CHAPTER 46 – Reality Cracks
The world began to visibly break the moment Gu Yanzhou seized unauthorized root authority over the compromised System.
The sheer audacity of a fictional character rewriting the fundamental rules of his reality sent shockwaves through the fabric of the narrative.
At first, the cracks were subtle, easily dismissed as fatigue or bad wiring.
A filming camera on a late-night set glitched, capturing a split-second frame of non-existent code.
A hospital corridor streetlight flickered even though the emergency power grid was stable.
A passing pedestrian outside the window froze mid-step for a full half-second—a brief, temporal hitch—then continued walking as if nothing happened.
But the symptoms quickly escalated beyond minor glitches.
The sky outside the window dimmed unnaturally, the color shifting to an unsettling, sickly grey.
Time seemed to skip forward by minutes suddenly, causing clocks to jump and medical monitors to briefly display erroneous data.
Objects shifted positions when no one touched them; a water glass slid three inches to the left, and a pen vanished from the bedside table, only to reappear under the pillow.
Xiao Xi sat bolt upright in her hospital bed, staring with wide, terrified eyes at a vase of flowers that had just teleported from the center of the table to the corner of the windowsill.
"Yanzhou…" her voice was a thin, panicked whisper.
He instantly caught her trembling hand, his own hand firm and steady despite the chaos around them.
"I know, Xiao Xi.
This is the System fighting back.
It's the resistance of the original code."
The System hummed urgently in her mind, the blue light now flashing red.
[Host danger rising. Physical reality compromised.]
[Story boundary collapsing due to Root Access conflict.]
[Stability at: 48%. Immediate action required.]
Xiao Xi swallowed, the dryness in her throat making speech difficult.
"It's because of us, Yanzhou.
We are breaking their world."
Gu's grip tightened, his eyes fierce.
"It's because someone decided our lives—your life—were disposable and only useful to serve a predetermined plot."
Her chest warmed despite the paralyzing fear, fueled by his unwavering resolve.
But the world continued to distort violently.
A large, complex mural on the opposite wall shimmered, its paint running and reforming into unrecognizable symbols.
The collapse was underway.
And the hacker… wasn't done yet.