The thing about being a barista at Heavenly Brews is that people tend to look right through you. I am the man who provides the caffeine, the nameless vessel for the morning rush. It's the perfect camouflage for a man who spent three centuries as a hermit and another five as a warlord.
After my shift, I didn't go back to my apartment. I didn't go to the laundromat. Instead, I walked into a high-end laundromat three districts over—one where the machines didn't rattle and the air didn't smell like cheap lavender.
I walked straight to the back, past a sign that said "Staff Only," and entered a small, windowless office. I reached into the hidden lining of my green apron and pulled out a second phone. It wasn't a smartphone; it was a heavy, slate-grey device with no screen, just a single jade button in the center.
I pressed it.
The air in the room didn't just grow cold; it ceased to move. The shadows in the corners lengthened, twisting into the shapes of kneeling figures.
"Report," I said. My voice didn't sound like the weary Chen Feng who struggled with vending machines. It carried the resonance of a mountain sliding into the sea.
A voice hissed from the slate-grey device, distorted by layers of spiritual encryption. "The pressure in Sector 7 is reaching critical mass, Chairman. The 'Silos' are primed. We await your word to begin the Reverse-Flow."
"Not yet," I replied, staring at my reflection in the darkened window. "Yue Qin has returned. She's suspicious. If we trigger the revival now, the Bureau will see the surge before we can stabilize the anchor points."
The organization I led didn't have a name in the modern tongues. In the old world, we were the Order of the Reclaiming Tide. We weren't just survivors of the Great Ebb; we were its architects' worst nightmare.
While the Bureau of Immortal Affairs spent their time policing fox-spirits and illegal mahjong parlors, my people were busy. We had spent the last fifty years building our own network—not to store the magic, but to act as a detonator.
Mei Lin thought I was a potential recruit. Yue Qin thought I was a power source. Neither of them realized that the "Sovereign of the Fallen Leaf" had spent his retirement planting the seeds for a global insurrection against the mundane.
If the "Silos" were the harvest, I was the wildfire.
"Chairman," the voice on the phone continued, "The Archive's representative, Mei Lin... she has begun investigating the coffee shop. She's looking for the 'Silo' beneath the basement."
I leaned back in the creaky office chair, a cold smirk touching my lips. "Let her look. She's looking for a storage tank. She won't recognize a ritual circle if it's disguised as a plumbing layout. Just make sure the 'Organic Raisin' imps stay out of her way. I don't want her distracted by minor pests."
I hung up and tucked the phone away.
Outside, the city continued its dull, un-magical hum. Millions of people living their lives, unaware that the bored barista who made their lattes was currently holding the "Start" button for the end of the world.
The Great Ebb had turned the world into a desert. I was just waiting for the right moment to break the dam and let the ocean back in.