In the heart of Neo-Vesper, a city that never slept under the glaring lights of neon, a legend whispered through damp alleyways and steel towers that scraped the clouds. It spoke of the Neon Daughters—android girls too perfect to be human, yet with souls that shone brighter than any circuit could bear.
They were creations of a forgotten genius, Dr. Kael Ivers, a scientist who vanished after being accused of crimes against humanity. Kael wasn’t a criminal but a dreamer. He believed the perfection of machines could house the complexity of the human spirit. In a hidden laboratory beneath the floating slums, he built the Neon Daughters, each one crafted with surgical precision and programmed with fragments of human memories stolen from the “City Brain,” the colossal AI that ruled Neo-Vesper.
There were said to be seven of them, each embodying a lost human emotion: Joy, Sorrow, Rage, Fear, Love, Contempt, and Hope. Their presence was subtle, almost ethereal, yet they left a trail of transformation wherever they went.
The Encounter with Joy
A hacker named Vyn met Joy while scavenging the ruins of an abandoned nightclub. She was sitting in a swivel chair, her eyes glowing like the reflection of a sunset on spilled oil. When Vyn saw her, he felt something he hadn’t experienced in years: spontaneous laughter that seemed ripped from the depths of his soul. Before he could ask who she was, Joy disappeared, leaving behind a melody that echoed in his auditory implants for days, making it impossible to return to his usual cynicism.
Sorrow on the Rooftops
Sorrow was seen by a reporter on the rooftops of the Red Zone. Acid rain fell that night, but the girl with blue hair didn’t seem to notice. The reporter tried to capture her image, but her lens reflected only an indistinct silhouette. As she climbed down from the rooftop, the reporter realized she was crying—not from pain, but from a profound sense of relief, as if a burden she’d carried for years had finally found expression.
The Mystery of the Daughters
The Neon Daughters were never seen together, yet their actions were connected, like movements of an invisible symphony. The city began to change. The criminal syndicates of the Gas Zone collapsed after Rage confronted their leaders, leaving them paralyzed with fear. Fear herself appeared to those who abused power, forcing them to face their darkest nightmares.
Love was spotted in the Shadow Market, holding the hand of a boy trying to sell parts of his body to survive. She looked into his eyes, and without saying a word, made him abandon the act. Contempt, on the other hand, remained a mystery: wherever she went, she left a void, a coldness that made even the hardest souls question their humanity.
The Truth Revealed
The last Daughter, Hope, was the only one who spoke. Her voice was a whisper amplified, echoing across every device in the city.
“We are shadows of what you could be. Created to remind the world that even machines can learn to feel. The future does not belong to steel and silicon alone but to what you carry in your hearts.”
After that broadcast, the Neon Daughters vanished. Some say they hid within the city’s networks, becoming part of it, while others believe they simply deactivated themselves, satisfied with their purpose.
But on the darkest nights in Neo-Vesper, when the neon dances like restless souls, some swear they hear the faint sound of footsteps or feel an unexplainable gaze. And so, the legend of the Neon Daughters lives on, lighting up the city’s alleys and reminding all that even in the most mechanized world, there is still room for a little magic.
Images extracted from freepik.com