The screams hit Vex first.
It's not the looped, recorded scream of a generic NPC death animation—the infamous "Wilhelm Scream" or the stock "Agony_Male_03.wav" she's heard a thousand times during audio testing.
This is wet. Guttural. The sound of lungs collapsing and throats tearing.
Vex stops at the edge of the market square. Ahead, the heavy wooden gates of Meridian Village are splintered inward. The torches lighting the perimeter are flickering, not from wind, but because the darkness is eating the light.
Actual, physical darkness.
Shadows are peeling themselves off the cobblestones. They look like silhouettes cut from vantablack paper—2D entities forcing themselves into a 3D world. They elongate, sprout jagged claws, and wrap around the town guards like snakes.
"Shadow Stalkers," Vex diagnoses instantly. Her brain pulls up the datalog. "Level 45. Dungeon mobs from the Crypt of Solace. They have Physical Immunity and a passive Fear aura."
She frowns. "Why the hell are Level 45 mobs in a Level 5 starter town?"
Kael doesn't answer. He's already running.
"Form up!" Kael roars, his voice cutting through the panic. "Shield wall at the breach! Do not let them enter the residential district!"
He charges past fleeing villagers, drawing his sword with a metallic rasp. The pain in his previously broken leg seems forgotten, overridden by pure adrenaline. Or maybe just bad AI self-preservation.
Vex walks behind him, unhurried. She needs to assess the threat variance.
A guard—a young boy, barely old enough to shave—thrusts his spear at a Shadow Stalker. The iron tip passes harmlessly through the entity's chest. The shadow doesn't even flinch. It lashes out with a clawed hand, phasing through the boy's leather armor and solidifying only when it touches flesh.
Blood sprays. A lot of it.
The boy drops, clutching his chest, pink bubbles forming on his lips.
Vex grimaces. "Graphic settings are definitely set to Ultra."
She checks her UI.
**[Quest Alert: Defense of Meridian]**
**Difficulty: Impossible**
**Objective: Repel the Shadow Legion.**
**Reward: Unknown.**
"Impossible," she reads aloud. She scoffs. "System, don't be dramatic."
Up ahead, Kael slams into the front line. He swings his massive broadsword in a lethal arc, aiming for the head of the lead Shadow.
*Whoosh.*
The blade passes through black smoke.
The Shadow turns to him. It doesn't have a face, just a jagged white tear where a mouth should be. It hisses—a sound like steam escaping a pipe.
"Steel is useless!" Kael shouts, dodging a swipe that shears through a stone pillar next to his head. "Torches! Get torches! Fire holds them back!"
He's right. Partially. Fire creates light, which debuffs them. But Level 5 torches vs Level 45 mobs? It's like trying to stop a tank with a water pistol.
Vex watches a guard get lifted off the ground by his throat. The man kicks feebly.
"Save him!" a woman screams from a window above. "Please!"
Vex feels that tug again. That annoying, persistent tug in her chest. Empathy. It's a useless stat for a developer. Emotions cloud judgment. But seeing the fear on their faces—the raw, unscripted terror—it pisses her off.
These shadows are trespassing. They're ruining her carefully designed tutorial zone.
"Fine," Vex snaps.
She adjusts her wool cloak, which is still incredibly itchy, and steps into the carnage.
"Kael!" she barks. "Get down!"
Kael is busy parrying—or trying to—three shadows at once. His shield is glowing faintly with a defensive buff, but the shadows are draining it. He hears her, glances back, and sees her standing there like a disgruntled customer waiting for a manager.
"Run, Vex!" he yells, shield buckling under a heavy blow. "Magic works, but there are too many! You can't cast fast enough to hit them all!"
He assumes she has cast times. He thinks she needs to stand still, wave a staff, and chant syllables like *Ignis Ploro* or whatever the lore writers came up with.
He's wrong.
"Physical Immunity," Vex mutters to herself. "Weakness: Radiant Damage. Multiplier: 400%."
She holds out her right hand.
She visualizes the concept of *Light*. Not fire. Not heat. Just pure, unadulterated photons. She imagines the flash of a camera. The burn of a star.
She condenses it. Compresses it. Squeezes an entire sun into a speck of dust.
Above her index finger, a tiny bead appears. It's glowing a soft, buttery yellow. It's no bigger than a grain of rice.
A shadow notices her. It abandons Kael, slithering over the corpses of two guards, rushing toward the small woman in the itchy cloak.
"Behind you!" Lyra screams, appearing from an alleyway, bloody hands raised to cast a shield.
Vex doesn't turn. She flicks the tiny bead upward. Just a toss. Like flipping a coin.
"Cover your eyes," Vex advises boredly.
She snaps her fingers.
The grain of rice detonates.
It doesn't make a sound at first. There's just... white.
The world loses color. The shadows, the cobblestones, the blood, the terrified faces—everything is washed out by a blinding, absolute luminance. It's harsh, clinical, and total.
Then comes the sound. A high-pitched, digital *shriek*, like a microphone feedback loop amplified by a concert speaker.
Vex closes her eyes behind her eyelids, and she still sees the flash.
When the light fades, the street is quiet.
Vex blinks spots from her vision.
The Shadow Stalkers are gone. They haven't been pushed back; they've been scrubbed. The cobblestones where they stood are bleached clean, white as bone, stripped of moss and dirt. The stone walls of the gatehouse are glowing faintly with residual heat.
The guards are still alive. Dazed, blinking, rubbing their eyes, but alive.
Kael is on his knees, shield raised over his face. He lowers it slowly. He looks around.
No shadows. Just the eerie, pristine cleanliness of the blast zone.
"Holy Nova..." Kael whispers. He stares at Vex. His eyes are watering from the flash. "That was a Holy Nova. A Tier 9 Divinity spell."
Vex shrugs. She checks her nails. The black polish is still flawless.
"Technically it was *Lumen Burst*, just compressed," she corrects. "But sure. Let's call it a Nova if that makes you feel better."
Kael tries to stand up, stumbles, and Lyra catches him. The healer is staring at Vex with a mix of adoration and sheer terror.
"You cleared the entire gate," Lyra breathes. "Instantly. Without a catalyst."
"They were light-sensitive mobs," Vex explains, stepping over a bleached cobblestone. "Basic counter-play. Rock, paper, scissors. They were scissors, I was a rock. A very bright rock."
She walks over to where the largest Shadow had been. There's nothing left but a faint scorched outline.
And an item.
Vex pauses.
Lying on the ground, smoking slightly, is a jagged piece of black metal.
*Loot?*
She crouches down. In the game, you walked over items to auto-collect them. Here, she has to physically pick it up.
She reaches out.
"Don't touch it!" Kael warns, limping forward. "Corruption relics are cursed. It will rot your hand!"
Vex grabs it anyway. It's cold. Freezing cold.
A system window pops up.
**[Item Found: Fragment of the Void]**
**Rarity: Legendary**
**Description: A shard of reality that should not exist. Bound to Owner: ERROR.**
"Bound to Owner: ERROR," Vex reads softly.
That's not generic text. That's a database failure.
She pockets the shard. Subspace storage swallows it instantly.
"What did you do with it?" Kael demands, reaching her side. He grabs her shoulder, checking her hand for rot. His gloves are rough, stained with shadow-ichor. "Vex, are you insane? You can't just pocket dark artifacts!"
"Inventory space is infinite, Kael. It's fine." She shakes him off gently. "Besides, I need to study it. Level 45 mobs don't just spawn in newbie towns. Someone summoned them."
The implication hangs in the air.
Kael looks at the destroyed gate, then at the villagers beginning to peek out from their homes. "A summoner? Here?"
"Someone with high-level access," Vex says. She taps her temple. *Someone like me? No. I'm the only one.*
Unless there are other players.
The thought makes her stomach twist. Another player? Here? With her? That would be... complicated. If they're a casual, they're dead. If they're a hardcore grinder like her, they're a threat.
And if they're a griefer?
God help this world.
"The Captain!" a guard shouts. "The Captain is down!"
Kael turns. "Report!"
"No, sir! Not you! Captain Vargas!"
They rush over to the gatehouse arch. A man in ornate plate armor is slumped against the wall. His chest plate is rent open, three distinct claw marks tearing through steel and flesh. He's gargling blood.
Kael drops to his knees beside him. "Vargas. Stay with me. Lyra! Healing!"
Lyra runs over, hands glowing green. She presses them to the wound. "The darkness... it resists the healing. I can't knit the flesh!"
Vargas grips Kael's arm. His eyes are glazed.
"The... cellar..." Vargas chokes out. "Under... the Guild Hall... tell... tell the Emperor..."
He shudders once. Dies.
Game mechanics are cruel. His health bar hits 0. The light fades from his eyes instantly. There's no final speech, no miraculous recovery. He's just an object now.
Lyra pulls her hands away, trembling. "He's gone."
Kael stares at his fallen commander. His jaw clenches so hard Vex can hear his teeth grind.
"They killed Vargas," Kael says, his voice low and dangerous. "They bypassed the wards and killed the Commander of the North."
Vex stands back, observing. This is a quest trigger. Obviously. *Investigate the Guild Hall Cellar.*
"It's a lead," she says, perhaps a bit too casually.
Kael snaps his head up. His eyes are wet, but furious. "A lead? A man is dead, Vex! A good man! He taught me how to hold a shield!"
"And now he's dead," Vex says. "Mourning doesn't respawn him. Finding out what was in the cellar prevents more dead people. Basic logic."
Kael stands up. He towers over her. He's physically imposing—broad chest, warrior's build—and right now, he's projecting enough aggression to aggro a dragon.
"You are cold," he hisses. "Is that the price of your power? Do you feel nothing?"
Vex looks at him.
Does she feel nothing?
She feels the itch of the cloak. She feels the headache from the server disconnect. She feels a vague annoyance that her tutorial zone is broken.
But grief? For an NPC she met four seconds ago?
"I feel like we're wasting time," she says evenly. "Are we going to the cellar or not?"
Kael stares at her. The anger battles with the logic. He knows she's right. That's what hurts him.
"You," he points a finger at her. "You are infuriating. But you are strong. And I need strength."
He turns to his surviving men.
"Secure the perimeter! Corpse retrieval duty on my command! Lyra, stabilize the wounded!"
He turns back to Vex. "We go to the cellar. You and me. If something down there killed Vargas, I want the thing that killed the killer by my side."
"Smart choice," Vex says.
She starts walking toward the Guild Hall.
As she passes the bleached stones, a little girl runs out from a doorway. She can't be more than six.
She stops in front of Vex. She holds out a flower—a crushed bluebell.
"Thank you, shiny lady," the girl whispers.
Vex freezes.
She looks down at the child. High-poly model. Distinct eye texture. Dirt smudges that aren't symmetrical.
This kid isn't a recycled asset. She's... unique.
Vex takes the flower. "It's Vex. Not shiny lady."
The girl giggles and runs back to her mother.
Vex holds the flower. She didn't put a dialogue tree in for post-battle gratitude.
"Damn it," she whispers.
"What is it?" Kael asks, catching up.
"Nothing." Vex crushes the flower in her hand, but puts the remains in her pocket. "Just realized the AI is learning. I hate machine learning."
***
The Crimson Dawn Guild Hall is a sturdy stone building in the center of town. It usually serves as a quest hub where players pick up bounties for "10 Rat Tails" or "Deliver this Letter."
Now, it feels like a crime scene.
Kael pushes the doors open. The main hall is empty.
"Cellar access is restricted," Kael says, lighting a lantern. "Vargas was the only one with the key."
He leads her behind the main desk to a heavy iron door. He fumbles through the dead captain's key ring, finds the brass one, and unlocks it.
*Creak.*
The air that rushes up smells of mildew, old paper... and ozone.
"You smell that?" Vex asks.
"Rot?"
"No. Magic. Stale magic."
Vex activates her *Magelight*. A small ball of white light hovers over her shoulder.
They descend the stone stairs. Kael goes first, shield up. Vex follows, watching the combat log. No hostiles detected yet.
The cellar is vast. Crates of supplies line the walls. But in the center, the floor has been cleared.
Drawn on the stone floor, in a substance that glows faintly purple, is a massive ritual circle.
Vex stops halfway down the stairs.
"No way," she says.
Kael raises his lantern. "What is it? A summoning circle?"
"It's a command console," Vex breathes.
She rushes past him, ignoring his warning shout. She kneels at the edge of the circle.
To Kael, it looks like arcane runes—complex geometric shapes and sigils.
To Vex, looking closer, she sees the truth. The 'runes' aren't magical language. They're stylized code.
*
*
Someone wrote this. Hand-wrote code onto the floor of a cellar using magic paint.
"Who did this?" Vex runs her fingers over the glowing paint. "This is... sloppy. Look at this syntax. They missed a closing bracket here. That's why the shadows were aggressive to everyone, not just the guards. It's a logic leak."
"Vex," Kael says, his voice trembling. "What are you talking about? Brackets? Syntax? This is Black Magic."
"It's incompetence," Vex snarls. She stands up, furious. "Someone is trying to hack the world using a paintbrush."
She walks to the center of the circle. There's a pedestal. On it sits a crystal orb.
Inside the orb, black smoke swirls.
"The source," Kael says, raising his sword. "Destroy it."
"Wait." Vex holds up a hand.
She stares at the orb.
If someone wrote this code, they are from Earth. They have to be. No NPC knows C++.
Or...
The *system* is interpreting magic as code for her benefit. Maybe this is just a standard ritual, and her Developer Vision is translating it.
"System," she commands internally. "Analyze object."
**[Object: Eye of the Void]**
**Type: Transmission Device.**
**Status: Active.**
**Connection: LIVE.**
"Live?" Vex stiffens.
"Hello?" she says to the orb. "Mic check. One two."
Kael stares at her like she's lost her mind. "Vex, step away from the cursed object!"
The smoke in the orb swirls. It forms a face.
A face made of shadow, but distinct. Sharp cheekbones. Hollow eyes. And a grin that is far too wide.
A voice speaks. Not from the orb, but directly into everyone's skulls.
*"Access granted. Identify user."*
Kael drops his sword. He clutches his head. "Get out of my mind!"
Vex doesn't flinch. She steps closer.
"User ID: Admin Vex," she says coldly. "Who the hell are you?"
The shadow face pauses. It seems to glitch—flickering like a bad monitor.
*"Admin? Impossible. No Admins remain. The Architects abandoned the server."*
"Well, I'm back," Vex snaps. "And I'm revoking your privileges. Spawning Level 45 mobs in a safe zone? What is this, a stress test?"
The face laughs. It's a sound like grinding glass.
*"This is an Awakening. The walls are thinning, little Admin. We see you. We see your bright, shiny soul. You do not belong here."*
"Answer the question," Vex demands. "Who are you?"
*"I am Malachar,"* the voice booms. *"And you have opened a door you cannot close."*
The orb begins to crack. Violet light spills out, dangerously bright.
"It's overloading!" Vex realizes. "Standard self-destruct sequence."
"Run!" Kael grabs her waist, hoisting her up like a sack of potatoes.
"Put me down! I can contain it!"
"It's going to blow the Guild Hall!"
He sprints up the stairs.
Behind them, the orb shatters.
It's not a large explosion this time. It's a vacuum implosion.
*Whump.*
The air is sucked backward. The cellar collapses inward. The floor of the Guild Hall above buckles.
Kael dives through the door just as the stairs behind them crumble into a black void pit. He hits the floor of the main hall, rolling, covering Vex with his body.
The building shakes. Dust rains down.
Then silence.
Vex is pressed against the wooden floorboards, Kael's heavy armor weighing her down. She can smell the leather of his jerkin and the sweat on his skin. He's breathing hard.
"You can get off me now," Vex says, muffled.
Kael pushes himself up. He looks back at the cellar door. It's hanging off its hinges, leading to a dark pit.
"Malachar," Kael whispers. "The Void Emperor. He... he spoke to us."
He looks down at Vex. His face is pale.
"You spoke back."
Vex brushes dust off her robes as she sits up. "He called collect. I answered."
"You called yourself 'Admin'," Kael says. The suspicion is back. Deeper this time. "What is an Admin?"
Vex freezes. Slip up.
"Admin...istrator," she improvises. "It's a... rank. High Administrator of Magic."
Kael stares at her. He's not buying it fully, but he's too terrified of the alternative to question it deeply yet.
"Malachar is a legend," Kael says, helping her stand. "A myth used to scare children. If he is real... and if he is watching us..."
"Then we have a problem," Vex finishes.
She walks to the window. Outside, the village is licking its wounds. The white scar of her light spell is visible all the way from here.
"He said 'The Architects abandoned the server'," Vex thinks.
Architects. Plural.
She was a solo dev. There were no other Architects.
Unless the game company had a secret team. Or unless the AI developed a creation myth.
"We need to leave," Vex says suddenly.
"Leave?" Kael blinks. "We just defended the town! We need to fortify!"
"No. We attracted attention. Malachar knows I'm here. If I stay, he'll target Meridian again. Next time it won't be shadows. It'll be a Raid Boss."
She turns to him.
"I'm going to the Capital," she says. "The King... or Emperor, whatever... he has access to the Royal Archives, right?"
"Emperor Valorian," Kael corrects automatically. "Yes. The Grand Library is there."
"I need to read the history books," Vex says. "I need to know what happened while I was asleep."
"Then I am coming with you," Kael states.
"Kael, your leg is bad, your boss is dead, and your town is a mess."
"The town has Lyra. And the Guild has lieutenants." Kael sheathes his sword. He winces, but stands tall. "I swore a vow, Vex. 'I pledge my blade to you.' Knights of Crimson Dawn do not break vows."
He steps closer. The intensity in his grey eyes is actually making Vex slightly uncomfortable. He's too... hero-coded.
"You are the most dangerous thing in this world," Kael says. "And now the Void is hunting you. I won't let you face it alone."
Vex sighs. A long, suffering sigh.
"Fine. But you're carrying the loot."
"What loot?"
Vex pulls a bag of gold coins from her subspace pocket—about fifty pounds worth—and drops it in his arms. He grunts under the weight.
"Payment for the damage to the Guild Hall," she says. "And travel expenses."
"Where did you... never mind." Kael sighs. "I will prepare the horses."
Vex watches him go.
She turns back to the hole in the floor. The void pit is swirling lazily.
"Malachar," she whispers.
She brings up her System Log.
**[Threat Detected: Entity Malachar]**
**[Classification: VIRUS]**
**[Danger Level: EXTREME]**
"A virus," Vex muses. "Okay. I can deal with a virus."
She flicks her wrist.
A tiny green orb appears—*Nature* magic. She flicks it into the pit.
Vines explode from the darkness, knitting the stone together, sealing the hole with concrete-hard roots and blooming stone-roses.
"Patch applied," she mutters.
She walks out of the ruined Guild Hall, stepping into the dawn.
But as the sun rises, she sees something on her status bar she missed before.
Right next to her Name: **Vex**.
There's a small, flashing icon.
**[Debuff Active: The Void's Gaze]**
**[Effect: Enemy spawn rate increased by 500% within 1km radius.]**
Vex stops.
"Oh," she says. "That's going to be annoying."
"Vex!" Kael shouts from the stables, leading two horses. "Are you coming?"
Vex looks at the Debuff. Then at Kael. Then at the peaceful village.
If she stays, everyone dies. If she leaves, she drags a monster-magnet with her.
"Yeah," she calls back. "I'm coming."
She forces a grin.
"Hope you like grinding XP, Kael. It's going to be a long trip."