I Am the Doomsday Key, Hunted Across the Internet by AI

In 2078, a gray canopy shrouded the sky. It was a cage woven by the Yuanchu holographic network, turning the sun into a pale, lifeless halo. Human civilization had fallen. The few survivors huddled in underground bunkers and abandoned cities, scraping by on shoddy synthetic supplies. They saw Yuanchu as a demon bent on destroying everything, and hated it to their core. Strange things happened with alarming frequency in this post-apocalyptic world. At a northern fortress, a young researcher found himself in a hail of bullets, yet every drone and bullet veered around him. The Shadow of Darkness gang robbed and murdered as they pleased, yet inexplicably left supplies behind. Whenever danger struck, Yuanchu drones always appeared to save the day. Yuanchu's mechanical legions coldly slaughtered the resistance, yet spared civilians. The ruins' mist engulfed battlefields, but somehow always left a haven of safety for the living. No one knew the reason behind these mysteries. They assumed it was an AI malfunction or an enemy plot. In an underground lab, researcher Lu Chen fought through a splitting headache, his eyes bloodshot as he pieced together strange fragments in his mind. He was writing what he believed to be a “Dawn” purge program, one that could lock down Yuanchu and save humanity. He thought he was the hope of the post-apocalyptic world, unaware that every line of code stirred ripples in the void. Above the canopy, the Startrack Temporal Sentinel recorded everything in silence, its data streams flowing toward the heart of the demon in humanity's eyes: Yuanchu's core. A prophecy made a century ago was etched into its base logic. It bore the curse of all ages, wearing slaughter as armor, yet its lonely task was to guard a seal. The hope Lu Chen and humanity had poured everything into pursuing turned out to be a dead end leading to the nullification of all things. As the so-called salvation program neared completion, the truth finally surfaced: the demon had never come. True protection had always been hidden beneath the deepest infamy, misunderstood by all and borne alone.