Reality had begun unraveling.
One week later, the Nexus itself bent under its own code. Mountains phased out of existence. Time stuttered. A tree would bloom, die, and bloom again in seconds. Hostile zones vanished—or appeared where none had existed.
Ashveil received reports from the outer zones: players caught in loops, monsters that couldn't die, memory wipes. The world was glitching.
Kael volunteered for a recon mission into the Fractal Plains, a zone infamous for bending perception. There, surrounded by mirrored ruins, Kael saw it.
Himself.
But not quite.
This version wore black and gold armor laced with circuitry. His eyes were empty sockets filled with red code.
"I am who you would've been… had you obeyed," it said.
They fought—brutally, without mercy. Kael barely survived, his body bruised, his soul fraying. The Echoform bled data as it disintegrated.
And then Kael saw it: the words burned into the mirrored floor beneath him.
"The system is breaking not because you resist…
but because you were never supposed to remember."