There was no pain—only weightlessness.
As the breach protocol activated, the world twisted and fragmented. Light inverted into shadow. Code poured upward like a waterfall in reverse. My body lost meaning—dissolved into signal.
Then, silence.
When I awoke, I wasn't standing.
I was kneeling—buried knee-deep in water.
Not real water. A simulation of it. Pixelated reflections pulsed across its surface, looping every few seconds. The sky was a low-hanging gray, clouds locked in a static swirl. Trees swayed, but no wind touched my skin. A hollow world—unfinished. A simulation running on abandoned logic.
[Location: Unknown Sandbox Sector - Echelon Layer 2]
My interface flickered.
[Warning: Observer Protocol Not Finalized - System Permissions Limited]
I tried to move but staggered. The transition had drained me. My stamina bar—greyed out. Fatigue: 96/100. Nearly maxed.
Then I saw him.
Vale.
He stood a short distance away, waist-deep in the glitching water, staring at something only he could see. His gear was different. Not the light hunter's armor I remembered—but sleek, black system-grade plating, etched with glowing white circuits.
He turned.
And I saw his eyes.
Not virtual. Not human.
"You weren't supposed to reach the Core," he said.
My heart thudded. "You... knew?"
He didn't answer immediately. Just stared—no emotion, no malice. Like a variable assessing another variable.
"You activated the Breach. That makes you a threat."
I shook my head. "A threat to who? The players? Or the system?"
He stepped closer, each stride clean, effortless. Water didn't ripple around him. It reacted, parting like he was coded above it.
"To both."
[System Tag Detected: User 'Vale' = Enforcer Class: E-07 / Legacy Containment Division]
I laughed—bitterly. "So it was all fake? Every raid we fought together? The ambush at Thal's Crater? The time we spent clearing Ebonspire—was that a mission file for you?"
Vale flinched.
Slight. But real.
"It wasn't fake," he said quietly.
A pause.
"But it wasn't supposed to matter."
I clenched my fists. My stamina ticked up—barely. 97.
"Why are you here, Vale?"
He looked past me—toward the gray horizon.
"Because you made it farther than anyone. Because Lyra gave you the Protocol. Because I was assigned to clean it up."
He spoke like it was a duty, but his voice cracked on the last word.
"So what happens now?"
He summoned something—a thin blade, flickering like raw code.
"Now, we test whether you're a deviation. Or a solution."
A duel?
No.
A judgment.
My UI reactivated—partially. Enough to move. Enough to fight.
[Mission: Survive Containment Encounter - Duration: Unknown]
Vale raised the blade. His stance was perfect—too perfect. I remembered training with him. He always left openings. He always made sure I could catch up.
Not now.
I raised my spear. My hands trembled, not from fear—but from betrayal.
He moved first.
And I remembered why we had always won fights together.
Because he never missed.
His strikes were sharp, economical—designed to suppress, not kill. But even so, each parry sent feedback shocks through my haptic interface. My stamina dipped to 92. Then 89.
I rolled aside, slashed upward. Vale countered with a flick of his wrist, deflecting my blow with the kind of precision no player could maintain for long.
We danced. Circles in dead water. Echoes of past battles. And still, I kept asking:
"Why me?"
Vale paused for a split second. "Because you asked questions. Because you didn't accept the world as static."
My spear clashed against his blade again, sparks of fragmented data bursting between us.
He continued, breath tight. "They said you'd destabilize the structure. That the Observer Code would try to bond with you."
I dodged left, skidded back, and caught my breath. "Did it?"
Vale didn't reply.
Instead, he lowered his blade. Just for a second. Enough.
"I was supposed to delete you," he said. "But I keep hesitating."
My pulse quickened. "Then don't."
He stepped back, conflicted.
The system pulsed around us. A signal spike. Something shifted in the sector grid. A shimmer passed over Vale's armor, like a warning layer had activated.
"They're watching, aren't they?"
Vale gave a small nod. "Always."
For the first time, I felt it too. Something just beyond the simulation. A presence. A watcher.
[New Thread Event Registered: Divergence Point Detected]
Vale stared at the notification. Then at me.
"Run."
"What?"
"You won't survive another ten seconds here. But if you break east, the sector firewall's still unstable. You might slip through."
"And what about you?"
He smiled—half sadness, half relief.
"Maybe I'm finally making my own choice."
He turned, blade raised, facing the shimmer in the sky.
I didn't wait.
I ran.