The chamber was no longer a chamber.
There were no walls.
No floor.
No ceiling.
Only broken fragments of reality, spinning in an endless, howling void.
Islands of ruined architecture floated like shattered planets, twisting and colliding in slow-motion destruction.
And at the center of it all —
The Architect.
It hovered over the dying core, its form flickering between different nightmare shapes —
a towering beast, a withered king, a network of screaming faces —
all stitched together by pure malevolence.
It had shed its disguise of structure.
Now, it was raw Error made manifest.
---
> [NEW OBJECTIVE: DEFEAT THE ARCHITECT — PHASE 2.]
[ENVIRONMENTAL STABILITY: 3%.]
[PERMA-DEATH: ENABLED.]
There would be no second chances.
One mistake here, and I would be erased — not killed, but unmade, unremembered.
My existence wiped clean.
---
The Architect struck first.
It reached into the spinning ruins, pulled forth a massive spear forged from the history of dead worlds, and hurled it at me.
I dove sideways, barely catching the edge of a broken cathedral island.
The spear buried itself into a passing shard of land, detonating it into clouds of screaming data-ghosts.
The shockwave hurled me off my footing —
I tumbled through zero-gravity space, desperately grabbing at a falling beam of twisted code.
Fingers found purchase.
Barely.
I swung my body up, landing crouched on another spinning platform.
Every breath burned my lungs.
My vision blurred at the edges.
> [VITAL SIGNS CRITICAL: 41%.]
[FOCUS: MAINTAINED.]
I couldn't stop moving.
Not even for a second.
---
The Architect came again, this time faster.
It split into multiple forms — illusions or echoes — each radiating different forms of annihilation.
One hurled waves of decaying code.
Another launched chains of collapsing timelines.
A third tried to corrupt my own memories, dragging me into false pasts.
I clenched my jaw and activated the Source Fragment fully.
The world snapped into clarity.
The real Architect stood at the center, surrounded by its decoys.
It roared in frustration as I locked onto it.
---
> [SYSTEM WEAVE: FINAL THREAD UNLOCKED.]
[ABILITY: REALITY THREAD REWRITE — ACTIVE.]
I didn't hesitate.
I launched myself forward, weaving between the collapsing ruins, rewriting platforms under my feet as I went.
Every step was an act of rebellion against the death spiraling around me.
Every heartbeat was stolen time.
I closed the gap in seconds.
---
The Architect slashed with limbs made of dying stars.
I ducked under one, vaulted a twisted root of corrupted earth, and drove the Patch Blade deep into its core.
A shockwave ripped outward.
The Architect howled, its body fracturing further.
Chunks of corrupted code fell away, revealing something underneath — something ancient, almost human.
A glimpse of what it once was.
What it had sacrificed to become this monster.
---
"You... cannot fix... what must be broken," it gasped, voice glitching between a hundred languages.
"I'm not fixing it," I snarled, twisting the blade deeper.
"I'm building something better."
The Architect convulsed violently, throwing me off.
I crashed onto a spinning shard of marble, rolled, and staggered upright.
The entire battlefield rippled.
The Architect wasn't dying yet.
It was evolving.
---
> [WARNING: FINAL PHASE TRIGGERED.]
[ERROR: Unknown Event Detected.]
The Architect drew itself inward, collapsing into a singularity of broken light.
For a heartbeat, there was nothing.
Only silence.
Then it exploded outward.
---
The final form of the Architect floated above the ruined battlefield.
Gone was the monstrous body.
Now it was a storm —
a vortex of corrupted data, failed dreams, and bleeding code.
At its heart floated a single shape:
a black cube — perfect, unbreakable.
The original Error Heart.
The true source of the collapse.
---
My HUD flickered, trying desperately to keep up.
> [FINAL OBJECTIVE: DESTROY THE ERROR HEART.]
[CAUTION: EXTREME DANGER.]
The Patch Tool pulsed with a desperate urgency.
This was it.
No more running.
No more climbing.
No more fixing.
Only one last leap into the storm.
One last chance to break the cycle.
---
I tightened my grip.
Focused every shred of willpower.
Then sprinted forward —
straight into the impossible.