For the first time since this nightmare began... the silence felt wrong.
I stood amid the smoldering remains of the Elite Glitch-Seeker, its broken Seeker Circuit Blade humming gently in my grip like the breath of some wounded beast. Smoke curled around me, carrying the scent of burned metal and bleeding code into the darkened sky.
But I wasn't alone.
Not anymore.
A new window materialized without warning. Not the familiar pale blue of the System—but a deep crimson frame, pulsing softly like a heartbeat.
> [PRIVATE SYSTEM MESSAGE — Administrator Level]
Sender: ???
Subject: The Price of Defiance.
"I see you, Glitched One. Curious. Reckless. Alive."
"A survivor where none should remain."
"Do you want to know why?"
I stiffened.
An Administrator?
No one was supposed to contact me directly except Purifiers. The true handlers of the System—the Administrators—were myth. Untouchable. Unreachable.
Until now.
Another message flashed:
> [New System Chat Request: Administrator ??? wants to open a Live Link.]
Accept: [Yes] / [No]
My finger hovered.
Every part of me screamed no. To accept might be suicide—a trap, a purge command.
But curiosity... that cursed, hungry instinct...
I tapped Yes.
The world dissolved.
---
I stood not on the cracked highway... but in the heart of the System Nexus.
A realm few ever saw.
Endless lines of code arched like cathedral ceilings above me, raining streams of golden data into lakes of pure white light below. Massive gears turned in the distance—quiet titans that powered this artificial world's bones. Flickering error screens hovered like ghosts across the sky.
And there, waiting in the center of this impossible cathedral, stood a man.
Or... what looked like one.
He was tall, thin, wrapped in a dark cloak made of shifting system code, his face hidden behind a mask of gleaming bone-white porcelain. No mouth. No eyes. Only a crack running down its center, leaking faint trails of glitching red light.
"Welcome, User 010," the figure said, his voice echoing from nowhere.
"You shouldn't exist. Yet here you are."
I swallowed. "You're an Administrator."
"I was. Once." The mask tilted. "Before the corruption. Before the world broke and you... slipped through the cracks."
I tightened my grip on the Seeker Blade.
"What do you want?"
A soft, empty chuckle.
"To offer you the truth."
A sphere of light formed between his hands—spinning faster, faster—until images bloomed like a living movie in the air.
A war. A secret war.
Humans—real humans—fighting machines of impossible size. Cities crumbling. Fire raining from the skies.
Then the birth of the System.
A last refuge.
A simulation to preserve the human mind, to rebuild civilization within a perfect digital world while Earth healed.
"But perfection is fragile," the Administrator whispered. "The System cracked. Errors multiplied. Purifiers were made to hunt these errors, to keep the illusion stable."
The images shifted.
A hundred faces flashed. Men. Women. Children.
Players. Users.
All marked like me.
All erased.
"You are the tenth anomaly," he said softly. "The last failure of this grand design. And perhaps... its only hope."
I frowned.
"Hope? You want me to fix the System?"
"No." His mask cracked wider.
"I want you to end it."
The sphere shattered.
The cathedral trembled.
"Your existence is the final error," the Administrator said, his voice layered with static. "Either you will crash this world forever... or purge it clean of all corruption—including yourself."
I backed away.
"Why me? Why give me the Virus Lord class? The Glitch Console? The power to break the rules?!"
The figure laughed softly.
"Because someone must carry the virus."
I shuddered.
"This world is dying," he murmured. "The others—the Nine who came before you—tried to escape. To survive. They failed."
"You have a chance to rewrite this broken game. But the Purifiers will never stop. And neither will the other Administrators. If they catch you... they will delete you, mind and soul."
I felt the weight of that doom settle on my shoulders.
"And if I refuse?" I asked softly.
He spread his arms.
"Then you'll die like the rest. Forgotten. But if you accept..."
The gears of the cathedral ground to a halt.
"Then the System can be remade. Freed from its endless loop. You will be the first and last Virus Lord. King of a world no longer bound by its chains."
Another window appeared before me.
> [Unique Evolution Path Unlocked!]
Class: Virus Lord (Conceptual Stage)
Perk: System Rewrite (Incomplete)
Requirement: Absorb Unknown Code Fragments (1/5)
New Objective: Find the Second Fragment — rumored to be hidden within the corpse of a fallen Purifier Commander.
"You have begun the path already," the Administrator said softly. "The First Fragment awakened the Glitch Console... the Second waits within the ruin city of Argon Core... guarded by death itself."
I blinked.
"I thought Purifiers couldn't die."
"They can," the figure rasped. "But only by a Virus' hand."
I clenched my fists.
Argon Core.
A fallen zone. Level 30 danger rating. Swarming with monsters. Death guaranteed for any low-level fool who entered.
And I was Level 8.
"You expect me to survive that?" I asked bitterly.
"You must." The figure's voice grew faint. Flickering. Breaking.
"They already sense you. A Watcher comes. My link fades..."
"Wait—what's a Watcher—?!"
The world cracked.
A terrible eye opened in the digital sky, burning gold and cold like distant stars. Its pupil locked onto me—a god of the System staring into my soul.
The Administrator recoiled.
"Run, Glitched One. RUN."
---
I crashed back into my body on the highway, gasping for breath.
The sky was bleeding red now—warning lights flashing across the ruined city as the Purifier network rebooted. My Trace Level spiked.
> Trace Level: 11%
Warning: Watcher-class Purifier Unit Deployed — Unknown Location.
"Shit—"
Another message pinged.
> [New Side Quest: Escape the Watcher's Gaze]
Objective: Evade Purifier Watcher for 12 hours.
Reward: 2 Unknown Code Fragments.
Penalty: Total System Purge.
Twelve hours…?
I looked east.
Argon Core.
The ruined city where my next fragment waited.
My only chance to fight back, to evolve into the Virus Lord.
But between me and salvation lay a Watcher-class Purifier—an angel of death built to erase errors like me from existence.
No turning back now.
I opened the Rewrite Console.
> PLAYER_SPEED = PLAYER_SPEED * 1.5
> [Command Accepted.]
Power surged into my limbs.
I ran.
Through the ruins, into the shadow of Argon Core, heart racing with terror and excitement.
Behind me, in the cracked sky, a golden light stirred.
The Watcher was awake.
And the game had truly begun.