Erevan had about sixty seconds to process what a "Glitch Storm" even meant before the world decided to rip itself apart.
It started with the sky.
The bright blue overhead didn't dim with thunderclouds or fade with nightfall—it fractured. Fine cracks snaked outward like glass under pressure, spreading until the entire dome of the heavens looked ready to shatter. Through those breaks wasn't darkness, wasn't sunlight, wasn't even sky. Instead, lines of scrolling white text blinked against an endless black backdrop. Error logs. Hundreds of them. Thousands. The System vomiting its failures across reality.
A low buzz crawled over Erevan's skin. The "wind" howling through the village wasn't air at all, but static, a harsh, grinding sound that rattled his teeth and set every hair on his body on end.
Villagers screamed.
Roofs disappeared mid-collapse, flickering out of existence to reveal the scaffolding of reality beneath. It wasn't wood and stone anymore—it was unfinished polygons, blank textures, the raw bones of a world that should never be seen.
The System chimed, its voice far too calm for the chaos breaking around them.
[System Alert: Glitch Storm Approaching]
[Recommended Action: Evacuate Safe Zone Immediately]
[Failure Condition: Data Corruption]
The ground lurched violently. Erevan staggered, barely staying upright as the cobbled street beneath his boots peeled up like paper. Grass textures tore loose, curling upward before disintegrating into glowing fragments that scattered into the static-filled air.
He spun toward Kaelith. She was already sprinting for the gate.
"Move!" she shouted, her voice sharp, leaving no room for hesitation.
Erevan's lungs screamed as he bolted after her. The chaotic pull of static filled his throat, making it harder to breathe. Villagers weren't as fast.
He glanced back.
One froze mid-run. Her body jerked, spasming as her face blurred, dissolving into glitching blocks of unreadable code. She didn't even have time to scream before she shattered into countless jagged shards that the storm scattered like dust.
Erevan's stomach twisted so hard he nearly tripped. His voice came out hoarse, ragged with disbelief.
"What the hell is happening to them?"
Kaelith didn't look back. Her braid whipped behind her as she ran.
"They're NPCs. The storm eats unstable code first. You want to join them, keep asking questions."
NPCs. Just data. Just lines of code. That was what she meant. Except it hadn't looked like just data when the woman's eyes went wide with terror.
Erevan clenched his teeth and forced himself to shut up. His legs burned, but the adrenaline shoved him forward.
The village gate warped as they dashed through, one half still solid stone, the other half collapsing into a jagged mess of unrendered polygons. Beyond, the forest stretched wide, its trees swaying unnaturally in the static-laden air.
"Out here's safer?" Erevan yelled, desperate for something that resembled reassurance.
"Not safe," Kaelith shot back. "Just less suicidal."
The words did absolutely nothing to ease the ice in his gut.
The forest wasn't a forest anymore.
Erevan had grown up around trees—oak, pine, ash. He knew how they should stand tall and rooted. But here? Here they bent at impossible angles, like drunken giants trying to stand upright. Some roots didn't dig into the dirt at all; instead, they clawed upward, spiraling into the sky. Branches twisted down into the soil, as though the world itself had gotten its directions scrambled.
Leaves flickered through entire lifecycles in seconds. Budding, greening, withering, falling—and then starting over, again and again. It was nauseating to watch, like staring at a looped animation that never synced right.
The ground didn't help either. Every few steps, it jittered like a broken video, skipping frames forward or jerking backward without warning. Once, Erevan's boot landed on what should have been grass, only for it to flicker into cobblestone for a blink, then back to soil. His balance nearly went with it.
Every instinct screamed at him to stop. To hide. To not take another step deeper into a world that was unraveling thread by thread. But Kaelith pushed forward without hesitation, bow taut across her back.
"You've done this before, haven't you?" Erevan muttered, his voice rough, more accusation than question.
Kaelith didn't slow. "Once. That was enough."
"Great. Glad I'm tagging along on your second apocalypse."
No reaction. She either didn't hear him or she was ignoring him, which was worse.
The System chimed again. Its message hovered at the edge of his vision, too calm, too clinical.
[Glitch Storm Duration: 59:12]
Erevan groaned out loud. "You've gotta be kidding me. An hour? An entire hour of this nightmare?"
Kaelith didn't answer. She just kept moving, scanning the warped terrain with an archer's steady calm.
Erevan cursed under his breath and forced his legs to keep up. Every step felt heavier. His brain begged for denial—this wasn't real, couldn't be real—but the static buzzing through his bones said otherwise.
"Where are we even going?" he demanded finally, unable to keep the panic out of his voice.
"There's a cave system up ahead," Kaelith said. "Natural terrain is more stable. Less for the storm to corrupt."
"Define 'less,'" Erevan muttered.
The System helpfully obliged before Kaelith could answer.
[Environmental Hazard: Reality Collapse]
[Stability: 42%]
Erevan threw his hands up at the floating message. "Fantastic. That's exactly the number I needed to see."
As if the world had been waiting for his sarcasm, a guttural roar ripped through the twisted trees.
Erevan froze.
The sound wasn't just loud. It was wrong. The pitch warbled, half of it a bestial growl, the other half pure static. The forest itself seemed to flinch as trees bent aside, glitching out of position as something massive forced its way through.
A wolf.
The corrupted wolf lunged, a blur of wireframe teeth and flashing textures.
Kaelith reacted first. Her bow snapped up, string humming as she loosed an arrow mid-run. The shot streaked straight into the beast's muzzle. For a heartbeat, Erevan thought she'd nailed it. But instead of blood, the wound pixelated, jagged lines of static rippling outward like cracks on a screen. The wolf didn't even falter.
Erevan's throat went dry. "Oh, great. That's fair. Totally fair."
He stumbled back as the beast barreled forward, the ground beneath its paws flickering from dirt to stone to raw grid-lines.
Fine. If arrows didn't work… then it was sheep time.
Erevan gritted his teeth, thrust out his hand, and summoned one. The familiar fluffy creature blinked into existence at his feet, bleating innocently. Above its head, the countdown had already started.
3…
2…
1…
The wolf's jaws snapped down.
The explosion rocked the forest. Heat slapped Erevan's face, branches tore apart, and a shockwave sent dust and leaves spiraling skyward. For a moment—just a beautiful, fleeting moment—Erevan dared to hope.
Then the smoke cleared.
The wolf still stood.
Half its body was missing, jagged holes showing bones and muscle rendered in hollow wireframe. Yet those glowing eyes still locked on him, unwavering, hateful.
The System chimed.
[Enemy Damaged – HP -35%]
Erevan threw up his hands. "Thirty-five? That was a goddamn nuke! What does it take to kill you, a tactical sheep strike?!"
The wolf lunged again.
He dove sideways, rolling through grass that flickered into water halfway through, soaking his entire side. The cold punched into his ribs, but he scrambled up, slipping on glitching ground as Kaelith fired again.
This arrow blazed with blue light. It struck the wolf's exposed ribs, detonating in a shockwave that ripped wireframe apart. The beast staggered, snarled, and then turned its gaze back on Erevan.
Kaelith's voice cut through the chaos.
"Your turn, anomaly!"
"Oh, sure, throw the spotlight on me when giant death-dog's eyes are already on my face. Thanks!" Erevan spat, summoning again.
Two sheep this time. Both flopped into existence at his boots, blinking up at him with unnerving calm as their timers ticked down. He shoved one toward the wolf. The little beast trotted forward proudly, bleating like it was marching to war. The second followed, bleating even louder.
3… 2… 1…
The forest vanished in triple fire.
The blast shattered trees, scorched dirt, and warped the already fragile terrain. For a heartbeat, Erevan thought his ears might never recover.
This time, it worked.
The wolf fragmented mid-snarl. Its body broke apart into jagged shards of corrupted code that hung in the air, vibrating violently before disintegrating into nothing.
The System confirmed it.
[Enemy Defeated]
EXP +400
Loot Acquired: Corrupted Core (Unstable)
Erevan bent double, hands on his knees, gasping like he'd just sprinted for his life—because, well, he had. Sweat stung his eyes, his lungs felt like collapsing bellows, and every nerve screamed at him to lie down and not get up again.
"This… is… insane," he wheezed.
Kaelith didn't give him the chance. She grabbed his arm, hauled him upright with surprising strength, and forced him forward.
"Save the panic for later. More are coming."
Erevan blinked, vision swimming. "More? No, no, no, that was the boss fight! You don't get more after the boss fight. That's against the rules!"
Sure enough, the forest around them began to warp again. Bark textures peeled away, spreading corruption oozing like rot through the trees. Patches of shadow gleamed with new eyes—pairs of glowing red, blinking open one by one.
Erevan's stomach plunged to his boots.
"We're screwed."
Kaelith's lips curved into a smirk, though it was thinner now, strained. "Not if you keep blowing up sheep like that."
The storm above howled louder, sky cracking wider. The timer in the corner of Erevan's vision ticked down, cruelly slow.
[Glitch Storm Duration: 52:44]
And this was only the beginning.
Except no wolf should ever be this size. It towered like a carriage stacked on top of another. Fur was missing in ragged chunks, replaced with flashing textures—red one second, blue the next, then collapsing into error grids. Its eyes glowed a hellish red, jaw distorting too wide, as though the rules of anatomy had been abandoned.
The System chimed again, cold and clinical.
[Enemy: Corrupted Direwolf Lv. 8]
Special Trait: Reality Anchor – Spreads Corruption on Contact
Erevan's entire body went cold. He stopped dead, feet refusing to move another step.
"Oh no. Nope. Absolutely not."
The wolf lunged.