Kael slept twelve hours.
He woke to sunlight stabbing through cheap curtains and the smell of reheated dumplings.
Haneul sat at the tiny kitchen table, hair in a lopsided bun, a blanket around her shoulders like a cape, tablet propped up against the salt shaker.
"Morning, ethics goblin," she said.
He squinted.
"Time?"
"Eleven," she said. "You looked like death. I let you rot."
"Thanks," he said, shuffling over to steal a dumpling.
His limbs felt like he'd run three Floors.
His mind felt like he'd argued with a thousand spreadsheets.
He sat opposite her.
Her shard was calmer this morning—background hum instead of blaring siren.
[FRAGMENT: STATUS – DORMANT (STABLE).]
"Any new shard DMs?" he asked.
"A couple," she said. "Mostly 'saw what you did with Root glitch, interesting, might try similar.' I sent back 'don't be jerks, start small, remember civilians are people, not scenery.'"
"Good," he said. "Beta?"
[MORAL_AUDITOR_BETA: STATUS – NORMAL.][NEW CASES FROM ROOT_DESYNC_EVENT: UNDER REVIEW.]
"It's grading us," he said.
"Let it," she replied. "Last night felt… better than transit day. Less like we were opposing the whole machine, more like we were filling in when it went blank."
He nodded slowly.
"Yeah," he said. "We weren't fighting the default. Just… catching it when it tripped."
She watched him.
"You okay?" she asked. "This is a lot, even for someone whose idea of fun is watching flag logs."
He blew out a breath.
"I keep waiting to feel like it's too big," he said. "Like I should just… stop touching anything, let the System wobble and reset on its own."
"And?" she asked.
"And then I see one person we actually helped," he said. "Transit guy. Old woman from the fire. Joon not getting pancaked by 30 spiders. Kind of hard to pull my hands off the wheel after that."
She smiled crookedly.
"Addiction to doing the right thing," she said. "Tragic diagnosis."
He swatted her ankle with his foot under the table.
"Were you scared?" he asked quietly.
"Last night?" she said. "Yeah. Not of the glitch. Of… hearing so many worth calls at once. All those 'what matters more' questions, all overlapping. Felt like standing in the middle of a thousand people arguing philosophy while a train is coming."
"Too much?" he asked.
She considered.
"It would have been, alone," she said. "With you and Beta and a couple of saner shards in the mix? Manageable. Barely."
He swallowed.
"Unknown_3?" he asked.
"Didn't DM me," she said. "Probably arguing with his own conscience."
"Beta's notes say he handled his floor better than he could have," Kael said. "Less slaughter, more actual teaching moment."
"There you go," she said. "You're a corrupting influence."
He grimaced.
"Not sure I want that badge," he said.
The door buzzed.
Joon's cheerful voice followed without waiting for an invite.
"It's your favorite DPS and also I brought pancakes!" he called.
He came in with a stack of takeout boxes and an expression that said he'd heard exactly none of the existential bits.
"Sleep good?" he asked Kael.
"Like a corpse," Kael said.
"Good," Joon said. "You're going to need the energy because floor queues are bonkers after last night. Everyone wants to 'test the new patch.'"
Haneul groaned.
"Of course they do," she said. "Humans are the same everywhere: 'the sky almost fell, let's see if loot tables changed.'"
Kael smiled despite himself.
"Let them," he said. "With any luck, the only thing they'll notice is slightly fewer unfair deaths."
"And slightly more ethics," Haneul added.
"Matte ethics," he corrected.
"Matte ethics," she agreed.
Joon blinked between them.
"I feel like I missed a memo," he said. "Did you two change religion while I was sleeping?"
"Yes," Haneul said. "We now worship 'not being terrible.'"
Joon considered.
"Reasonable god," he said. "Tithe in pancakes?"
"Accepted," Kael said, stealing another box.
Their UIs pinged quietly with background updates—post-event analyses, minor patch notes, a new "guidance" tag Mira had pushed to Observers about when to escalate to Executors.
Outside, Towers loomed as always.
Inside, in a too-small apartment, three people ate mediocre pancakes and incredibly good dumplings and pretended they weren't slowly becoming part of the System's immune response.
Beta watched, logging nothing critical.
The Root channels hummed—less glitchy, for now.
Shards dreamt.
For the first time in a while, "after" actually felt like a thing, not just "before the next disaster."
Kael let himself enjoy it.
Just for a bit.