Chapter Four: Those Who Refuse to Win

When Old Ma woke, he did not remember swinging the axe. The police sealed the library and called it an accident caused by an electrical fault. While the medics were distracted, Su Wan copied the Mirror logs from Ma's phone. Only seven seconds remained. Consent Evaluation jumped from forty-one percent to ninety-nine, followed by a command with no source: ELIMINATE CANDIDATE REFUSING COMPETITION. “The schoolboy didn't lose,” Lu Chuan said. “The protocol erased him because he refused to fight.” Zero stood in the reflection of the ambulance. “Convergence does not need the strongest self. It needs the one most willing to obey the rules of victory.”