Stability lasted three months.
Three months of peace, of research, of helping other dreamers integrate with the Record. Three months of feeling permanent, eternal, safe.
Then reality began to break.
It started small. A flicker in my peripheral vision. A moment where sound didn't quite synchronize with sight. Nothing dramatic—just tiny inconsistencies that nagged at the edge of awareness.
"Are you seeing this?" I asked Mash one morning.
"Seeing what?"
"The way the light is... I don't know. Wrong somehow."
She looked around carefully. "It seems normal to me."
But it wasn't normal. I could feel it. Something was off.
Over the next few days, the inconsistencies grew. Objects would be in slightly different positions than I remembered. Conversations would have gaps, words missing that I was certain had been spoken. The sun would set twice in the same evening.
And I was the only one noticing.
"Master," Da Vinci said when I brought it to her, "your measurements are fine. You're stable, integrated, solid. There's no indication of any problem."
"Then why am I experiencing these glitches?"
"Maybe you're tired. We've been working intensely for months. Perhaps you need rest?"
But I wasn't tired. I was terrified.
Because the glitches were getting worse.
One morning, I woke up and Argentium was visible from our camp—despite us being weeks of travel away from the city. When I mentioned it, no one else saw it.
Another day, I encountered the old shepherd from the mountains. Except we were on the plateau, nowhere near where we'd met him. And when I spoke to him, he repeated our previous conversation word for word before vanishing mid-sentence.
I was seeing the seams of reality.
And they were coming apart.
"We need to go back to the Record," I told the others urgently. "Something's wrong with my integration. Maybe the connection is degrading."
We made the journey quickly, tension thick in the air. My companions couldn't see what I was seeing, but they trusted that something was wrong.
The Record's cavern was different.
Or rather, it was flickering between different states. Sometimes vast and ancient, sometimes small and new, sometimes not there at all. The sphere of light pulsed erratically, like a heart struggling to beat.
"What the hell?" Cu muttered, hand on his spear.
"You see it too?" I asked, relieved.
"See what?" He was staring at me, not at the cavern. "Master, what are you talking about?"
My stomach dropped. "The changes. The fluctuations. The cavern is—"
"The cavern is fine," Artoria said carefully. "Master, you're not making sense."
I looked at them. Really looked.
And saw what they couldn't see about themselves.
They were glitching too. Flickering between different versions—Mash as I'd first met her, as she'd become, as she might be. Cu shifting between poses, expressions, ages. All of them unstable, multiple, overlapping.
"Oh no," I whispered. "Oh no, no, no."
"Master?" Mash reached for me, and I saw her hand pass through multiple positions simultaneously before landing on my arm. She didn't notice.
I pulled away, stumbling toward the sphere of light.
Da Vinci moved to stop me, but I was faster. I plunged my hands into the light, diving deep into the Record, searching for answers.
What I found destroyed me.
The integration hadn't solved the problem. It had hidden it.
By connecting to the Record, by becoming part of fundamental reality, we'd distributed our existential instability across the entire system. And now, after months of strain, the system was starting to buckle.
Not just our world. All worlds. Every reality maintained by every dreamer was flickering, destabilizing, coming apart at the seams.
And I was seeing it first because I was at the center of the fracture.
I pulled back from the Record, gasping.
"We did this," I said. "The integration. It didn't fix the problem—it spread it. We're causing a cascade failure across all of existence."
"That's not possible," Da Vinci said, but her voice shook. "My calculations—"
"Were incomplete. We didn't account for systemic load over time. We're like a virus, and we've infected the entire structure of reality." I looked at them, these people I loved, these people I'd doomed. "We have to disconnect. All of us. Every dreamer who integrated—we have to sever the connection before we tear everything apart."
"But if we disconnect," Medusa said slowly, "we'll go back to the consumption problem. We'll start fading again."
"I know."
"So we're choosing between our existence and everyone else's existence," Emiya summarized.
"Yes."
Silence fell over the cavern.
"Then it's not really a choice," Artoria said finally. "We disconnect."
"Wait—" Mash started.
"We disconnect," Artoria repeated firmly. "We don't have the right to risk all of existence just to preserve ourselves. That's not heroic—that's monstrous."
"But Master will fade," Mash's voice broke. "If we go back to the old method, Master will—"
"Will make that sacrifice if necessary," I finished. "Artoria's right. We can't justify our existence at the cost of everyone else's."
"No," Mash said fiercely. "No, there has to be another way. There's always another way. We just need to find it—"
"There's no time," I said gently. "Reality is already fracturing. If we wait to search for a perfect solution, we might not be able to fix it at all."
"Then we work fast," Cu said. "We disconnect, stop the cascade, and then we find a real solution. We've done it before—"
"I won't survive that long," I interrupted. "Once we disconnect, I'll start fading immediately. The consumption rate was too high. I have maybe days, a week at most."
The words hung in the air like a death sentence.
"Then we'll stabilize you another way," Da Vinci said desperately. "The emotional resonance method that dreamer taught us, or the cyclical patterns, or—"
"None of those will work fast enough." I smiled sadly at her. "We both know it. The only reason I survived this long was the integration. Without it..."
"Without it, you die," Mash finished, tears streaming down her face. "And you're asking us to accept that."
"I'm not asking," I said softly. "I'm telling you what has to happen. And I'm trusting you to do it even though it hurts."
"That's not fair," she sobbed.
"No," I agreed. "It's not."
We stood in the flickering cavern, reality coming apart around us, facing the impossible choice that wasn't really a choice at all.
"How do we disconnect?" Artoria asked quietly.
"The same way we connected," Da Vinci said, voice hollow. "Through the Record. We touch the light, and we sever the bond. All of us, simultaneously."
"And the other dreamers?" Emiya asked.
"I'll send a message through the threshold points," I said. "Warn them, tell them what's happening. Most will understand. Those who don't..." I couldn't finish.
"Will cause their own destruction and take their worlds with them," Medusa finished grimly. "But that's their choice."
"We should vote," Cu said.
"No," I said. "This isn't a democracy. This is my responsibility. I created this world, I involved you in the integration, I caused this cascade. I decide."
"And you decide we disconnect," Artoria said. Not a question.
"I decide we disconnect."
"Even though it kills you."
"Even though."
Mash made a sound like a wounded animal. Medusa caught her as she collapsed, holding her while she cried.
"How long do we have?" Emiya asked. Always practical, even in crisis.
"Once I send the warning? Maybe an hour before we need to disconnect. Enough time to say goodbye." My voice cracked on the last word.
"Then let's not waste it," Cu said roughly.
We left the cavern and returned to our camp. I sent out the warning through every threshold point I could reach, explaining the situation, begging other dreamers to disconnect before the cascade became irreversible.
Then I sat with my companions—my creations, my friends, my family—and we talked.
Not about grand things. Not about the nature of existence or the ethics of reality. Just small things. Memories. Favorite moments. Stupid jokes that made us laugh through tears.
"Remember the village?" Mash said. "When we first learned I could create things? I made that shield, and I was so proud."
"Remember the festival?" Artoria added. "When we realized we were becoming real?"
"Remember Argentium?" Cu said. "Best fighting pits I've ever found."
We remembered. We held each other. We existed together one last time.
When the hour was nearly up, I stood.
"It's time."
They stood with me.
We walked back to the Record's cavern. The flickering had intensified—reality was minutes away from catastrophic collapse.
"Are you ready?" Da Vinci asked, voice shaking.
"No," I said honestly. "But I'm going to do it anyway."
We approached the sphere of light together. Placed our hands on its surface. Felt the connection that had saved us and doomed us.
"On three," I said. "One. Two—"
"Wait," Mash interrupted. "Master, I just want to say—"
"I know," I said. "I love you too. All of you."
"Three."
We severed the connection.
Reality snapped back like a rubber band released. The flickering stopped. The cascade halted. The sphere of light stabilized, pulsing with steady, healthy rhythm.
And I started fading immediately.
Not slowly. Not gradually. Fast, like someone was erasing me from existence with violent efficiency.
"Master!" Mash grabbed for me, but her hands passed through.
"It's okay," I tried to say, but my voice was barely there.
The world was blurring, dissolving. I could see my companions like ghosts, like memories, like dreams I was waking up from.
"No, no, no—" Mash was sobbing, trying to hold onto something that was no longer solid.
"Find a way," I managed to whisper. "Find a way to stay real. All of you. Promise me."
"We promise," Artoria said, her voice breaking.
"We promise," they all echoed.
The last thing I saw was their faces.
The last thing I felt was their love.
Then—
Nothing.