Chapter 15: The Betrayal's Aftermath
The real world didn't have a HUD.
There were no glowing arrows pointing David toward his next objective, no clear-cut Level tags over the heads of the things moving in the shadows. There was only the wet, heavy thrum of his own blood and the biting cold of a Lagos night that had forgotten the sun.
David dragged himself toward the flicker of the campfire he had seen under the ruins of the Third Mainland Bridge. Every step felt like walking through waist-deep mud. He was Rank 20—a literal bottom-feeder in the eyes of the system—but here, "Rank" was a fantasy. Here, there was only survival.
Thump... Thump...
His heart gave a sudden, sharp jolt. It wasn't the Thump of Dread he was used to; it was a rhythmic, scratching sensation.
"Halt."
The voice didn't boom like the Saint's. It was thin, raspy, and carried the weight of someone who hadn't spoken in days.
Out of the darkness of a collapsed pylon stepped a woman. She wasn't wearing tactical gear or silken robes. She wore a patchwork of scavenged tires and rusted sheet metal. In her hand was a crossbow, but the bolt wasn't made of steel—it was a jagged shard of blue data-crystal, salvaged from a dead Construct.
"You smell like the Nursery," she said, her eyes narrowing. They weren't glowing with system light. They were bloodshot and tired. "You smell like 'Candidate' skin."
David raised his hands slowly. The obsidian veins in his palms flickered with a dying violet light. "I'm not a Candidate anymore. I'm... a glitch."
"A glitch?" She stepped closer, the crystal bolt aimed squarely at David's throat. "The last 'glitch' that came through the Backdoor tried to eat our camp's essence. Give me one reason I shouldn't put this shard through your throat before you start 'refining' our air."
David felt his knees buckle. "Because... I have the Primal Heart. And I know how to kill the Saint."
The woman froze. The mention of the Saint caused a ripple of movement in the shadows behind her. Three more figures emerged. They looked like ghosts—gaunt, grey-skinned, and marked with scars that looked like digital burns.
"The Saint is in the Sky-Cradle," a man muttered, his arm ending in a rusted prosthetic. "No one kills the Saint. He owns the code."
"He doesn't own the dirt," David panted, collapsing to his knees. "I gave him my Soul Force. I gave him the only partner I had left. I'm empty... but I'm free."
The woman lowered the crossbow, her expression shifting from hostility to a grim curiosity. "Empty, huh? Let's see."
She reached out and touched David's chest, right over the obsidian stone. The moment her fingers made contact, David's Void-Sight flared. He didn't see her as a person; he saw her as a flickering flame of 'Real' energy, suppressed by a heavy, grey shroud of 'Simulation Dust.'
She gasped, pulling her hand back as a spark of silver wind jumped from David to her.
"You... you really have the Blessings," she whispered. "But you're dying, 'glitch.' Your heart is trying to pump essence that isn't there."
"The 5th Blessing," David wheezed. "The Spirit of the Origin. Where is it?"
The survivors exchanged a look of profound dread.
"The Sahara Abyss," the woman said. "But you won't find a ritual there. You'll find the Maw. The Ancestors didn't leave the 5th Blessing for us to find. They left it as a drain. It's what keeps this world broken so their 'Nursery' can stay fueled."
[Warning: Soul Force at 1%]
[Life Support: Critical]
David's vision began to blur. He thought of Emily, sitting on her golden throne, forgetting his name. He thought of the Saint, laughing at the 'glitch' that threw itself into the trash.
"Help me reach it," David said, his voice a mere whisper. "And I'll turn the drain... into a fountain."
The woman looked at the sky, where the faint, shimmering outline of the Sky-Cradle—the "Eternity Realm"—floated like a mocking moon.
"My name is Zuri," she said, signaling the men to pick David up. "And if you're lying to us, I'll feed your obsidian heart to the Scavengers myself. But if you're real... then maybe it's time the 'trash' started an uprising."
As they carried David toward the warmth of the fire, his system gave one final, ghostly notification before turning completely black.
[New Quest: The Scavenger King]
[Goal: Rebuild your Soul Force using the 'Real' Essence of Earth.]
[Current Path: The Maw of the Abyss.]
David closed his eyes. He was no longer a player in the game. He was the bug that was going to crash the entire server.
End of Volume 1