Incubus Living In A World Of Superpower Users

The room was quiet.

Not in the way most people think of quiet—empty and still—but in the kind of quiet that comes when everyone already knows what's about to be said.

No need to talk. No need to ask. They were here because something had shifted, and the Director had called them. That alone said enough.

Twelve board members. All present. Not on screens. Not as holograms or remote links. In person.

That detail by itself made things feel heavier. They hadn't met face-to-face in years. Not all of them at once. But today, they had.

This wasn't protocol.

This was pressure.

The Director didn't sit. He stood at the front of the room, one hand resting lightly on the corner of the long black table.

The war room's usual displays—maps, feeds, threat grids—were off. Every screen was filled with static. Not a glitch. Not a malfunction. That was on purpose.

Too many eyes were watching lately. Too many systems were wired to other systems.

He didn't want projections.

He didn't need them.

Because he had the file.

A single paper dossier rested in front of him. Plain, unmarked. No tags. No headers. No seals except the one he'd personally broken right before the meeting started.

He opened it.

Didn't look up.

Didn't clear his throat.

Just started reading.

"A gate confirmed active near the seabed off the southern trenchline," he said flatly. "One of ours reached it.

There was no immediate reaction, no breach, but the structure was watching—not dormant, not blind, but watching."

He turned the page with the same quiet control.

"A child—female. Age five. Bloodline traced through a dormant noble line. Marked at birth. Not by Crescent. Not by any standard deity. This one doesn't offer blessings. It claims."

Another page.

"A relic courier. No awareness of what he carried. Memory shard. Still active. Still warm. Carved into the body of a cult agent.

The scan led to a new city—less than ten years old—built directly above a half-buried temple that predates even Crescent's historical registry.

He closed the folder with a soft thump, his hand still resting on it.

"This isn't a theory. This isn't a warning on its way. This is happening. They're preparing for a second descent."

The words didn't echo. The room was too heavily reinforced, too tightly packed with shielding to let anything resonate.

But the weight of those words still filled the air.

For a while, no one spoke.

Then finally, one of the board members leaned forward, voice low. "Do we know where they'll come through?"

The Director nodded. "Two likely entry points. One through the submerged gate. The other, through the capital, uses the girl's bloodline as a tether point."

Another voice followed. Sharper. "You're planning an interception?"

"No," the Director said calmly. "I'm planning an invitation."

He tapped the folder lightly.

"We leak part of this intel. Not all of it. Just enough to suggest that we've picked up on something big but haven't moved yet.

We float it through one of our loser networks. Mid-tier contact. Someone with enough reach to be noticed but not trusted enough to be considered airtight."

He finally looked up, his eyes steady.

"Then we give them something to chase."

He stepped away from the table and moved toward the physical control panel mounted on the wall beside him.

There were no screens, no smartglass, just old-fashioned dials and mechanical inputs.

He turned one slowly, bringing up a map. Not detailed and not even labeled.

Just a grid.

He pointed at one section near the edge of the capital. It was an old utility zone with minimal oversight, weak spiritual density, and few patrols.

"This will be our site. We'll mark it as a possible ritual anomaly. Unstable, flickering energy. Something that looks valuable, urgent, and vulnerable."

One of the board members narrowed their eyes. "A trap."

The Director nodded. "Yes. But not obvious."

He pressed another switch.

The map shifted. Highlighted lines are curved around the marked zone.

"These will be the entry points. Designed to funnel them in. No exit route once they're inside.

A god-disruption lattice will be set across the perimeter—a slow charge hidden in the ambient infrastructure. The moment they settle into the zone, the net closes."

Another voice spoke. Older, more cautious. "That only works if they take the bait."

"They will," the Director said. "They've shown too much interest to ignore an opening like this. They believe we're still scrambling. Still patching holes."

A pause.

"And that's the point. We let them believe it."

He stepped back from the map and returned to the table. He carefully set the folder down and smoothed the edge of the page.

"This isn't just about capturing them."

He looked around the room now, locking eyes with each board member in turn.

"This is about leverage. We don't follow the board they're playing on. We redraw it. And if they think they're pulling us into a corner—then let them find out the corner is made of steel."

Another beat of silence.

Then one of the board members gave a single nod.

"We'll start reallocating assets. Quietly."

Another followed: "We'll need city coordination—power dips, temporary route closures, and temple patrols redirected."

A third added, "I'll oversee the comm-layer masking. We don't want anyone tracing the leak back to us."

The Director nodded once.

"Do it. Begin now."

No one stood yet.

Not right away.

They waited, watching him, knowing there was still something else coming.

He turned back toward the war room window. It didn't look out over anything—just a blank wall. But he wasn't looking at the wall.

He was thinking through it.

"They think they're ahead," he said, voice low. "They think we're chasing shadows. Let them keep thinking that. Let them believe they've got the timing."

Then his hand fell loosely to his side.

"And when they finally reach for what we've dangled—make sure the door behind them doesn't open again."

The silence that followed wasn't agreement.

It was an execution.

And outside the walls of that room, Crescent began to move.

Systems adjusted. Orders redirected.

At first, it didn't look like much.

Traffic signals changed their cycle.

Utility requests were rerouted.

Maintenance teams were reassigned.

Temple presence began to shift—subtle, quiet, like a coincidence.

But none of it was a coincidence.

The net was forming.