Nero sits at a table — two capsules laid out in front of him.

He picks up the first.

I took the blue pill a long time ago.

Not in a single moment of revelation. Not all at once.

I swallowed it in sips. In every unquestioned salute. In every nod when I should’ve asked why.

In every time I chose comfort over curiosity.

Obedience wasn’t forced upon me. It was offered — and I drank it willingly.

A sigh.

That’s the brilliance of Arcadia. It doesn’t feel like a cage; it feels like home.

You graze. You breathe. You follow the flock.

You’re told you’re free — as long as you never ask where the fences are.

And like every lamb… I followed.

Nero twirls the capsule in his fingers.

That’s how the sedation works. It teaches you that questions are danger; that safety lies in silence.

That the ones who disappear must’ve had it coming.

So I kept grazing… Head down, heart numb —pretending the illusion was enough.

The eyes of his mask brighten.

Until something glitched.

One corrupted file. One irregular beat in the rhythm I’d been taught to sleepwalk through.

Just like that, the field vanished. I was no longer in a pasture; I was in a construct.

A simulation.

The grass turned to wireframe, the sky fractured, and I saw the shepherds for what they really were…

Architects — not leading sheep — but herding minds.

A shake of the head.

That day, I realised I wasn’t inside the system; I was the system.

Feeding it.

Powering it.

And once I’d seen it — I couldn’t go back…

So I made a choice.

Nero sets down the blue capsule and picks up the red one.

I took the red pill. Not for safety or comfort, but to rip away the veil.

To read the code beneath the smiles; the script behind the silence.

The red pill didn’t offer freedom — it showed me the price.

He closes his fist around the red pill.

This isn’t a cure; it’s a weapon. Not to fight others — but to cut through the wool pulled over our eyes.

It shows you the fence. The blade.

The trap disguised as peace.

It doesn’t save you; it snaps you out of it. Turns lambs into wolves — sharp-eyed and unyielding.

No longer willing to be led…

Nero leans forward.

At Pandemonium, the choice is yours.

Take the blue pill, and you’ll wake up in Arcadia.

You’ll graze, smile, sleep through the slaughter, and when the blade falls, you won’t even know it’s coming — because that’s the fucking deal.

Comfort without truth. Peace without freedom.

Ignorance dressed as innocence.

But the red pill…

He brings the capsule closer.

The red pill is the scream you’ve swallowed since the day you were told to stand still.

It’s the moment the field burns and you finally run — not from fear, but because you remember what it means to move.

Nero sweeps the blue pill off the table.

Me? I wasn’t born to graze.

I was born to break the fence…

He places the red pill in his mouth — swallowing it down.

And on Saturday night, I’m burning the whole field down.