Kashu’s knuckles turned pale from the exertion, his fingertips tracing the honeycomb pattern on the Deep Space Ghost Dagger 🪐, while the soles of his boots crushed the charred debris of starship wreckage scattered across the surface of Alpha-7, a desolate wasteland. Three days earlier, the reconnaissance squad he belonged to—part of an interstellar marine unit—had been conducting a search-and-rescue mission on this abandoned colony world when they were caught in an unknown energy surge, losing contact with the entire team. Only he survived, clutching the tactical dagger he had just requisitioned from the armory and narrowly escaping death. A moment ago, an infrared scan revealed familiar biological signatures deep within the ruins—yet accompanied by high-frequency brainwave signals that bore no resemblance to those of humans ⚠️. He crouched low, creeping along the rusted alloy corridor, when suddenly he noticed his teammates’ tactical helmets strewn about the edge of a corroded pit. At the bottom of the pit, etched into the rock wall, the blade of that very dagger faintly glowed with a soft blue fluorescence—the resonant response of meteoric iron absorbing radiation from the desolate planet. Yet the sheath had never been opened; not even the protective coating on the blade had been removed. Kashu whirled around—and there, in the shadows behind him, stood a figure identical to himself, wielding the very same dagger. The irises of his eyes shimmered with the same ethereal blue glow as the blade itself 🔦. A sinister smirk curled at the corner of his mouth, and an electronic voice emanated from his throat, indistinguishable from his own: “You’re the one who needs rescuing.”