July 3, 2000 | Seoul, South Korea
The morning began like any other.
The sky was a flawless dome of blue, unmarred by even a whisper of cloud. Sunlight poured over the city like molten gold, baking the streets until the asphalt shimmered as if liquefied. Heat waves danced above car roofs, warping their reflections into ghostly mirages. Engines murmured beneath the hum of fans, and impatient car horns created a rhythm that belonged uniquely to Seoul—a city constantly in motion.
From sidewalk stalls, the scent of grilling pork belly, garlic, and sweet soy curled upward into the hot air, twisting through alleyways and around buildings like invisible ribbons of comfort. Ajummas barked orders over crackling oil, spatulas clanging as they flipped sizzling pancakes and tossed noodles with flicks of well-practiced wrists. The city breathed in steam and sweat and swallowed it with indifference.
In a narrow alley off Jongno, children darted barefoot through puddles left by morning cleaning. They laughed as they leapt between sagging clotheslines strung with still-dripping laundry. A boy banged a dented pot like a war drum, leading his imaginary army through crooked streets. A girl followed with her arms wide, pretending she had wings.
Above them, on the rooftop of a worn brick apartment, two teenagers leaned against rusting railings, sharing a cigarette and a stolen moment of peace. One of them exhaled smoke toward the sky and muttered, "Hot enough to fry your soul today."
Somewhere nearby, an old radio crackled with static before a bubblegum pop song burst through, its beat skipping slightly with each sway of the antenna.
It was Seoul in summer.
Loud. Crowded. Alive.
Just another day.
Ordinary.
Unremarkable.
Until the sky changed.
---
It didn't happen all at once.
First came the sensation—subtle, easily dismissed. Some felt it as a pressure behind the eyes, like the ghost of a migraine. Others swore they heard a low hum beneath the city's natural roar, too deep to name and too constant to place.
Then came the flickers.
A streetlamp stuttered in daylight.
A bus radio glitched into silence.
In a third-floor apartment above a noodle shop, Mr. Kim frowned at the way his teacup trembled without wind. His television—midway through the morning news—cut to black. He tapped the remote, checked the power cord, even thumped the screen with the same frustration passed down through generations.
Just as he gave up, the screen flared back to life.
But the anchor wasn't smiling.
She stood stiffly behind her desk, hands clasped as though in prayer, lips pale.
"We are receiving unconfirmed reports of unidentified black structures—appearing simultaneously across major cities worldwide. The first verified sighting was above Seoul. Authorities advise citizens to remain indoors and away from windows. Please—do not panic."
She paused, as if listening to someone off-screen, then added in a strained whisper:
"They're not planes. Or satellites. They're… stationary. And they didn't come from the sky."
Mr. Kim turned toward the window.
Far in the distance, rising between two concrete towers like a blade shoved through the earth, was a spire of darkness.
It was tall—impossibly so. Taller than Namsan Tower. Taller than any building he'd ever seen.
But what chilled him wasn't its size.
It was the way it didn't reflect sunlight. It didn't cast a shadow.
It simply was, like a tear in the fabric of reality.
---
On the west side of Seoul, Mrs. Park dropped a dish into the sink. It shattered against the steel and sliced open her palm, but she didn't notice.
Her eyes were locked on the television, where a shaky drone feed displayed the same black structure. It was too wide to be a tower. Too still to be alive. Too… wrong.
Her son, Minho, peeked from behind the couch. "Is it a spaceship?"
Mrs. Park shook her head, voice barely audible. "I don't know."
"It looks like the stories you told me. The bad ones. With monsters."
Another tremor shook the apartment. The floor rippled like water underfoot. A bookcase tipped and spilled its contents. The lights flickered. A vase fell.
This time, she screamed.
The tower outside didn't move.
But the sky around it began to darken.
---
In the streets, people stopped walking.
Phones rang, buzzed, and lit up with emergency broadcasts. Cars pulled over. Some drivers opened their doors, others simply stared upward through their windshields.
Someone screamed.
Someone laughed, too loud, too long.
Children clutched their parents' legs.
Strangers held hands.
And all eyes turned toward the thing in the sky.
It wasn't a structure in the traditional sense. It had no visible doors. No windows. No signs of construction. Its surface wasn't stone or steel or glass. It was smooth, and yet not—its edges constantly shifted, like trying to focus on a shadow underwater.
It didn't feel real.
It felt wrong.
Some fell to their knees and prayed.
Others ran.
By noon, reports confirmed the same towers had appeared in Tokyo, Paris, New York, Moscow, Manila, Cairo, and over Jerusalem.
By 1:00 PM, an unedited live stream from Berlin caught the edge of the tower moving—a ripple, subtle, like something inside had adjusted.
By 2:00 PM, the stream from London ended with a gasp.
The camera tilted up.
And something shifted behind the black veil.
Like breathing.
---
The world paused.
Governments held emergency meetings behind closed doors. Militaries canceled operations and deployed rapid response teams to cities affected. The UN convened for the first unscheduled emergency session in its history.
Science offered no comfort.
Satellite scans returned corrupted. Drones lost signal. Machinery failed. Attempts to interact with the towers physically caused nausea, hallucinations, and in two cases—spontaneous bleeding from the eyes and ears.
Inside, expedition teams met impossible interiors.
Corridors that looped.
Stairs that went sideways.
Light that flickered with no source.
One soldier from an American task force screamed over comms, "It's watching us!" before the feed went dead.
Only two returned.
One without his arm.
The other without his mind.
---
That night, the face of Dr. Hana Choi, South Korea's top biophysicist, appeared on every screen.
Her voice trembled. Her hair was unkempt. She hadn't slept.
"These towers are not machines," she said. "They're not built. They're grown. We've detected organic tissue within the structure. They respond to proximity. To thought. They're… like immune systems."
A pause.
"I believe we are the virus."
Silence followed.
Then, General Carter of the U.S. Joint Command appeared on-screen.
"This is not a drill," he said. "We are dealing with an unprecedented global phenomenon. All nations will implement survival protocols. Evacuate densely populated zones. Seek shelter. Do not provoke."
His eyes were hollow.
"We face extinction if we act foolishly."
---
July 5, 2000 — Sector 9, Seoul
The sky had dulled.
No clouds. No birds. Just a haze that muted the world.
The usual noise of the city had vanished, replaced by a low mechanical hum from government loudspeakers and the weary shuffling of tens of thousands waiting in lines.
One such line stretched six blocks toward a government shelter carved beneath the old subway station.
Soldiers with rifles stood guard.
People whispered. Prayed. Wept.
In that line stood a five-year-old boy named Rover.
His mother clutched his hand like it was the last real thing in the world. Her face was pale. Her lips were dry and cracked. In her other hand was a battered duffel bag with their identification, bottled water, crackers, and a photo of Rover's father—long since gone.
Rover's red dinosaur backpack bounced with every step. In his small fist, he gripped a plastic robot missing one leg.
He didn't cry.
But his eyes never stopped moving.
The shelter loomed ahead.
"Mama," he said. "Why are we here?"
His mother didn't answer right away. Her gaze was locked on the soldiers, on the armored trucks, on the barricades.
"We're just being careful," she said at last.
He looked up at her.
"But… I'm thirsty."
"I know, baby. Just a little longer."
Behind them, a woman started shouting—angry and afraid.
A man tried to cut the line and was shoved back.
A baby wailed.
Then—
A sound.
A high whistle.
Thin. Sharp. Distant.
Rover looked up.
"Mama, what's that?"
A moment passed.
Then the soldier nearest them screamed:
"INCOMING! DOWN! GET DOWN NOW!"
Everything shattered.
The line became a storm.
People screamed and surged. A woman fell, vanished beneath a dozen trampling feet. A man clambered over the barricade and was tackled by two soldiers.
Gunfire cracked overhead—warning shots into the sky.
And then—
The shadow arrived.
It fell over them like a curtain.
The temperature dropped.
The sky howled.
Rover looked up.
Something vast descended through the clouds—wings outstretched, body coiled like a living spear hurled from heaven itself.
It wasn't a plane.
It wasn't a machine.
It was alive.
A wyvern.
Scales like blackened steel shimmered in the light. Horns twisted from its skull. Its talons curled into the concrete like meat hooks.
It shrieked.
Not like a bird.
Not like anything natural.
It was the sound of fear incarnate.
One soldier raised his gun—fired—
The bullets bounced.
Another screamed.
The wyvern lunged.
A man was gone in a blink—snatched up like a rabbit.
A mother tried to shield her child.
She failed.
Rover's mother grabbed him, eyes wild.
"RUN!"
He couldn't.
Not fast enough.
Not before the tail crashed into the ground near them, knocking both aside.
She hit the wall.
Hard.
Rover's hand slipped from hers.
His robot clattered beside him.
"Mama?"
She didn't move.
The wyvern roared again, eyes glowing.
And Rover, a small boy lost in a nightmare made real, whispered:
"That's… a wyvern."
Not from a book.
Not from a dream.
From the sky.
And it had come for them.
---
To be continued…