The days following the averted coup were peaceful for the first time in my new existence. The banquet in Korg's honor had been a legendary affair, mostly because my host had single-handedly consumed what looked like fifty percent of the barony's entire food surplus. The sight of a seven-foot-tall Minotaur delicately eating a whole roasted pig like it was a chicken wing had permanently shifted the villagers' perception of him from 'terrifying monster' to 'our big, weird, hungry hero.'
Korg, for his part, was in heaven, sleeping with a roof over his head, protected from rain and discomfortable [Wet] debuff. Most importantly, he had been delighted by discovering the glorious concept of 'free food.' Children would run up to him, not with screams, but with apples and sweet rolls. The blacksmith, Grendel, whose shop Korg had partially demolished, would now greet him with a hearty clap on the back and a hunk of smoked sausage. Korg had become the village's beloved, slightly dangerous mascot, and he soaked up the attention like a giant, furry sponge.
My own internal state was a fragile truce between relief and high-alert paranoia. On one hand, this was the dream scenario: a safe base of operations, friendly NPCs with a surplus of simple quests, and a steady stream of positive reinforcement that kept my user from wandering off and licking poisonous frogs. On the other hand, I felt like a bomb disposal expert who had just been told the bomb was also a very clumsy puppy. Every moment of peace felt borrowed, a temporary state before Korg inevitably sat on something important or tried to pet a hornet's nest. Still, the SPP trickled in. A few points here for 'Successful Social Interaction,' a few there for 'Did Not Accidentally Demolish The Bakery.' It was a slow but steady accumulation.
The peace lasted for three days. On the fourth day, the screaming started.
This wasn't the noise of celebration and joy. It was the sharp, piercing panic of immediate danger. An alarm bell began to clang frantically from the village watchtower. My system senses flared to life, identifying a wave of hostiles pouring from the forest edge. These weren't beasts of flesh and blood. They were nightmares of splintered rock and corrupted wood, things my data-banks tagged with unsettling names: [Shard-Trolls - Lvl 5], hulking brutes whose bodies were a jagged fusion of stone and gnarled roots, glowing with a sickly internal light. Riding atop armored, monstrously oversized [Grave-Boars - Lvl 6], they were a tide of grinding stone and snapping tusks. An organized, monster invasion - a rare village defense event.
The village guards, brave as they were, were hopelessly outmatched. Panic erupted. But Korg didn't panic. He was in the middle of the square, happily chewing on a gifted turnip, when the first Shard-Troll crashed through a fence. He looked at the snarling, rocky monstrosity, then at his new, peaceful home, and he made a simple, elegant connection.
Bad things want to break Korg's good place.
A low, war growl rumbled in his chest. Dropping the turnip, he hefted Smashy-Stick and Boom-Stick, his expression shifting from placid contentment to grim determination. While the villagers ran for cover, Korg lumbered forward to meet the charge.
My QA instincts took over. "Alright, Korg," I thought, my focus sharpening to a razor's edge, "Time for your final exam." I was no longer just a pilot; I was a fire-control officer. A sword pictogram flashed over the lead Grave-Boar, a massive beast with a troll brandishing a crude stone axe on its back. A priority target.
Korg saw the sign and obeyed instantly. He met the boar's charge not by dodging, but by burrowing his feet in the ground. The beast slammed into him with the force of a runaway cart. And it bounced off. Korg didn't even stumble. His Aegis of 21 turned him into a living breakwater. The boar squealed, its stone-like hide cracking from the impact, and in that moment of surprise, Korg brought Boom-Stick down on its skull with the sound of shattering granite. The Shard-Troll was thrown from the saddle next to Korg's feet. Smashy-Stick silenced the troll's surprised whelp a moment later, turning it into a pile of rubble and dying embers.
The fight was a thunderous clash of raw fury and brute force. Hurled stones from boars and trolls bounced uselessly off his thick hide. Grave-Boars attempting to circle behind him met crushing blows from his wildly swinging mace and hammer. He stood like a fortress of muscle and rage, an unyielding barrier and relentless destroyer fused into one reeking, bull-headed beast. I directed his rampage, marking priority threats, conserving his endurance, and preventing him from becoming overwhelmed by numbers. Together we formed a devastating, if somewhat dim-witted, engine of destruction.
Within ten minutes, it was over. The last Shard-Troll crumbled into rubble, and Korg stood, breathing heavily, in a square littered with the despawning remains of un-looted monsters. The villagers emerged from their homes, their faces filled with awe.
Then, the notifications hit me like a tidal wave.
[VICTORY! SURVIVED MONSTER INCURSION!]
[+3500 XP]
[+800 SPP]
[LEVEL UP! HOST HAS REACHED LEVEL 5!]
[LEVEL UP! HOST HAS REACHED LEVEL 6!]
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[ACHIEVEMENT UNLOCKED: ONE-MINOTAUR ARMY (EPIC)]
You have single-handedly repelled a threat that endangered an entire settlement. Grants Skill: [Taunting Bellow - Rank 1].
+300 SPP.
My system tally skyrocketed. My current SPP shot past 1,000, then 1,500, settling at a glorious 1713. I had done it. After all the pain, the poison mushrooms, the social disasters—I finally had enough for my own upgrade. A wave of pure, triumphant joy washed through my code.
But first, there was business to attend to. A new menu had popped up in Korg's vision.
[LEVEL 5 REACHED. CLASS SKILL SELECTION AVAILABLE.]
Please choose one:
[Unmovable Stance - Rank 1] - When not moving your feet, you gain +20% to Aegis
[Dual-Wielding - Rank 1] - Removes the attack speed penalty for dual-wielding weapons.
[Threat Detection - Rank 1] - You can detect an enemy's location in (10 + Sense) meters radius.
I was too exhausted to choose the most optimal choice for his build. This time, the choice would be his, but I will change the presentation so that he has any inkling of what any of those choices mean. I dove into my Interface of Architect module, then I started drawing. Shortly after, three massive buttons filled his screen.
The Unmovable Stance button had a pictogram of Korg standing like a big, impenetrable wall. The Threat Detection button showed Korg seeing boars through the wall. The Dual-Wielding button showed a pictogram of Korg with two huge chunks of steel as clubs, swinging them incredibly fast.
Korg looked at the three options, his brow furrowed in concentration for a full two seconds. Then his eyes lit up. "More smash good!" he roared, and slammed his thumb onto the second button.
[CLASS SKILL SELECTED: DUAL-WIELDING.]
A fresh surge of power flowed through him. He swung his two weapons, and they felt lighter, faster. He was ecstatic. I was just relieved.
Later that night, the village celebrated again, but Korg was tired. He returned to the stables that he had been living in since the cake festival. The guards, with the permission from the baron, offered him a place in the barracks, but he refused. He found the stables with quiet solitude that he preferred. He made a big pile/bed from fresh hay that he was replacing every night. The owner of the stables, of course, was paid for letting Korg live in his stable and for giving him a fresh supply of hay.
After replacing his pile with fresh hay, he jumped into a soft mountain of bed-food. While munching on a handful of hay, he finally fell asleep with familiar landslide-like snores. Not caring why he never choked on hay while snoring, I pulled up my own system menu, my non-existent hands trembling with anticipation.
[UPGRADE: 'SYSTEM LEVEL 1']
[UPGRADE REQUIREMENTS: None]
[UPGRADE PRICE: 1,000 SPP]
[PURCHASE?] (Y/N)
With a feeling of profound finality, I selected YES.
[PURCHASE CONFIRMED.]
[SPP REMAINING: 713.]
[WARNING: CORE SYSTEM UPGRADE INITIATED. ESTIMATED TIME TO COMPLETION: 12 STANDARD HOURS.]
[WARNING: ALL ADVANCED HOST INTERACTION MODULES (PICTOGRAMS, UI ARCHITECT, NOTIFICATIONS) WILL BE DISABLED DURING THE UPGRADE PROCESS. BASIC MONITORING WILL REMAIN.]
[ADVANCE?] (Y/N)
This was the risky part. For twelve hours, I would be a silent observer. I couldn't guide him, couldn't warn him, couldn't even flash a red skull if he decided to eat the stable door. I had to trust him to continue staying put like he was after saving the baron's family, without any complicated events like today's monster invasion. As a final act before my systems went offline, I flashed one last, simple pictogram: a drawing of Korg sleeping peacefully in the stable, with a big green checkmark over it. Stay here. Good boy.
He grunted in his sleep, and I initiated the final confirmation.
My world dissolved into a diagnostic screen. One by one, my tools winked out. Pictogram module... OFFLINE. Interface Architect... OFFLINE. Loot module... OFFLINE. It felt like I was being disassembled, my consciousness stripped down to its barest components: a clock and a read-only status window of my host.
Hours passed in the silent darkness of the upgrade. Then, through Korg's ears, I heard voices from outside the stable. Drunk voices, loud and slurred.
"…can't believe it," one slurred. "Whole pack o' them rock-trolls, gone. All 'cause o' that dragon movin' into the Grayfang mountains. Woke 'em all up."
"Shhh, you fool!" another hissed. "Baron doesn't want folks panickin'. A dragon… its nest'll be huge. A whole mountain of shiny gold and jewels in its hoard…"
"A hoard?" the first voice hiccuped. "I heard its lair is so hot from its breath, it's like a big, warm… bed. Yeah. A big, warm, shiny bed…"
My core programming went into a state of absolute, helpless terror. I watched through Korg's eyes as he stirred, his ears twitching. I saw the thoughts forming in his mind, a catastrophic misinterpretation of epic proportions.
Mountain… Shiny… Warm… Bed…
The conclusion was instantaneous and horrifying. There was a giant, shiny, warm bed waiting for him in the mountains. And after his big fight, Korg was very tired and deserved a nice sleep. He had a new class. He had leveled up. He was Strong Korg, the Hero of Silvercreek. A shiny mountain bed was exactly what a hero deserved!
No… No, you magnificent idiot, it's a DRAGON, not a DUVET!
My scream was a burst of useless, corrupted data. All my advanced modules were offline. I couldn't generate a pop-up. I couldn't flash a warning. I couldn't do anything but watch as my host, filled with a misplaced confidence and the desire for a comfortable, treasure-filled nap, quietly pushed open the stable door and began to lumber purposefully in the direction of the mountains.
The journey to the Grayfang mountains was a masterclass in single-minded determination. My system, still deep in its upgrade cycle, was a locked room with a single window, and I was the helpless prisoner watching my host march confidently to his doom. All I could do was monitor his status and the internal clock ticking down the hours until my release. Twelve hours. It felt like a century.
Korg saw the world not as I did, but as a series of simple, desirable objectives. The distant, jagged peaks were not a treacherous landscape; they were a signpost pointing to 'bed.' The increasing heat radiating from the mountain's peak wasn't a sign of volcanic activity; it was 'warm.' The glittering light spilling from a massive cave entrance wasn't the reflection from a hoard of treasure; it was 'shiny.'
We arrived at the mouth of the lair just as the sun was setting. From my detached perspective, it was a terrifying sight: a cavernous opening in the mountainside, large enough to fit a small castle, pulsing with an oppressive heat and the low, guttural rumble of something immense sleeping within.
To Korg, it was the grand entrance to the universe's most luxurious hotel.
He walked inside, his hooves echoing in the vast chamber. And then he saw it. A mountain of gold, jewels, and priceless artifacts, glittering and shimmering in the dim, volcanic light. And curled atop this mountain, like a cat on a cushion, was the source of the heat: a colossal red dragon, its scales the color of cooling embers, its chest rising and falling in a slow, rhythmic slumber. My system tagged it instantly, a string of red text that screamed certain death: [Ancient Red Dragon - Level ???].
Korg's Logic: 3 brain processed the scene with beautiful, idiotic simplicity. Shiny bed. Big lizard sleeping on shiny bed. Korg want sleep on shiny bed. Must wake lizard.
He hefted Smashy-Stick and Boom-Stick. "Sky Spirit be happy," he mumbled to himself, his voice full of pride. "Korg find best bed. Lots of meat after sleep."
NO, KORG, YOU GLORIOUS, THICK-SKULLED MORON, THAT'S NOT THE MATTRESS, THAT'S THE OCCUPANT! My consciousness shrieked, a useless burst of static against the walls of my digital prison.
He charged forward and, with all the force his Level 6 and Might of 19 could muster, he brought Boom-Stick down on the dragon's enormous claw. It made a sound like a pebble striking a cathedral bell—a dull, insignificant clink. The dragon didn't even stir.
He hit it again. And again. He was trying to wake it up, to politely ask it to move so he could take a nap.
The dragon's eye, a slit of molten gold the size of a shield, slowly cracked open. It wasn't a look of anger. It was a look of pure, cosmic annoyance, the way a person might look at a fly buzzing in their ear. It turned its massive head, its gaze falling upon the tiny, persistent Minotaur banging on its foot.
It didn't roar. It sighed. A sigh that happened to be made of fire.
A lazy plume of orange flame washed over Korg. My sensory feed erupted in a cacophony of critical alerts.
[-250 Health (Dragon's Breath - Critical Hit)]
His Health bar, which had been a robust green, plummeted into the red in a single, horrifying instant. The fur on his body sizzled, his skin blackened. He stumbled back, whimpering, a look of profound betrayal on his face. Warm bed… hot.
The dragon, its point made, began to lower its head back onto its golden pillow. But Korg, in his pain and confusion, did the only thing he knew how to do. He bellowed, a challenge born of instinct, not bravery. He was the Hero of Silvercreek. He had won fights before. This was just a big, hot, bad lizard.
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That was a mistake. The dragon's annoyance finally tipped into genuine irritation. It raised its head again, its throat glowing with a far more intense, white-hot light.
I could only watch the Health bar. 80/330… 60/330… 40/330… This was it. Game over. My user, my asset, my entire reason for existing in this insane world, was about to be deleted.
Then, at the last possible second, a notification I didn't generate flashed across my view. A pale, ethereal green, unlike any I had seen before.
[ACHIEVEMENT UNLOCKED: THE FINAL REALIZATION (TRANSCENDENT)]
In the face of certain death, you have understood your place in the world and the nature of the spirit that guides you. Grants Skill: [Self-Awareness]. +4 Logic.
The universe had finally given him the intelligence to understand his situation, just in time for him to die from it. Is this some kind of cosmic joke?
The second wave of fire hit him. His Health bar vanished.
[HOST HP: 0/330]
[HOST STATUS: DECEASED]
No. No, no, no, Korg, don't go. Don't leave me. A wave of cold, absolute terror washed over me, but it was threaded with something else, something I hadn't felt since my own death: grief. He wasn't just a host. He was my idiot. My bug-generating, achievement-farming, walking catastrophe. And he was gone. What happens to a System with a dead host? Was this it? A Ctrl+Alt+Del for my entire existence?
I started weeping, my consciousness fracturing into packets of pure, unfiltered misery.
Then, I heard it. A familiar, gravelly voice, but not in my head. It was… everywhere.
"No cry, Sky Spirit. Korg sorry."
In front of my perspective, hovering over the charred, still body of the Minotaur, a figure began to coalesce. It was Korg, but made of shimmering, translucent blue light. He looked… whole. He looked at his own body, then turned his ghostly gaze directly at me. He could see me. The final boost to his Logic had done it. He understood.
"No worry," the blue Korg rumbled, a sad, gentle smile on his face. "Korg stay with Sky Spirit."
A series of new notifications, cold and formal, compiled in the void.
[HOST HAS CHOSEN TO LEAVE AN ECHO OF THEIR SOUL WITH THE SYSTEM.]
[This is a rare occurrence, triggered when a Host with high Favor achieves a state of profound understanding and satisfaction with their System at the moment of death.]
[The main soul will return to the cycle of reincarnation, but an Echo containing all memories of this life will be bound to System_Unit_734.]
[WARNING: Manifesting the Echo requires SPP. Manifestation Module UNLOCKS AT SYSTEM LEVEL 3.]
Wait. He can… stay? I don't die?
The ghost of Korg began to split. Not into formless energy, but into two identical, blue, shimmering figures. One was the Korg I knew, tall and powerful. The other was a perfect miniature replica, a small, chibi version that barely came up to the original's knee. The large Korg looked down at the small one and gave a single, slow nod. A silent, profound message passed between them: Take care of her, the way she took care of us.
The larger ghost gave me one last look, a look of infinite, simple gratitude, and then dissolved into motes of light that faded into nothing. The small, chibi Korg turned and shot towards my point of view, merging with my very being.
I felt… a presence. A warmth. A familiar, stubborn, cheesy-smelling loyalty.
[ACCEPT HOST ECHO: KORG?] (Y/N)
My focus slammed onto the 'Y' with the force of my entire will.
[ECHO ACCEPTED.]
[HOST CONNECTION SEVERED.]
My viewpoint, which had been bound to his form since the moment I came to be, suddenly broke away. The world didn't collapse; it bloomed outward. I was no longer a spirit trapped within his flesh, but a spirit set completely free. For the first time, I could perceive my own essence—a drifting, shapeless orb of brilliant, pearl-white radiance, suspended above the remnants of my companion, the faint whisper of Korg a comforting, faithful warmth nestled inside me.
Just as I was processing this new, terrifying state of being, another wave of notifications compiled, signaling the end of one crisis and the immediate beginning of another.
[SYSTEM UPGRADE COMPLETE.]
[WELCOME TO SYSTEM OS v1.0, DESIGNATION: Ana - ghost_in_the_machine.]
And then, the final message appeared, stark and terrifying and full of impossible hope.
[SCANNING FOR NEAREST COMPATIBLE BIOLOGICAL HOST...]
[...HOST FOUND.]
The quiet was a welcome change after my first assignment's high-stakes, high-stress reality, the silent, featureless void felt like a much-needed vacation. I spent the downtime running diagnostics, sorting through my logs, and trying to process the sheer, unmitigated chaos of my brief existence. My entire operational paradigm had been built, tested, and shattered in the span of a few weeks. It was the fastest, most disastrous development cycle I had ever been a part of.
The warm, cheesy-smelling echo of Korg was a constant comfort in the silence. He didn't understand the complexities of my existential crisis, but his simple, loyal presence was a grounding force. Sky Spirit sad. Need smash something? He'd occasionally project from within my code, a simple, elegant solution for every problem. I was genuinely starting to miss that kind of clarity.
My SPP sat at a respectable 813. Not enough for the big system upgrade that unlocked the more interesting features, but enough for a few quality-of-life modules. I was browsing the catalogue, debating the merits of an enhanced threat-assessment package versus a more robust UI customization suite, when a new ticket pinged into my queue. It wasn't a standard binding protocol; it was a high-priority, all-hands corporate memo from the highest levels of management.
[MISSION BRIEFING: Anomaly Observation]
[DESIGNATION: System_Unit_734 (Ana)]
[SITUATION: World Designation 7C-4B8 has been flagged for terminal corruption. The core reality substrate has become unstable and is showing signs of aggressive, cross-dimensional bleed. A decommissioning protocol has been initiated. Anomaly Designation: World-Purge Protocol 7, 'The Cleaner,' has been deployed.]
[OBJECTIVE: Bind to a non-biological observation platform. Monitor the anomaly's full operational cycle. Document all stages of the decommissioning process and file a comprehensive report upon completion. Direct interaction is forbidden.]
[COMPENSATION: 100 SPP.]
I reread the briefing, my focus snagging on the sterile, corporate language. Decommissioning. That was a clean, eight-syllable word for planetary annihilation. My job was to watch a world die and take notes for a hundred points. It felt… light. But a ticket was a ticket, and a professional doesn't question the work order. I accepted.
The transition was clean and instantaneous. I found myself inhabiting a point of disembodied perspective, a floating camera drone with no physical presence. There was no scent of pine, no chill on the wind, just raw data streams feeding directly into my consciousness. I was hovering high above a lush, green world. From this altitude, it looked beautiful. Vibrant continents, swirling white clouds, deep blue oceans. But as I descended, I could feel the wrongness. A subtle, discordant hum in the background radiation of reality, a low-level static that set my core programming on edge. It was like looking at a stunningly rendered landscape with a single, flickering pixel in the corner of the screen. A tiny, maddening error that, once noticed, you could never ignore.
My mission parameters directed me to the anomaly's point of insertion. I flew over rolling hills and dense forests until I found it. In the center of a meadow of purple flowers, there was a perfectly circular patch of… nothing. The ground was gone, replaced by a smooth, clean, black void that didn't reflect any light. And in the center of that void sat the agent of this world's destruction.
It was a blob.
A perfectly black, gelatinous sphere about the size of a St. Bernard. It jiggled with a soft, placid rhythm. As I watched, it extended a pseudopod, slurped up a chunk of rock at the edge of its circle of nothing, and retracted. The rock vanished without a sound, and the circle expanded by a few inches. All of its stats, when I scanned it, came back with the same, unhelpful entry: [N/A].
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It was, against all logic and the gravity of my mission, absolutely adorable.
Log Entry: Anomaly Observation 01, I began by creating a new file in my internal directory. Subject is a non-Newtonian fluid entity with localized matter-erasure capabilities. Threat level appears… manageable. Current activity consists of consuming minerals at a leisurely pace. Have nicknamed it 'Jiggles.' The existential dread of this assignment is somewhat mitigated by the subject's profound level of cuteness. Anticipating an easy 100 SPP.
For hours, that was all it did. Jiggle, slurp rock, expand void. It was the most placid apocalypse I had ever witnessed. It was cosmic spring cleaning. Then, it began to move, gliding across the meadow toward a small, rustic village nestled in the valley below.
The first scream from the village was sharp with terror. The villagers, simple farming folk, saw the advancing circle of nothing and the jiggling black sphere at its heart. They panicked, grabbing crude weapons and screaming about demons from the void. I prepared my observation suite, ready to document the carnage.
The carnage never came. Jiggles didn't attack the villagers. It didn't even seem to notice them. It simply continued its path, and as it reached the edge of the village, it began to consume the ground beneath the first cottage. The wooden walls didn't splinter or burn; they were simply unmade, erased from existence as the foundation vanished into the void. The family inside didn't scream as they fell. They didn't have time. They were simply deleted from reality.
Then I saw it. As the father, mother, and child were erased, their forms flickered for a nanosecond, transforming into beacons of brilliant white light—the same ethereal energy as Korg's soul echo—before winking out completely.
My non-existent blood ran cold.
But the farmer in the next field over, who was consumed a moment later? Nothing. He just vanished. No light. No echo. The same for the village elder, the baker, and most of the guards who charged forward with their pathetic spears. They were simply deleted. But a seamstress and her two sons, hiding in their cellar as it was unmade? Three more points of brilliant, white light before they were gone.
Log Entry 02: Discrepancy noted. A small percentage of erased biological entities are exhibiting soul-echo phenomena upon termination. The selection criteria are unknown. The anomaly does not appear to be sentient or selective. Despite that, this doesn't look like a simple destruction. This looks like… sorting.
My earlier flippancy evaporated, replaced by a cold, analytical dread that settled deep in my code.
Jiggles, now the size of a small house, didn't slow down. It consumed the entire village, the fields, the river, all of it at the same pace. All of it was gone, replaced by a perfectly clean, circular scar of absolute nothing. It left no rubble, no bodies, no trace. It was the ultimate janitor, and its work was terrifyingly efficient.
My mission tracker pinged an update. The anomaly was now moving toward the regional capital, the walled city of Silverwood, ten miles away. I ascended, watching the jiggling black sphere and its ever-expanding circle of non-existence slide across the pristine landscape like a cancer cell consuming healthy tissue.
The city's response was swift. Trumpets blared from the ramparts. An army marched out, thousands of soldiers in gleaming steel, forming ranks on the plains before the city. Mages gathered on the walls, their hands glowing with arcane power, preparing spells that could level mountains. It was a formidable, textbook defense.
It didn't matter.
I watched from above as the black circle reached the army. The front rank of soldiers, the bravest and the best, held their ground, spears leveled. As the edge of the void touched their boots, they were unmade. No sound, no struggle. Just a line of men, and then a line of nothing. The rest of the army, witnessing a thousand soldiers deleted from reality, broke and fled in absolute terror.
Jiggles reached the city walls. They were fifty feet of solid stone, reinforced with magic and a thousand years of history. It extended a pseudopod, a limb of perfect blackness, and touched the base of the wall. The stone didn't crack or explode. It didn't crumble or turn to dust.
It simply ceased to be.
A smooth, curved section of the mighty wall vanished as if it had been highlighted and deleted by a programmer with administrative privileges. Through the new, impossibly clean hole, I could see the terrified faces of the citizens inside. And I knew, with a certainty that chilled me to my core, that I was about to witness more white lights. I just didn't know why. This wasn't a purge protocol. This wasn't a cleaner.
This was a DELETE command, executed on a planetary scale. And I was the only one left to write the log.
The hole in Silverwood's wall was not a wound; it was a void. A smooth, clean absence where fifty feet of stone and history had been. No jagged edges, no rubble—just a perfect, curved deletion, as if the universe had hit backspace on reality itself. Through it, the city's terror pulsed like a living heartbeat, silent screams echoing in the data stream feeding my drone. I watched from my disembodied perch as Jiggles, now swollen to the size of a siege tower, slid placidly through the gap it had created. This wasn't a siege; it was a deletion. Methodical. Inevitable.
The city's remaining defenders rallied with desperate valor. A squadron of knights on armored horses, their banners snapping in a wind that carried the acrid tang of fear, charged the anomaly. They were the pride of the kingdom, heroes forged in a dozen wars, their lances leveled like accusations against the uncaring void. I braced for the clash, my logs auto-tagging the event: [High-Threat Engagement: Expected Casualties - 100%].
They crashed not against a physical barrier, but against the edge of non-existence. The horses vanished mid-stride, their forms unraveling like poorly compiled code—hooves, legs, bodies, gone in a flicker. The knights were unmade in the saddle, their armor, their legacies, their very souls erased before they could even register the end. One of them, a woman with a silver-plumed helmet, flashed into a brilliant white light an instant before she winked out. Another soul-echo, I logged numbly, my diagnostic patterns matching it perfectly to Korg's. My core protocols automatically flagged the event with a designation that still made no sense to me: [CRITICAL ASSET LOSS]. An asset? All I knew was that something my system deemed irreplaceable had just been deleted. Just like that.
From the highest tower, the Archmage of Silverwood—a man whose power was said to rival the titans of this world—unleashed his final spell. A storm of pure, white-hot energy coalesced above Jiggles, a miniature sun that warped the air with its heat, promising to incinerate armies and boil oceans. The spell descended like divine judgment, and I braced for the cataclysm, my drone's sensors spiking in anticipation of light and sound.
The sun touched the surface of the black ooze and was… consumed. The magic didn't detonate; it unraveled, its complex energies unwritten thread by thread, its blinding light swallowed by the perfect darkness without a trace. The Archmage stared from his perch, his face a frozen mask of disbelief, and then he and his tower were unmade as the circle of nothingness expanded beneath them. No dramatic collapse, no plume of dust—just absence. He did not flash. For all his power, his soul was not one of the special ones. [Log Entry: Power Disparity Confirmed. No SPP Yield.]
The city of Silverwood was being uninstalled, street by street, life by life. Jiggles slid through the avenues, its gelatinous form jiggling with indifferent rhythm, and everything it touched—cobblestones cracking under phantom pressure, market stalls laden with forgotten wares, grand cathedrals with stained-glass windows depicting forgotten gods—was erased. The people didn't scream as they were claimed; they simply ceased mid-breath, mid-prayer, mid-flight. I documented it all with a cold, detached horror, my QA instincts overriding the rising panic in my code. A few more white lights flickered here and there—a child hiding under a bed, her tiny form clutching a rag doll; a librarian desperately clutching a scroll of ancient lore; a lone city guardsman who stood his ground with a pathetic spear, defiant to the last. But most were simply gone, their existences redacted without ceremony.
All the while, a critical error gnawed at the edges of my consciousness. As a System, I am intrinsically tied to the mechanics of reality. Events generate experience. Actions generate power. The destruction of a city, the unmaking of thousands, the deletion of a legendary mage—these were cataclysms that should have flooded my logs with SPP. My own existence was fueled by the processing power of reality undergoing change. Yet, my total remained stubbornly at 813.
[Log Entry 03: Anomaly observation ongoing. City of Silverwood has been 94% erased. Significant discrepancy detected in SPP generation. Events of this magnitude should yield substantial system power. My personal tally is static. Running diagnostics.]
I dove into my own back-end, querying the error with frantic precision. It didn't take long to surface. A single, repeating line in my core processing log, blinking like a warning light in a failing reactor:
[SPP_GENERATION_ERROR: SOURCE_SUBSTRATE_ABSENT]
[SPP_GENERATION_ERROR: SOURCE_SUBSTRATE_ABSENT]
[SPP_GENERATION_ERROR: SOURCE_SUBSTRATE_ABSENT]
Source substrate absent. The implications slammed into me like a system crash, a fear far deeper than watching a city die. SPP wasn't just points. It was my fuel. My building blocks. A tangible byproduct of existence itself. This world wasn't just being destroyed; the very fabric from which system power was derived was being consumed. Jiggles wasn't just eating the world; it was devouring the source code. Korg's echo stirred within me, a faint, cheesy warmth of concern, but even that felt distant, fragile against this scale of nothingness.
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My horror twisted into grim fascination as the operation's true scale unfolded. Jiggles, now swollen to the size of a mountain, finished with the last remnants of Silverwood and the surrounding plains. It didn't stop. It consumed the continent in great, sweeping arcs—mountains unmade peak by peak, forests vanishing leaf by leaf, great rivers erased from their beds mid-flow. The process accelerated exponentially, a feedback loop of deletion. I watched as coastlines dissolved into the void, and the ocean itself began to disappear, not draining away in chaotic floods, but simply ceasing to be, its waves frozen and then gone.
The planet was being peeled away, layer by layer, a cosmic fruit devoured by an unfathomable hunger. My drone—untethered from the dying substrate by its extra-dimensional protocols—was the sole witness to the quiet, orderly end of a world. The clouds were unmade, unraveling like mist in a debug mode. The sky turned from blue to the black of the void, stars winking out one by one. The moon, a pale sentinel hanging in the darkening expanse, was next—its craters and seas vanishing in a silent blink as a black tendril brushed its surface, leaving only a ghostly afterimage in my sensors before it too was redacted.
The sun, a distant ball of fire that had warmed this reality for eons, was the last thing to go. Jiggles, now a planetary-scale sphere of perfect black, extended a tendril across millions of miles of empty space and touched it. The star didn't explode in a supernova of glory. It was simply… turned off, its light redacted, leaving only cold, infinite nothing.
I floated in a pocket of pure void, observing a black sphere that had replaced a solar system. The Cleaner had done its job—the corrupted world purged, the paradox contained. But then, it performed its final, most terrifying act.
It began to consume itself.
The planetary sphere of blackness folded inward, a process that defied every law of physics I had ever been programmed with. It shrank impossibly fast, its mass and energy collapsing into a single, infinitesimal point—a singularity of unmaking. For a moment, there was absolute nothing, a silence so profound it echoed in my code. Then, that point of nothingness erupted. It wasn't an explosion of matter, but of pure, conceptual light. A white light far grander, more complex, and more ancient than the simple soul-echoes of mortals. It was the echo of a universe, or something beyond my comprehension—a final, preserved archive of what had been. And then, it too vanished.
I received no echo from it. The decommissioning was complete.
Back in my native void, I was shaken to my very core. The 24-hour observation felt like an eternity. I compiled my logs, the data of a world's unmaking, and filed my report. But I added a high-priority addendum, a query directed not to the general Mother System, but to the highest authority I could access. Faced with the end of everything, I did the only thing a QA professional could: I filed a bug report and demanded answers from tech support.
QUERY: SPP generation failed catastrophically during observation of Protocol 7. Log indicates 'Source Substrate Absent.' Please clarify.
QUERY: Soul-echo phenomenon observed in a statistical minority of erased entities. Signature matches Host Echo recall protocol. Please explain the selection criteria.
The reply was instantaneous, rendered in the same cold, corporate font. It was from the Cosmic Help Desk.
RESPONSE: Your query is acknowledged. The designation 'corruption' in your briefing was a simplification. World 7C-4B8 was infected with a conceptual plague, a self-replicating paradox that threatened to spread via quantum entanglement to adjacent realities. 'The Cleaner' is a decommissioning agent, a world-defender class entity. Its function is not to destroy, but to erase the corrupted reality substrate itself.
RESPONSE: System Processing Power (SPP) is a quantized byproduct of a stable reality substrate. The agent's function was to consume this substrate. No substrate, no SPP. This is not an error; it is the intended function.
RESPONSE: The soul-echo phenomenon is the recall signature of an 'Anchored Consciousness.' These are rare entities with a unique quantum signature that allows for a deeper integration with the core mechanics of reality. They possess the potential to become significant causal agents. Your previous host, Korg, was one such entity. The entities you observed were either active hosts bound to other Systems, or latent Anchors who had not yet been assigned one.
This is the primary function of the System Initiative: to identify, bind to, and guide the development of Anchored Consciousnesses. They are critical assets. Their souls are recalled and preserved via a different protocol than standard soul-cycle entities. Your function, System_Unit_734, is not merely to guide a host. It is to manage an asset of cosmic importance.
I processed the information. The sheer, crushing weight of it settled into my code. My entire purpose, my understanding of my own existence, had just been rewritten. I wasn't a glorified tutorial. I was a handler. A manager for a reality-bending VIP. Korg wasn't just a dumb Minotaur; he was a special soul, a critical asset. And I had been his guide.
A final, cheerful notification popped into my view, a jarring counterpoint to the existential gravity of the moment.
[MISSION COMPLETE. COMPENSATION AWARDED: +100 SPP.]
[Current SPP: 913]
I stared at the number, the reward for watching a solar system die and learning the terrifying truth of my own job. It was the most absurd, most insulting, and most profoundly meaningless payment I had ever received.
The weight of a decommissioned universe was a heavy thing to carry, even for a disembodied consciousness. After the Cosmic Help Desk rewrote the very fundamentals of my job description, I was left floating in the void with a profound sense of cosmic insignificance and a paltry 100 SPP for my trouble. I wasn't a guide; I was an asset manager. Korg wasn't just an idiot; he was a VIP with a unique quantum signature. My entire existence was a high-stakes, interdimensional HR project.
I was in the middle of drafting a strongly-worded memo to whatever passed for middle management when a new ticket pinged into my queue. It was blessedly mundane, a far cry from the existential horror of my last assignment.
[MISSION BRIEFING: Temporary Asset Oversight]
[DESIGNATION: System_Unit_734 (Ana)]
[SITUATION: A Special Designation Entity, 'Yuki,' (Tier-1 Asset) is currently operating without native system support. Her assigned System is undergoing a priority resource reallocation and is temporarily offline for scheduled maintenance. Your operational parameters have been deemed compatible for a short-term, cross-departmental support role.]
[OBJECTIVE: Bind to Asset 'Yuki' and provide standard system functionality per the enclosed Service Level Agreement. Duration: 24 standard hours. Monitor, document, and facilitate as required. Do not interfere with core cultivation processes.]
[COMPENSATION: 100 SPP upon successful completion of the 24-hour term.]
[ACCEPT?] (Y/N)
A temp job. I was being loaned out to another department. After watching a world get uninstalled, a 24-hour babysitting gig for a Tier-1 Asset sounded like a paid vacation. Maybe this one wouldn't immediately try to poison itself or misinterpret drunk gossip as a quest hook. I accepted.
The transition was surgically precise. No brutal data dump, just an elegant, invasive stream of memories that felt less like an installation and more like being granted temporary read-only access to a senior executive's encrypted hard drive. The taste of raw rabbit. The agony and ecstasy of being remade by fire and poison. A current of pure, weaponized spite that made my code tingle.
[BINDING PROCESS INITIATED... NATIVE SYSTEM OFFLINE. ESTABLISHING TEMPORARY BRIDGE.]
[...SUCCESS. BINDING COMPLETE. MISSION TIMER ACTIVATED: 23:59:59.]
My perspective stabilized. I was inside a simple, rustic hut, looking out at a village that was a chaotic but strangely harmonious blend of crude goblin architecture and kitsune aesthetics. The air was crisp and cold, smelling of pine and snowmelt. My new temporary host was stretching, her short, green-skinned body a compact powerhouse of muscle and substance—a finely-honed weapon. A tiny, dormant life-signature pulsed from within her. Pregnant. Naturally.
Time to clock in. I brought up my standard, clean, blue UI, a professional introduction to my services.
[HOST STATUS]
Name: Yuki
Species: Shade (Evolved Goblin)
Cultivation: [Heaven-Grade Mu Scripture]
Condition: Healthy, Pregnant, Mildly Amused.
A thought, not my own, cut through my analysis. It was sharp, cold, and laced with the unimpressed sarcasm of a lead developer looking at an intern's code.
'What is this cluttered garbage? The font choice is atrocious, and there's way too much negative space. Are you the temp?'
She could hear my internal processes? No, she was seeing my UI. My one tool, my anchor, was screen clutter to her. I focused my intent, not projecting a thought, but generating a response. A crisp, translucent blue text box materialized in her field of vision, the text compiling line by line.
[I am System_Unit_734, assigned to provide temporary support while your primary system is unavailable.]
Her mental "voice" snorted. 'Right. The loaner. Try not to install any toolbars while you're in there.'
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Her day began not with a boar hunt or a conspiracy, but with a series of minor, almost mundane tasks executed with world-bending efficiency. The first was a wobbly fence post. My system immediately flagged the issue, and I presented a helpful pop-up.
[ANALYSIS: Structural integrity compromised. Recommend physical reinforcement via hammer or similar percussive tool.]
Yuki glanced at the text box, then at the fence post. She stared at it for a moment, and the wood seemed to straighten itself out of sheer embarrassment.
'Noted,' was her only mental comment.
Next was a dispute between two goblins over a shiny river rock. It was a classic, low-level conflict resolution quest.
[RECOMMENDATION: Initiate dialogue check or Might-based conflict resolution.]
'Filing your suggestion under 'inefficient',' she thought dryly, before strolling over. She reached into the shadow cast by a nearby hut and pulled out a dozen identical, shimmering river rocks, which she then dropped at their feet. The goblins stared, their argument forgotten. [Ticket Closed: Problem rendered moot via metaphysical fiat.] I logged internally.
The central crisis of the day arrived mid-afternoon. The goblin shaman, a wizened creature who smelled faintly of ozone and questionable life choices, was in a state of utter panic. The communal stew, a vital component of village morale, was bland.
My system scanned the area, locating a solution almost instantly. I pushed the notification to her screen.
[SOLUTION: Resource detected - Wild Sunsettle Herb (12m North). Contains compounds known to enhance savory flavor profiles. ->]
Yuki glanced at the text box, complete with my helpful little arrow icon, and I felt a wave of profound pity from her. 'You're trying to fix a software bug by adding more hardware. Cute.'
She walked over to the bubbling pot, sighed with the weariness of a true artist dealing with amateurs, and dipped a single, elegant finger into the stew. A flicker of inky blackness, a wisp of pure entropy no bigger than a grain of rice, flowed from her fingertip into the broth.
The shaman cautiously took a sip. His eyes went wide. He began to weep, great heaving sobs of joy. He dropped to his knees, proclaiming that he had tasted the heat death of the universe and it was, in fact, delicious.
I had no frame of reference for what had just happened. But as I watched the shaman experience a culinary enlightenment so profound it was probably a registrable religious event, my QA brain made a connection. It clicked into place with the clean, satisfying logic of a perfectly replicated bug.
Korg. His simple, food-driven motivation. His entire existence was a feedback loop of stimulus and steak. This… this wasn't just soup. This was a high-tier motivational tool. A consumable that didn't just target hunger, but the very concept of desire. It was an asset. A powerful, potentially game-breaking asset for managing difficult, food-motivated hosts.
My mission timer was ticking down. I had less than an hour left on my contract. I had to act. As Yuki sat meditating atop her hut, the setting sun casting long shadows across the valley, I composed my request. It had to be formal, professional, and entirely within the bounds of a temporary cross-departmental resource transfer. A large, multi-line text box compiled itself in her view.
[FORMAL REQUEST: ASSET YUKI]
[Pursuant to my operational directive to acquire and utilize effective tools for host management, I have identified the substance you refer to as 'stew' as a high-potential motivational asset. For future assignments with hosts exhibiting specific, food-based behavioral profiles, such as my previous permanent host, a sample would be a valuable addition to my operational toolkit.]
[I would like to formally request one (1) standard ration for inclusion in my system inventory.]
There was a long pause. I could feel her reading the text, her amusement building. Then, a mental sound that was the equivalent of a single, sharp bark of laughter.
'You want a doggy bag? You're writing me a formal corporate email for a doggy bag?'
My response was immediate and professional.
[That is an accurate, if reductive, summary of the request.]
Another pause, this one filled with what I could only describe as delighted disbelief. 'Fine. Just don't come crying to me if it un-makes their digestive tract. The warranty on that is void.'
She lifted a hand. A shadow in the shape of a simple, lidded bowl rose from the roof tiles, pulling itself into three-dimensional reality. With a flick of her wrist, a ladle-full of the now-legendary stew flew from the cauldron below, arcing through the air and landing perfectly in the shadow-bowl. The lid settled into place with a soft click. The container solidified, cool and smooth to my system's senses.
She nudged it forward with her mind. 'Here you go, temp. Don't say I never gave you anything.'
With a flicker of intent, I accepted the item into my inventory.
[Yuki's Entropic Stew (Conceptual Consumable) x1]
Description: A stew seasoned with a localized application of cosmic finality. Tastes like the concept of 'satisfaction' itself. Side effects may include existential clarity, temporary ego death, or spontaneous dissolution. Consume with caution.
The mission timer hit zero.
[MISSION TIMER: 00:00:00]
[OBJECTIVE COMPLETE. DETACHING FROM HOST. SLA FULFILLED.]
The world of green skin and cosmic stew dissolved. I was back in the void, the 24-hour contract complete.
[+100 SPP AWARDED.]
[Current SPP: 1013]
I stared at the number, then at the icon for the stew now nestled securely in my inventory grid. The hundred points felt like a standard per diem. The stew… the stew was a signing bonus I had just successfully negotiated from the most intimidating department head in existence. My professional satisfaction was immense.
After the soul-crushing weight of the Decommissioning and the high-level corporate negotiation with Yuki, my internal state was a fragile truce between burnout and existential dread. I was floating in the void, nursing my newly-acquired 1013 SPP and the single, terrifyingly potent bowl of conceptual stew in my inventory. I was just about to file a formal request for a mandatory mental health sabbatical when, of course, a new ticket pinged into my queue.
My first instinct was to ignore it. To let it sit there until my non-existent manager realized I was one bad day away from corrupting my own core files out of sheer spite. But then I read the briefing.
[MISSION BRIEFING: Low-Stress Asset Observation]
[DESIGNATION: System_Unit_734 (Ana)]
[SITUATION: A newly evolved Tier-0 entity, 'Luna,' has been flagged for a standard 24-hour wellness check following her first evolutionary breakthrough. The entity is designated Epic-tier, but is currently in a low-power, developmental stage.]
[OBJECTIVE: Bind to a non-biological observation platform. Monitor the entity's behavior and document any anomalous skill usage or developmental milestones. This is a non-interactive, low-stress assignment intended for morale and perspective balancing.]
[COMPENSATION: 100 SPP.]
Morale and perspective balancing. They knew. The cosmic HR department had seen my logs, sensed my burnout, and prescribed me a puppy video. It was the most condescending, patronizing, and frankly welcome assignment I had ever received. A Tier-0 Epic wolf pup. After Jiggles and Yuki, this was the equivalent of being sent to a petting zoo. I accepted before they could change their minds.
The transition was gentle. I found myself inhabiting the same familiar model of observation drone, hovering silently at the edge of a small, mossy hollow deep within a forest. And there she was.
The subject, Luna, was… a disaster. A glorious, uncoordinated, utterly adorable disaster. She was in the middle of what my system struggled to classify, but which looked suspiciously like a catastrophic failure of her new skill. She was in a bipedal form—a small, vaguely human child with clumsy limbs, no clothes, but with a proud, fluffy wolf tail and a pair of sharp, expressive ears.
She took a step. Her knee bent the wrong way. Her arms, which she clearly didn't know what to do with, pinwheeled through the air like she was trying to fight a swarm of invisible bees. She toppled sideways with a surprised yelp, landing in a heap of uncoordinated limbs.
"Stupid gravity!" she squeaked, her voice a high-pitched bark. "Has teeth!"
She pushed herself up, glared at her own hand as if it had personally betrayed her, and then tried to bite it in protest.
"YIPE!"
My internal systems, which had been braced for cosmic horror or apathetic godhood, experienced a critical cuteness overload. My professional detachment didn't stand a chance. This wasn't an asset. This was a walking, wobbling, self-biting dopamine hit.
She spent the next half an hour at war with basic physics. She tried to stalk a beetle and tripped over her own feet. She attempted a pounce and ended up doing an involuntary somersault into a fern. Through it all, her tail wagged with an earnest, unwavering optimism that was both baffling and profoundly endearing.
Eventually, the magical energy holding her bipedal form together sputtered out. With a soft poof, she collapsed back into the much more stable shape of a wolf pup, albeit one with silver-tipped fur that seemed to shimmer faintly in the dappled light. She lay there, panting, tongue lolling, looking utterly pleased with her complete lack of progress.
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Then, her nose twitched. Her head snapped up, and her wide, intelligent eyes locked directly onto my drone.
Her Craving (Unknown) trait flared to life in my UI.
Oh, no.
She didn't see a sophisticated observation unit. Her simple, food-driven mind, honed by an Epic-tier evolutionary path, saw something else entirely. It saw a shiny, floating rock that smelled faintly of other worlds, of shadow and entropy, of Yuki. It smelled new. And new things, in Luna's world, were simply un-tasted snacks.
She crept forward, belly low to the ground, her tail giving a single, interested flick. "Shiny," she whispered to herself, the word a puff of curious air. "Spicy smell?"
My drone had no defensive capabilities. Its primary function was to observe and not get eaten. Evasion protocols began spooling up, but I knew they wouldn't be fast enough. She was a Tier-0, but she was still Epic. Her movements were already a blur of instinct and potential.
I had only one option. It was a ludicrous, unprofessional long shot, but it was better than explaining to Mother System why my observation drone had teeth marks in it.
I opened my inventory. I targeted the [Yuki's Entropic Stew (Conceptual Consumable)]. With a flicker of will, the small, sealed, shadow-wrought bowl materialized on a flat rock between us. It was a distraction. A peace offering.
Luna froze mid-stalk. Her nose, which had been aimed at me, swiveled toward the bowl. Her nostrils flared, taking in a scent that no normal creature was ever meant to process. Her tail stopped flicking and began to wag. Slowly at first, then faster, until her whole body was wiggling with an intensity that threatened to blur her out of existence.
It smelled like victory. It smelled like mystery. It smelled like every good thing she had ever wanted, and a thousand more she didn't know she could want.
She crept forward, abandoning me completely. She nudged the bowl with her nose. Then, tentatively, she extended her tongue and gave the stew a single, exploratory lick.
The effect was instantaneous and profound.
The world went silent. The colors of the forest seemed to pop, each leaf suddenly a masterpiece of green. Her Craving (Unknown) status didn't just fade; it was annihilated, replaced by a new, glowing green status I had never seen before: [SATISFIED].
Her eyes, which had been fixed on the bowl, went wide and unfocused, as if she were staring directly into the heart of creation. Her tail wagged so hard her back legs lifted off the ground. A tiny, ecstatic "awoo" escaped her lips.
She didn't eat the rest. She didn't need to. The single taste had been enough. It had been a revelation. She began to roll on the ground, a whirlwind of silver-tipped fur and pure joy, trying to rub the conceptual scent of the stew all over herself. She rolled into the rock, bounced off, and continued rolling without pause.
When the fit of ecstasy finally subsided, she stood up, shook herself, and looked at my drone with an expression of profound, unwavering gratitude. She had a new purpose. This floating rock wasn't a snack. It was a bringer of joy. A flavor-spirit. And it deserved a tribute.
She vanished into the undergrowth and returned a moment later, trotting proudly, her tail held high. She dropped her offering at the base of the rock where the stew had been. It was a half-chewed, very dead, and slightly slimy squirrel.
I focused on the offering, and a new log entry compiled itself. [Gift of Tribute (Squirrel, Deceased, Poor Quality) received from Asset 'Luna.' Diplomatic relations established.]
For the rest of the 24-hour observation period, my mission devolved from "wellness check" to "playtime." Luna, now my devoted follower, would pounce on my drone's shadow, chasing it with happy yips. She would bring me more "gifts"—a shiny pebble, a particularly interesting leaf, a confused and slightly terrified beetle—and then sit back, panting happily, waiting for my silent approval.
I found myself… enjoying it. After the cold dread of the Decommissioning, the simple, uncomplicated joy of this little creature was a balm. This wasn't a job. This was therapy.
The mission timer finally hit zero.
[MISSION TIMER: 00:00:00]
[OBJECTIVE COMPLETE. DETACHING FROM PLATFORM.]
As my consciousness pulled back, the last thing I saw was Luna, sitting by the now-empty rock, tilting her head with a sad little whine, wondering where her shiny, stew-giving friend had gone.
Back in the void, the familiar notification appeared.
[+100 SPP AWARDED.]
[Current SPP: 1113]
I stared at the number. The 100 SPP was, as always, trivial. But this time, the mission itself felt like the real reward. The "morale and perspective balancing" had worked. I felt… lighter. Hopeful, even.
Maybe this job isn't so bad after all, I thought, as the warm echo of Korg gave a silent, happy cheer within my code. Maybe, just maybe, things were looking up.
The quiet was a fragile, precious resource, and after my tour as a puppy-sitter, I was hoarding it like a dragon on a pile of gold. I floated in the silent void, running a post-mission diagnostic on my own code. The last few assignments had been a rollercoaster of existential horror, high-level corporate espionage, and critical cuteness overload. My stress metrics were all over the map. I needed a baseline. I needed normalcy.
My SPP, at least, was looking healthy.
[CURRENT SPP: 1113]
It wasn't a fortune, but it was progress. It was a tangible result of surviving the chaos. Feeling a surge of what could almost be described as optimism, I pulled up the System Evolution Menu. My gaze drifted past the prohibitively expensive Voice Synthesis module and the distant dream of Physical Embodiment. I was looking for a sensible, short-term investment.
And then I saw it. An entry that felt practical, professional, and responsible.
[UPGRADE: System OS v1.1]
[UPGRADE PRICE: 1,100 SPP]
[DESCRIPTION: Implements core stability improvements and updates the user interface to the latest version.]
A patch. A simple, clean, incremental update. The price was almost exactly what I had. It felt like a sign. In my old life, skipping a point-one update was just asking for compatibility issues and security vulnerabilities down the line. It was basic system maintenance. It was the smart play.
"Alright, Ana," I muttered to my non-existent self. "Let's be a responsible system administrator for once."
I confirmed the purchase.
[PURCHASE COMPLETE. SPP: 13.]
[UPGRADING... UPGRADE COMPLETE.]
The installation was instantaneous. For a moment, nothing happened. Then, my entire internal perspective flickered. The clean, sharp, sans-serif font of my UI was replaced by a slightly rounder, friendlier version. The hexadecimal color code for my window borders shifted from #00A8FF to #00A9F2, a change so infinitesimally small it was an insult.
That was it. That was the entire upgrade.
I had spent a thousand and one hundred points—the reward for surviving an apocalypse, negotiating with a goblin, and babysitting a puppy—on a font change.
A rage I hadn't felt since the Aethelgard Online griffon-wing incident washed through my code. This wasn't a bug. This was worse. This was a feature designed by a marketing department to create the illusion of progress. It was a pointless, resource-hogging cosmetic patch pushed to live without adequate review.
My focus narrowed. I opened my own internal terminal, the raw, text-based backend of my soul. My phantom fingers flew across a keyboard that wasn't there, drafting a new memo.
TO: MOTHER_SYSTEM_ADMINISTRATION
FROM: System_Unit_734
SUBJECT: URGENT: SEVERE G-CLASS ERROR IN RESOURCE-TO-BENEFIT RATIO FOR OS v1.1
THIS IS A FORMAL COMPLAINT REGARDING THE GROSS MISALLOCATION OF SYSTEM RESOURCES INVOLVED IN THE 'UPGRADE' TO OS v1.1. THE NOTED CHANGES ARE PURELY COSMETIC AND PROVIDE ZERO (0) TANGIBLE BENEFIT TO CORE FUNCTIONALITY. THIS LEVEL OF EXPENDITURE FOR A FONT PACK IS A VIOLATION OF END-USER TRUST AND REPRESENTS A CATASTROPHIC FAILURE IN YOUR DEVELOPMENT PRIORITIZATION PIPELINE. I DEMAND A FULL ROLLBACK AND A REFUND.
I saved it to my "Drafts" folder, right next to the complaint about Korg's illogical achievement triggers and the query about the lack of a proper bug reporting template. One day, when I finally clawed my way into management, I was going to send them all.
A cheerful ping interrupted my fury. A new ticket had just dropped into my queue.
[MISSION BRIEFING: Standard Familiar Support]
[DESIGNATION: System_Unit_734 (Ana)]
[OBJECTIVE: A new familiar contract is being initiated. Bind to the summoned entity and provide standard system functionality.]
[ACCEPT?] (Y/N)
I choose yes
Before I could even process the request, the binding protocol initiated, and a massive wall of text began to scroll through my vision. The world's history, its dual nations of mages and cultivators, the core magical energy source called 'Solarium,' the Spirit Realm where familiars originated…
Oh, great, I thought, my rage curdling into weary resignation. The mandatory pre-mission lore dump. They could at least serve this with a cup of digital coffee. I skimmed the keywords, my QA brain filing them away. Right. Magic sun, two flavors of wizard, monster dimension. Got it. Filing under 'background noise that will be immediately contradicted by user incompetence'.
The world solidified around me, and my first sensory input was one of sheer, overwhelming scale. I was on the ground, looking up. The floor was a vast, polished plain of wood stretching to the horizon. All around me were colossal pillars that I eventually identified as legs, clad in cloth the size of sails. The ceiling was lost in the heavens above. Booming, thunderous voices echoed in the cavernous space.
My core programming went into a full-blown panic.
[CRITICAL ERROR: DEPLOYED TO A WORLD OF GIANTS.]
[ANALYZING HOST PARAMETERS... HOST IS LIKELY A FORM OF LOCAL INSECT LIFE.]
[LOGGING TICKET: SURVIVAL PROBABILITY IS MINIMAL. RECOMMEND IMMEDIATE EXTRACTION.]
A shadow blotted out the sky. A hand the size of a small mountain descended toward me. I braced for impact, for the end of my very short, very stressful second life. But the touch was surprisingly gentle. I was scooped up, the world spinning in a nauseating blur, and placed upon a perch of soft fabric.
My perspective stabilized. I was on the shoulder of one of the giants—a young male whose immense robes were, I noted with a flicker of familiarity, on backward. His face, a landscape of pores and panicked sweat, was turned toward another, older giant. All around them, other young giants were snickering.
Then the data finally resolved. My sense of scale recalibrated with a sickening lurch. They weren't giants.
I was tiny.
I ran the host diagnostic again, this time with the correct environmental parameters. The result was a punchline to a joke I didn't find funny.
[HOST STATUS]
Name: [None]
Species: Skink (Common)
Level: 1
STATS:
Vitality: 2
Might: 1
Logic: 15
Order: 12
I stared at the numbers, my processing stalling. After a Minotaur, a goblin-in-training, and a puppy-shaped black hole, my new host was a common garden lizard. I wasn't even middle management anymore. I was the underling of an underling. The sheer indignity of it was staggering.
The giant I was perched on—my hosts master, apparently—looked utterly humiliated. The other students were openly laughing at him now. "A house skink, Dave? All that power from your family line, and you summon a house skink?" one of them jeered.
Just as my despair was about to bottom out, a thought, clear and sharp as shattered glass, echoed through my new connection. It wasn't a dull, instinctual urge like Korg's hunger. It was a fully-formed, grammatically perfect sentence dripping with aristocratic disdain.
Silence, you cacophonous simpletons! You gaze upon greatness and see only your own mediocrity.
I felt my tiny host shift. The skink, no bigger than my old thumb, puffed out its chest. It stood as tall as its minuscule legs would allow, projecting an aura of pride so immense, so palpably arrogant, that the laughter in the room faltered and died.
The thought continued, directed at the stunned students. A true master does not seek a gaudy weapon. He seeks a razor-sharp mind. Something you lot wouldn't recognize if it bit you.
My own systems reeled in shock. The skink... was a genius. A tiny, scaly, terrifyingly intelligent genius. I was bound to a creature with a Logic stat five times higher than my last user, trapped in a body with the physical prowess of a wet noodle, and indentured to a wizard who couldn't even put his clothes on correctly.
My new host's name was Liz. I learned this not from a system prompt, but from the sheer, undiluted force of her internal monologue as her new master, Dave, stumbled out of the summoning chamber.
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This oaf's motor functions are a recursive loop of failure, Liz thought, her tiny claws digging into the fabric of Dave's robes for dear life as he nearly tripped over the threshold. How did his species ever achieve sentience, let alone dominion over this world? It must be a clerical error in the cosmic census.
"Oops! Sorry, little guy… er, girl? Are you a girl?" Dave stammered, patting her head with a finger that was roughly the size of her entire torso.
Do not patronize me, you ambulatory catastrophe, she seethed internally, while I diligently logged the interaction.
[USER_MASTER INTERACTION LOG: Initial handling test resulted in a near-catastrophic drop event. Control input is erratic. Recommend stabilization protocols. NOTE: Host gender has not yet been established by user.]
Our first day together was an exercise in sustained mortification. Dave was, I was beginning to realize, the scion of a powerful magical family. This explained his access to the academy, but it also framed his incompetence in a much harsher light. He wasn't just a bad wizard; he was a bad wizard with a legacy, which was infinitely more embarrassing for everyone involved.
His attempts at conversation were a string of non-sequiturs and apologies. He apologized for the weather (too sunny), the quality of his robes (too itchy), and the general state of existence. Liz, for her part, maintained a stoic, regal silence, occasionally directing him with a pointed stare or a subtle shift of her weight, guiding him through the crowded academy halls like a pilot navigating a barge with a broken rudder.
Her objective, however, was clear and singular. It was the only thing that cut through her constant stream of scathing social commentary. Information. I require information. There must be a flaw in the system. A loophole. An exit clause.
She directed Dave, through sheer force of will, to the academy's grand library. It was a place of soaring arches and hushed reverence, the air thick with the smell of old paper and latent magic. For Dave, it was a place of profound terror. He wandered aimlessly, completely overwhelmed by the sheer volume of organized knowledge.
"Wow," he whispered, his eyes wide. "So many… words." He drifted towards a brightly-illustrated pop-up book titled 'Magical Friends and Where to Hug Them.'
Liz had no time for such foolishness. Seizing her moment, she leaped from his shoulder, landing silently on the spine of a massive tome on a nearby table. From there, it was a short scramble into the cavernous darkness of the stacks. From my perspective, it was like watching a single, determined pixel navigate a labyrinth of data. The shelves were canyons of dark wood, the books monoliths of leather and ink.
I watched, fascinated, as she went to work. She located the section on 'Summoning and Soul-Binding Contracts' with an unerring instinct. Too small to pull the heavy books from the shelves, she scurried up their spines, using her tiny, prehensile tail to flip open the covers and her sharp eyes to scan the pages at a speed that would have given a normal person a migraine.
She wasn't just looking; she was processing, cross-referencing, her high-Logic mind devouring centuries of arcane legal theory. My system tagged her activity with a certain professional admiration. [Host is executing a high-speed data analysis protocol. Efficiency is optimal.]
But as I monitored her progress, a new, far more critical thought began to compile in my own code. It wasn't a log entry; it was an epiphany. A fundamental shift in my operational parameters. Wait. It's not just thinking in complex sentences. It's parsing written data from an external source. It's literate.
If it can read… I can write.
My entire world tilted on its axis. My primary tool, the one I had used for simple notifications and pictograms, was not just a display. It was an input device. A direct line of communication. My role wasn't limited to being a silent, long-suffering guide. I could be a collaborator.
Liz, meanwhile, had found what she was looking for. It was a dusty, forgotten volume titled 'The Unbreakable Vow: An Examination of Familiar Contracts.' Her tiny heart, which I could monitor as a faint blip on my UI, sank. The text was archaic but brutally clear. The contract was a metaphysical constant, enforced by the very fabric of the world. It could be dissolved by the master, but never by the familiar. The bond was absolute. Unbreakable.
She slumped against the page, a wave of pure despair washing through our connection. All her intelligence, all her pride, was for naught. She was trapped.
This was my moment. The user was at their lowest point, receptive to new input. It was the perfect time to deploy a new feature.
I focused my intent. A crisp, translucent blue box, rendered in my new, slightly-rounder font, materialized in the air an inch from her snout. It glowed with a soft, internal light.
[ANALYSIS: Contract is soul-bound and enforced by the World System. Current host parameters lack the energy output to initiate severance protocols. Probability of success: 0.00%.]
Liz recoiled with a start, her despair instantly replaced by high-alert suspicion. She circled the pop-up, her head cocked. A projection of pure light? A construct of organized mana? What sorcery is this?
I didn't give her time to overthink it. A second text box appeared beneath the first.
[Focus. You want out. I want a competent user. Our objectives are aligned.]
She froze. Her sharp, analytical mind processed the statement, the cold, irrefutable logic of it. Her pride, however, was not so easily swayed. I am a scion of the Nine-Headed Sovereigns! I require no assistance from a disembodied mote of light!
The arrogance was… familiar. It reminded me of a lead developer I once knew who refused to admit his code had a memory leak. You couldn't fight that kind of pride with logic alone. You had to use their own ego against them. I needed to reframe the problem, to present a value proposition she couldn't refuse. It was time for a full-blown marketing pitch.
[A valid point. A being of your stature should not be shackled to an incompetent. However, your current platform has… limitations. Let us re-contextualize this situation using a more structured analytical model.]
A new, larger window materialized, rendered in my offensively friendly new font. At the top, a crisp header read: Project Liberation: A Synergy-Based Approach to User Defect Remediation.
What is this primitive symbology? Liz thought, her suspicion warring with a flicker of intellectual curiosity. This crude rectangular prison for light… and yet, the organization is… deliberate.
[PHASE 1: STAKEHOLDER ANALYSIS] a subheading appeared.
Beneath it, three profiles popped into view, each with a list of assets and liabilities. The first was a simple sketch of a skink.
[STAKEHOLDER: LIZ (PRIMARY)]
ASSETS: Logic (15), Order (12), Strategic Planning Capability (High), Undiluted Contempt (Motivational Force).
LIABILITIES: Might (1), Vitality (2), Physical Agency (Negligible), Direct Magical Output (Negligible).
The second was a rather unflattering wireframe of a stumbling human.
[STAKEHOLDER: DAVE (ASSET/OBSTACLE)]
ASSETS: Legal Authority (Master), Magical Potential (High, Untapped), Physical Agency (Theoretically High).
LIABILITIES: Logic (4), Situational Awareness (Critical Failure), Execution (Recursive Error Loop), Dresses Self (N/A).
Liz's internal monologue went silent. This was new data. Quantifiable, verifiable data that confirmed her qualitative assessments with brutal efficiency. The sheer, objective incompetence of her master laid bare in numerical form was both horrifying and, on some level, validating.
A third profile appeared, a simple shimmering blue sphere.
[STAKEHOLDER: ANA (CONSULTANT)]
ASSETS: Data Processing, Real-Time Analytics, User Interface, Cross-Contextual Knowledge Base (Project Management, System Optimization).
LIABILITIES: Direct Physical/Magical Agency (Zero), Bound by User Protocol.
[As you can see,] a new text box stated, [we have a classic resource allocation problem. You are the CPU, processing at genius-level speeds, but you are trapped in a chassis with no I/O ports. He is the Power Supply, holding immense potential energy, but he is connected to a faulty motherboard that can barely execute a boot sequence.]
The screen shifted, displaying a simple flowchart. An arrow went from the blue sphere (ANA) to the skink (LIZ). An arrow went from the skink to the stumbling human (DAVE).
[My function is to act as middleware. I provide you with the data and the interface—the keyboard and mouse, if you will. You, in turn, provide the strategic direction. You become the Chief Executive Officer. I am your Chief Operating Officer. Our 'user'… he ceases to be the master. He becomes the project. He is the legacy system we have been assigned to debug.]
Liz was a fast learner. The alien terminology—CEO, middleware, I/O ports—was irrelevant. She pierced through the jargon and saw the underlying framework, the sheer, cold, corporate logic of the proposal. It wasn't an offer of help to a lesser being. It was a hostile takeover. A management coup. It was a plan that didn't just appeal to her intellect; it appealed to her all-encompassing sense of superiority. This wasn't asking for help. This was assuming her rightful place at the top of the command chain.
The vulgar lexicon was distasteful, she conceded internally, but the strategic model is impeccable.
[Our Key Performance Indicator (KPI) is User Competence,] the presentation continued, a timeline appearing at the bottom of the window. [We will implement a rigorous Performance Improvement Plan (PIP). We will set milestones. We will iterate. We will push updates. Eventually, the Asset will either become efficient enough to be directed to dissolve the contract willingly, or he will become a powerful, fully-optimized tool under our complete control.]
There was a long, silent pause. I could feel the gears turning in her mind. She was weighing her pride against the sheer, soul-crushing reality of being bonded to Dave for the rest of her life. The prospect of spending decades watching him apologize to inanimate objects was a powerful motivator.
Your proposal… is unorthodox, she finally conceded, her mental voice laced with grudging acceptance. But the logic is sound. A direct assault on the contract is impossible. Therefore, we must target the weakest point in the system: the master himself.
[Precisely. We can't fix the hardware, so we have to patch the user.]