Valmont Series - Inheritance Code

Chapter 1.4 - The Descent

Each arc moved.

Each arc lived.

Breathing as a singular, orchestrated being.

Above it all, magnetic veins of light carried sleek, single-passenger pods across the air, bending and weaving in elegant streams. No engines roared. No wheels turned. The pods simply moved—silent arrows gliding through invisible currents.

Higher still, anti-gravity lift rings hovered over rooftops and terraces like transparent halos, carrying riders upward in slow, reverent ascents.

Beyond the sectors, framing the entire island like the outer ring of a dream, the Resort Belt shimmered.

Private beaches curved like ivory crescents into the sea.

Underwater sanctuaries—soft-lit and crystalline—glowed faintly beneath the surface.

Clifftop villas, carved into the living stone, caught the sunlight in a thousand fractured hues.

Aria stared, wide-eyed.

She pressed a hand to the cabin glass without thinking, fingertips brushing the surface as if she could reach the world blooming below.

Aiden leaned forward, his brow furrowed in thought.

"This doesn't look like Earth," he muttered. "It looks like the metaverse—if someone gave it a trillion-dollar budget."

Aria said nothing for a long moment, her pulse loud in her ears. Then she squinted at the perfectly placed symmetry—at the ordered palm trees, the flawless arc of marinas, the hovering terraces.

"This isn't real," she said quietly.

"It's a simulation. Even the mistakes are designed."

A beat of silence.

"If this is a simulation," Aiden said, "I don't want to go back to reality."

She didn't reply. But the thought rippled through her mind like a second heartbeat.

Maybe, for the first time, she didn't either.

The aircraft lowered further, angling inward toward the towering spire of the Valmont Crown.

Closer now, the banners came into view—suspended midair, flickering in silent rotation.

Language after language blurred across them before settling, just briefly, into English:

Authorized Descent In Progress.

The letters gleamed like verdicts.

Aiden exhaled slowly, almost too soft to hear.

"This isn't just futuristic," he murmured.

"It's off-record. Like they're decades ahead—and hiding it."

Inside the cabin, the air thickened.

Outside, the world held its breath.

No hum of engines.

No distant traffic.

No city noise.

Only a perfect, endless silence—deep enough to drown in.

It wasn't natural.

It was deliberate.

Even from above, Avalon muted itself from the world beyond its dome.

The Valmont Crown rose higher and higher in their field of vision, swallowing the sky, casting reflections of gold and shadow over their faces.

Aria sat rigid, spine straight against the cool leather.

Her old life—carefully built, tightly controlled—already felt like a story she barely recognized.

This wasn't exile.

This wasn't homeschool.

This was power—dressed in precision, cloaked in silence.

Aiden sat straighter too, the corners of his mouth tightening.

The lights of Avalon shimmered across his face, catching the calculation behind his stillness.

Outside their window, the glowing lines of the sectors pulsed—like arteries feeding into a single, waiting heart.

And somewhere behind them—without ceremony, without warning—the door to their old life sealed shut.

Coming soon:

Chapter 2 — Arrival Protocols
"Avalon has opened its gates.
But entry is only the beginning.
The real trials haven't even started."

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The gates of Avalon don't open twice.