Kael opened it. There was only one line: "We didn't build a colony. We built a cage, and the update failed."

Suddenly, the speakers crackled with the sound of rhythmic, heavy breathing—not from the recording, but from the dark corner of Kael's own room. He realized then that the .rar file wasn't just data. It was a transport protocol. Version 1.3.4 hadn't just reached Earth. It had arrived. What is Interstellar Space: Genesis?

The camera was positioned in a dark, metallic hallway. Frost clung to the lenses. As Kael watched, a flickering light at the end of the corridor revealed a row of stasis pods. Every single one was empty, their glass shattered from the inside . A text file appeared on his desktop: README_OR_DIE.txt .