Crossed Fiction

Glory and The Richest | Chapter 1

Layer Two felt completely different from the streets below.

The moment Vin and Rin stepped beyond the massive gates, the atmosphere itself changed. The noise disappeared first. No sirens. No crowds. No panic. Only silence. Cold, artificial silence that felt carefully manufactured.

The district stretched endlessly beneath glowing white lights and polished glass structures that looked too perfect to be real. Elevated walkways crossed overhead like veins through the city while enormous holographic screens floated between buildings, displaying endless streams of citizen rankings, financial statistics, and surveillance feeds from every corner of Aurelia.

Everything here watched them.

Vin noticed it immediately.

Tiny cameras hidden inside streetlights followed their movements. Drones hovered silently between skyscrapers. Even the reflective windows felt unnatural, as if hundreds of unseen eyes were standing behind them.

Rin glanced upward for a brief moment before looking ahead again.

“…I hate this layer more.”

Vin shoved his hands into his coat pockets while continuing forward carefully.

“Yeah. This place feels like privacy died painfully.”

The Traversal Gear around their wrists suddenly flickered to life once more.

LAYER TWO: OBSERVATION DISTRICT

PRIMARY FUNCTION: SURVEILLANCE AND CONTROL

WARNING: HOSTILE TRACKING ACTIVE

Almost instantly, thin red laser lines appeared across the streets surrounding them.

Hundreds of them.

Vin froze for half a second.

“…that can’t be good.”

The city answered immediately.

Turrets emerged from the walls around them without warning. Hidden compartments opened across nearby buildings while sleek white weapons rotated outward and locked directly onto both of them.

Then the first shot fired.

A concentrated beam of energy tore through the air beside Vin’s head, hot enough to melt part of the street instantly. The pavement exploded into glowing fragments.

Rin grabbed his collar and yanked him downward just before three more blasts pierced through the wall behind them.

The explosions shook the entire district.

“Move.”

They sprinted immediately.

Layer Two wasn’t designed for open combat.

It was designed for hunting.

The district itself functioned like a giant automated execution system. Every movement they made triggered another wave of attacks. Turrets rotated constantly overhead while surveillance drones tracked their heat signatures from the skies above.

And unlike the soldiers in Layer One—

These defenses never hesitated.

Vin vaulted over a shattered barricade while firing upward toward the nearest drone cluster.

Three shots.

Three kills.

But five more drones instantly replaced them.

“Oh, come on.”

Rin ran beside him before suddenly grabbing his shoulder and forcing both of them sideways.

A massive energy beam pierced through the exact spot where Vin had been standing less than a second earlier. The blast continued through three separate buildings behind them before disappearing into the distance.

Vin stared briefly at the destruction.

“…yeah okay, that definitely would’ve killed me.”

“You think?”

They kept moving through the endless white streets while alarms echoed around them. Above the city, giant holographic screens repeatedly displayed the same warning across every surface.

MULTIVERSAL CONTAMINANTS DETECTED.

NEUTRALIZATION IN PROGRESS.

Then suddenly—

The screens flickered.

For a brief second, every advertisement disappeared.

A woman’s face replaced them instead.

Elegant.

Expressionless.

Her silver eyes looked directly down upon the city below.

“The intruders have entered Layer Two,” she announced calmly.

Her voice echoed across the entire district through hidden speakers.

“Permission to terminate has been approved.”

Rin narrowed her eyes slightly.

“She looks annoying.”

Vin glanced toward her while continuing to reload.

“That’s your observation?”

The woman continued speaking as if she could hear them.

“Aurelia exists because order exists. Wealth exists because superiority exists.”

Her gaze remained fixed on them through the giant screens.

“You threaten balance itself.”

Then she smiled faintly.

“And balance must be preserved.”

The district transformed immediately afterward.

Massive walls rose from the streets without warning, splitting entire sections of the city apart. Pathways shifted mechanically while buildings repositioned themselves around Vin and Rin like pieces on a giant machine.

The observation district wasn’t merely tracking them anymore.

It was adapting to them.

Vin stopped briefly as another wall slammed down directly in front of their path.

“…okay that’s actually cheating.”

Rin looked upward toward the floating surveillance cameras.

“No.”

Her grip tightened around one of her knives.

“It means they’re scared.”

The moment she said that, every light across Layer Two suddenly shifted into deep red.

Heavy footsteps echoed somewhere ahead of them.

Not human footsteps.

Too heavy.

Too precise.

Then the machines appeared.

Humanoid combat units marched through the streets in perfect synchronization. Their white armor reflected the city lights while glowing golden visors covered where their faces should have been. Each one carried massive energy weapons that looked far too large for ordinary humans to even lift.

Vin slowly stared upward at them.

“…you know, I really miss fighting regular people.”

The machines raised their weapons simultaneously.

Then the district exploded into light.

Gunfire flooded the streets instantly.

Rin moved first.

She sprinted directly toward the nearest combat unit while energy rounds tore through the ground behind her. Sparks erupted around her boots as she slid low beneath incoming fire before driving her blade directly into the machine’s knee joint.

Metal screamed loudly.

The machine collapsed immediately.

Vin used the falling unit as elevation, leaping onto its shoulder before firing toward the others with terrifying precision. Every shot struck critical points cleanly.

But Layer Two’s combat units were different.

Even damaged, they kept moving.

One of the machines suddenly grabbed Vin midair before slamming him through a glass wall hard enough to shatter the entire structure around him.

The impact knocked the air from his lungs instantly.

“…okay,” he coughed painfully while standing again, “that one actually hurt.”

The machine charged him immediately.

Vin barely avoided its massive blade as it carved directly through the floor where he had been standing seconds earlier.

Meanwhile outside—

Rin was completely surrounded.

Five combat units closed in around her simultaneously while surveillance drones filled the skies overhead. Golden targeting lasers covered her body from every angle.

For the first time since arriving in Aurelia—

Things genuinely looked dangerous.

Rin exhaled slowly.

Then smiled faintly.

Somewhere nearby, Vin noticed immediately.

“…oh no.”

Rin disappeared.

Not metaphorically.

Actually disappeared.

One second she stood motionless in the middle of the street.

The next—

Pure chaos erupted.

Metallic impacts exploded throughout the district as combat units were suddenly torn apart faster than the surveillance systems could even process. Sparks flooded the streets while shattered pieces of armor crashed violently across the pavement.

One machine lost its arm instantly.

Another collapsed after losing its head.

A third was sliced completely in half before it even realized she had moved.

Vin watched the destruction while reloading his pistol slowly.

“…remind me to never annoy her.”

Rin reappeared moments later behind the final combat unit.

One clean s***h.

The machine collapsed instantly.

Silence briefly returned to the district.

Then the giant holographic woman smiled again.

“Interesting.”

The city lights dimmed softly.

“You may proceed.”

A massive gateway slowly opened at the far end of Layer Two.

Beyond it—

Clouds floated endlessly through the sky.

Gardens.

Palaces.

Floating islands suspended above the world below.

Layer Three waited high above the heavens of Aurelia.

The elevator that carried them toward Layer Three moved silently through the clouds.

For several minutes, neither Vin nor Rin said anything.

The higher they ascended, the stranger Aurelia became.

Layer Two had felt cold and mechanical, but this place felt almost divine. Massive floating islands drifted peacefully through golden skies while enormous gardens stretched across marble platforms suspended above the clouds themselves. Waterfalls poured endlessly into the empty air below, vanishing into mist long before reaching the lower layers of the city.

Everything looked beautiful.

Too beautiful.

Vin leaned slightly against the transparent wall of the elevator while staring outside.

“Y’know,” he finally said, “I think rich people in this universe genuinely believe they’re gods.”

Rin stood quietly near the opposite side of the platform, arms crossed while watching the floating structures around them carefully.

“They probably stopped seeing normal people as humans a long time ago.”

Vin glanced toward her briefly.

“That sounded personal.”

Rin didn’t answer immediately.

Her eyes remained focused on the distant palaces drifting between the clouds.

“In Skyfall,” she said quietly, “the people above always decide how everyone below suffers.”

The reflection of golden light moved softly across her face.

“Different universe. Same disease.”

Vin stayed silent for a moment after hearing that.

Then the elevator suddenly stopped.

Hard.

The entire platform shook violently.

Warning lights flashed across the walls while the peaceful music quietly playing in the elevator immediately cut off.

Vin straightened instantly.

“…yeah, there it is.”

A distorted voice echoed through hidden speakers above them.

“Unauthorized entities detected.”

“Layer Three lockdown initiated.”

Then the floor beneath them split apart.

Without warning.

The center of the platform collapsed instantly between them as massive steel walls slammed down from above.

“Rin!”

Vin lunged forward reflexively.

Too late.

The floor beneath Rin completely disappeared as the platform mechanically separated into multiple sections. Thick barriers erupted between them while entire walls rotated violently through the air.

Rin barely caught herself before falling into the clouds below.

The last thing she saw before the walls fully closed was Vin reaching toward her through the narrowing gap.

Then everything sealed shut.

Silence.

Vin slammed both hands against the metal barrier immediately.

“RIN!”

No response.

Only the distant sound of machinery moving somewhere beyond the walls.

Vin clenched his jaw tightly.

“…great.”

The room around him shifted again.

The walls unfolded mechanically before revealing an entirely new area ahead of him — a massive white hallway lined with golden statues depicting elegant human figures standing above kneeling crowds.

Every statue looked arrogant.

Even the architecture felt condescending.

Vin slowly drew his pistol while walking forward carefully.

“Okay,” he muttered to himself, “new rule. Every universe with rich people is automatically suspicious.”

Meanwhile—

Far away on another section of Layer Three—

Rin landed hard against marble flooring before quickly recovering into a crouched position.

Her knife was already in her hand before she even fully stood.

The area surrounding her looked completely different from Vin’s side of the district.

Instead of white hallways and statues, she stood inside what looked like an enormous artificial garden suspended directly above the clouds. Golden trees swayed gently beneath warm sunlight while crystal-clear water flowed through narrow streams across the marble floor.

Peaceful.

Quiet.

Fake.

Rin slowly looked around.

“…they really built an entire layer just to feel superior.”

A soft laugh suddenly echoed nearby.

“Well,” a calm voice answered, “that is essentially the purpose.”

Rin turned instantly.

A woman stood several meters away near the edge of the garden.

Long silver hair moved gently in the wind while elegant white clothing flowed around her like liquid silk. Unlike the soldiers below, she carried no visible weapon.

Which immediately made Rin trust her even less.

The woman smiled faintly.

“You move beautifully,” she said calmly. “Violently. But beautifully.”

Rin’s grip tightened slightly around her knife.

“And you talk too much.”

The woman didn’t seem offended.

“My name is Seraphine.”

She stepped forward slowly.

“One of the Overseers of Layer Three.”

Rin remained completely still.

“Cool.”

Seraphine tilted her head slightly.

“You are not surprised?”

“I stopped being surprised after meeting the female version of someone from another universe.”

“…fair enough.”

For a brief second, silence returned between them.

The wind moved softly through the artificial trees while distant floating palaces drifted across the skies behind Seraphine.

Then Seraphine spoke again.

“You and the boy from Earth are searching for the fracture.”

It wasn’t a question.

Rin narrowed her eyes slightly.

“You already know about us.”

“Of course.”

Seraphine slowly turned toward the endless sky surrounding Layer Three.

“In Aurelia, information is more valuable than life itself.”

Her expression softened slightly afterward.

“You should leave.”

Rin blinked once.

“…what?”

“You heard me.”

Seraphine’s silver eyes shifted back toward Rin.

“The fracture is destabilizing Aurelia faster than the High Circle expected. The upper layers are beginning to collapse internally.”

Rin stared at her suspiciously.

“And why would someone from the High Circle help us?”

Seraphine stayed quiet for several seconds before answering.

“Because Aurelia deserves to end.”

The wind suddenly felt colder.

Far in the distance, faint cracks became visible across the golden sky itself.

Reality was weakening.

Seraphine slowly raised one hand toward the floating heavens around them.

“This world traded its humanity for comfort,” she said quietly. “The people below suffer so the people above can pretend they are gods.”

Her voice carried no anger.

Only exhaustion.

“The fracture gave Aurelia power. But power without limits always becomes rot eventually.”

Rin remained silent while studying her carefully.

Then—

An explosion suddenly echoed somewhere far away across Layer Three.

Vin.

Rin recognized the sound immediately.

Seraphine looked toward the distant smoke rising beyond the floating gardens.

“…it seems your partner has already caused problems.”

Rin immediately turned toward the direction of the explosion.

“He’s not my partner.”

“Mm.”

Another explosion echoed through the skies.

“…still,” Seraphine said calmly, “you should probably go save him.”