The rooftop burned.
Ash fell like grey snow from a fractured sky, thick enough to choke. Smoke spiraled through shattered vents, mixing with the stench of ozone, blood, and melted steel. The air shimmered with heat. Sirens in the distance crackled and died out, swallowed by static.
And in his arms—
Kara.
She trembled against him, her hoodie soaked through with blood. Too much. Her breaths were shallow. Gasping. Wrong.
Riven pressed both hands to the gash below her ribs, trying to hold her together. His fingers slipped. "Stay with me," he whispered. "Please. Don't close your eyes."
She laughed, or maybe it was a cough. It was soft, cracked, tired. "That's your plan?"
"Yeah." His voice caught. "Just… just stay awake."
Her silver eyes fluttered half-shut.
"No," he said, panicked. "Look at me."
The fire crackled, creeping along the metal piping near the rooftop's edge. The last escape stair had melted minutes ago. The Hollowborn were still below, shrieking like animals — no, not animals. Just wrong. Boneless limbs. Unfinished faces. Flesh that didn't know what shape to take.
But Riven couldn't move.
He held Kara tighter, pressing her closer to his chest like maybe he could give her some of his strength. "You're going to make it. We're going to get out of here. I'll carry you. Just like before."
She didn't answer.
"You promised we'd see the sun together again."
"I lied," she whispered.
"You don't lie."
Her hand found his. Weak. Cold. She squeezed. "You're the worst liar, Riv."
They had made it farther than they ever should have.
Past broken checkpoints and collapsing bridges. Past flood zones and empty sectors, where the sky blinked red and nothing living breathed. They crossed into Sector Nine together — the last functioning zone — only to find it already half overrun. Refugee shelters crushed. Military walls breached. Systems dead.
There was no more extraction.
No more patrols.
Just Hollowborn and fire.
But they had run. Fought. Bled.
He'd carried her when she could no longer walk, shared the last ration bar, pulled her from wreckage with his own back torn open. They had held on.
Together.
Until now.
Kara stirred, her voice smaller than before. "You have to go."
"No."
"Riven—"
"I'm not leaving you."
"You have to live."
"I don't care."
"You have to," she said. Her eyes were losing focus now, staring past him. "This world… it needs someone to remember what came before."
"I remember," he said. "I remember everything. But not without you."
She exhaled. A long, slow breath that didn't come back.
"Kara."
He shook her lightly.
"Kara—"
Her fingers slipped from his.
"No, no no—"
He lowered his forehead to hers. Her blood stained his hands, his shirt, his thoughts. He couldn't even cry. There were no tears left.
The rooftop shuddered beneath them.
The sound of steel snapping — then stone crumbling — rippled up through the building. The structure was giving way.
And from below came a new sound. Not screeches. Not footfalls.
A low, echoing hum. Like breath drawn into something ancient. Something wrong.
The Hollowborn were climbing.
Riven shifted, just slightly, placing Kara's body behind him. He stood, legs shaking. His hands, still slick with her blood, curled into fists.
He was weaponless.
Spent.
Dying inside.
But he would stand.
One last time.
They surged over the ledge — eight-limbed things with hollow sockets and ragged skin, crawling like spiders twisted in half. The first one hissed and lunged.
Riven didn't move.
Let them come.
Let them take him.
There was nothing left to save.
Nothing left to fight for.
Except—
A flash of light.
A pull behind his eyes.
Not a sound, exactly. Not pain either.
Just—
Everything broke.
The world fell apart.
Not metaphorically.
Literally.
The air shattered like glass. The rooftop blinked into darkness. Heat vanished. Gravity vanished. Time itself fractured.
Riven didn't fall.
He simply… unmade.
And in the silence that followed, he heard one last echo.
Kara's voice.
"Then lie to me. One more time."
[You Have Died.]
[Thread Signature Detected…]
[Preserving Core Anchor… Success.]
[Reboot Sequence Initializing…]
Cold.
He hadn't known real cold in years. Not since the reactors died and the weather collapsed into endless haze.
But this was different.
This was absence.
Of heat. Of gravity. Of body. Of time.
Riven floated. No lungs. No heartbeat. No breath. Just consciousness and a distant awareness of himself.
It should have been terrifying.
It wasn't.
Only numb.
[Memory Sync Complete.]
[Initiating Echo Mark Protocol…]
[Thread Offset: 5.3 Years Reversion Confirmed.]
[Collapse Forecast: 30 Days Until First Anchor Breach]
[Wake Cycle Engaging…]
Riven gasped awake.
The breath tore through his lungs like he was surfacing from deep water. His body arched. He slammed a palm to the ground—and found concrete.
Not the rooftop.
Not ash.
A back alley.
Morning light poured through rusted awnings above him. Birds chirped. Somewhere in the distance, a street sweeper hummed. The world was… normal.
Whole.
Alive.
And he—
He was younger.
His coat was clean. His hands were unscarred. The callus on his left knuckle — the one he got from smashing open the gate to Outpost 17 — was gone. His face felt lighter. Less lined. His muscles didn't ache like they had for years.
He scrambled up, heart hammering.
This couldn't be real.
[Echo Mark Activated.]
[Class: HOLLOWFORM (Unbound)]
[Trait: Echo Sense I – Passive Unlocked]
[Trait: Memory Latch – Initialized]
[Quest Issued: Survive the First Collapse]
[Time Remaining: 29 Days, 23 Hours, 58 Minutes]
Riven staggered against the wall.
"What the hell…"
It wasn't a hallucination.
His wrist burned — black lines etching outward from a mark that hadn't existed an hour ago. It looked like veins, branching with an unnatural pulse, flickering faintly violet in the sunlight.
He stared at it, breathing hard.
It was real.
All of it.
The rooftop. Kara.
Her death.
His.
Now this.
A second chance.
Not through magic. Not through faith.
Through something worse.
The System.
He looked up toward the city skyline. Towers still stood. Traffic still moved. Civilians bustled past the alley without seeing him.
None of them knew what was coming.
But he did.
Because he'd seen it end.
He had watched the world fall into flame, watched Hollowborn tear through steel and bone, watched his sister die in his arms.
And now he had thirty days before it all began again.
Not this time.
He would find the ripples.
He would learn the System.
He would save her.
Even if it broke him again.
[Echo Detected: Zone 12B – Thread Unstable]
[Tier I Anomaly Approaching]
Riven narrowed his eyes, heart cold and steady.
"Let's begin."