The room was a wreck. Posters torn from the walls. Light blue hair scattered across the floor in tangles. Two of the three monitors had cracked screens. Every cable ripped from its socket. Drawers hanging open. Contents spilled everywhere. Last night. Yuuma sat on that floor. Knees drawn up. Dawn light filtered through the curtains in thin lines. Past 8 AM. Hadn't slept. Couldn't bring himself to sleep. The PC. Gone. The one that was on the desk. Verde's people took it. The storage too. All three fragments—voice, memory, emotion—everything. Jaw throbbed. Dull ache. Lip split open. Didn't matter. Kasumi was there. Corner of the room. Back against the wall. Old notebook PC on her lap. Hadn't slept since last night. Dark circles under her eyes. Dried blood still visible under her nose. "[serious]The cleaner's evolved" Voice low. Stripped of emotion. "During last night's raid, it relearned the node structure. Tracking signals are scrambled. At this rate—we can't even pinpoint the fragments' location" Yuuma said nothing. Had no words to say back. Kasumi stared at error logs. Red text filled the screen. Her hands moved. Her face didn't. Yuuma rummaged through the drawer. Reflex. Earbuds came out. White. Cheap ones. Tried to plug them into the PC. Hands stopped. No PC. Miku's songs were only on that PC. One year. Put these earbuds in and he could listen. Any night. No matter how exhausted. Miku's voice was there. Nothing now. Yuuma held the earbuds. Didn't move. That feeling alone confirmed everything was gone. ── Past noon. Kasumi silently held out her phone. Yuuma looked at the screen. SNS timeline. "Digsafe Law Violation. Illegal AI Data Manipulation—Dangerous Minor." His name was there. School name was there. No photo. But name and school were enough. Already hundreds of retweets. Account traced to Verde subsidiary media. Comments filled with "AI terrorist in training." Posts mentioning Harukaze High were starting to appear. A guy from his middle school class retweeted it. Yuuma handed the phone back to Kasumi. Stared at the wall. Not anger. Dread came first. His name carved into the world like this. Couldn't delete it. Spreading. Moving in places his hands couldn't reach. His story was happening without him. "[serious]Before the school gets contacted, maybe you should tell a teacher—" Kasumi started. Stopped. Looked at Yuuma's face. Stopped. She understood. This wasn't the moment for that. Phone notification. Old middle school friend. "You okay?" Short message. Yuuma turned off the screen. Had no words to send back. Didn't even know if he was okay. ── Past 5 PM. Front door opened. Footsteps in the hallway. Stopped. Yuuma didn't turn around. His mother's presence at the doorway. He felt it. Day shift over. Still in white nurse's uniform probably. Silence stretched. Something hit the floor. Luggage. "[crying]Yuuma..." Voice shaking. Mother came into the room. Stepped on the torn poster. Passed the broken monitor. Knelt in front of Yuuma. Reached toward his face—the bruised jaw, the cut lip. Yuuma quietly pushed her hand away. Tears spilled from her eyes. "[crying]Please stop. Miku is data, Yuuma. She's gone. Please see reality. I'm begging you" Words fell into the room. Yuuma opened his mouth. Closed it. Wrong. Miku isn't just data. That light was real. That laughter and sadness were real—he wanted to say it. But his throat wouldn't move. Because her tears were real. Because he could see she was worried. Because that loneliness—being misunderstood even when she cared—cut deeper than anger. "[sad]Don't drag Kasumi into this" Just that. Then she stood. Walked toward the bedroom. "...I understand" Yuuma answered to the floor. Kasumi heard the exchange from the next room. Behind one wall. Staring at the notebook screen. Motionless. Mother's bedroom door closed. The room fell silent. ── Past midnight. Kasumi stood up. "[whispers]Going to get some air outside" Yuuma didn't nod. Her footsteps disappeared down the hallway. Front door closed quietly. Alone. Yuuma turned off the light. Complete darkness. Sat on the floor. Knees drawn up. Took out the earbuds. Put them in. Searched for the play button on his phone. No Miku songs on the phone. All on the PC. That PC was gone. No sound played. Complete silence. For one year since 8.15. Just put these earbuds in and he could listen. Any night. Sleepless nights. Nights wanting to cry. All of them. Miku's voice was there. Tonight there was nothing. That silence ripped away a year's worth of support all at once. Yuuma took out the earbuds. Set them down. Covered his mouth. Cried silently. Made himself small. Didn't want anyone to hear. Fragments stolen. Akira's betrayal. Name exposed. Mother's denial. Can't even listen to Miku's songs now. Maybe it's over—those words were forming in his head. Yuuma shoved his hand into his pocket. Resonance Key. Silver USB memory device. Warm when held in his palm. Peeling water-blue sticker. This much remained. This much they didn't take. That feeling alone kept him anchored in tonight's darkness. ── Past 1 AM. Door knocked. Quiet. Two times. Yuuma turned on the light. Eyes adjusted slowly. Opened the door. Kasumi. Eyes red. Maybe she'd been crying. Yuuma had never seen Kasumi cry. But maybe tonight she had. Kasumi came in. Sat across from him. Pulled a thin USB memory from her bag. "[serious]I contacted my father" Quiet voice. "After he left the industry, he secretly kept backup log fragments of Miku on his home server. Verde threatened him. Couldn't tell anyone. Said they'd hurt the family. But when I explained everything, he gave it all to me" Yuuma watched her. "[serious]In those logs, the source address of the 8.15 interrupt code was recorded" Kasumi placed the USB on the table. "Source: Trifolium Tower, 42nd floor server—Verde Consortium headquarters" The room froze. "So 8.15 wasn't an accident from power surge. Verde deliberately triggered it. Planned data deletion to steal Miku's self-evolving AI technology core" Planned. That word echoed through Yuuma. Not an accident. Not chance. That night. In front of 42,000 people. Miku was—intentionally erased. By Verde. "[sad]My father knew the whole year. Stayed silent to protect the family" Her voice trembled slightly. "Why he locked himself in his room for a year—I finally understood tonight" Yuuma's eyes fell to the Resonance Key clenched in his hand. Something moved in his chest. Anger. Not hot. Quiet anger. But definitely there. Verde erased her. Verde stole the fragments. Verde exposed his name. All from the same place. Trifolium Tower, 42nd floor. "[cold]Do we end this here. Or do we go take it back" Not a question. Confirmation of an answer she already knew. Yuuma stared at the floor for a while. Broken. Jaw aching. Name exposed. Mother's rejection. Just one Resonance Key in his hands. But—he couldn't find a single reason to give up. The three stolen fragments. Verde has them. Which means they're in Trifolium Tower. Yuuma reached out his hand. Kasumi took it. Yuuma stood up on his own. Not pulled up by her. He stood. "[serious]We're breaking into Trifolium Tower" Silence between them. No entry route. Biometric and IC card dual authentication. 1,200 Verde employees in that building. No way in from outside. Less than 48 hours left. Nothing. But they'd go. Kasumi opened the notebook PC. "[serious]We plan tonight" Screen light alone illuminated the dark room. On the wall, fragments of the torn Miku poster still clung. Water-blue hair pieces caught in the glow.