackouts lingered in patches, holo-ads sputtering back to life with corp emergency bullshit, while players—free or glitching—formed packs in the ruins. Some hailed Jace as the breaker, others hunted for scraps of the old power. Lena limped beside him, crutch digging ruts, her shock rifle slung low. Milo trailed, rig backpack humming as he scanned for tails.
"Second shard's in the old factory district," Jace
