Darkness.
Not the kind that comes when the sun sets but the kind that clings, like breathless smoke in the lungs of the forgotten. Yoruzen opened his eyes to nothing. No sky. No ground. Just... floating in the middle of a vast, weightless void,as if existence itself had been paused,but he alone remained awake.
His throat burned. Not from fire but from silence that had lasted too long. Then came a voice. Mechanical. Cold. Female.
"Genesis Rift Core initializing... error detected."
"User soul signature: UNSTABLE. Timeline residue detected."
"Attempting to reconstruct…"
A sharp, stabbing pressure pierced through his chest. Yoruzen gasped, his body convulsing not because he was in pain… but because pain reminded him he was alive. And then it hit him the flood of memory, jagged and broken:A burning field. A girl reaching for him with trembling hands. A dagger of light. And a whisper.
"You don't belong here."
His eyes snapped open this time, for real. He was lying inside what looked like a ruined stone chapel, half-swallowed by thorned vines and black ash that danced like snow. Moonlight poured through a shattered stained-glass window, painting his face in red and gold fragments. He wasn't alone.
Across the room, a corpse sat on the altar.
Or what used to be one. A man half-burned, half-frozen. His mouth was open in a silent scream. His eyes… melted. Carved into the altar beneath his body were six jagged words:
"GODS FALL. STORIES DIE. WITNESS LIVES."
Yoruzen slowly stood, his legs shaking. No interface. No HUD. No magical stats. Just a dull ache in his skull… and the feeling that he had cheated death.
"Where... am I?" he whispered.
The chapel didn't answer. But something else did. A heartbeat. Not his own. It echoed through the walls like a drum beneath stone,
slow, ancient, and mechanical. And then the voice returned.
"Genesis Rift Core stabilized. Soul anchor accepted."
"System Lock Activated."
Initiating Plugin Load: 'Dead Root Path'...
Welcome back, Yoruzen."
His breath caught. He hadn't told it his name. He didn't even remember saying it out loud. "What the hell is this place?"
And then something flickered at the edge of his vision. A translucent message, burning in scarlet:
[WARNING: CHOICE CORRUPTION ACTIVE]
Every decision from this point forward will mutate your fate.
Yoruzen's eyes narrowed. He was awake. He was cursed. He was alive. And something was terribly, terribly wrong. Yoruzen took a slow step forward. The chapel creaked, not from age but like a living thing stirring beneath its skin. A sound pulsed beneath the stone again. That mechanical heartbeat. Louder this time. Closer. Hungrier. He narrowed his eyes.
"System… if you're listening," he whispered,
"Then tell me what the hell is going on."
The scarlet message shifted.
[You are in a corrupted zone.]
"Dead Root Chapel – Timeline Rupture No. 13"
[Tutorial Protocol: Skipped]
[Reason: User soul history incompatible with standard path]
[First Decision Unlocked: Anchor Event Detected]
Another flicker of red light shimmered before him three symbols, hovering midair like bleeding runes. Each one whispered a voice not his own. Each one... offered something he didn't ask for.
[FORGE THE BODY]
Accept the pain. Absorb the corpse's soul. Claim its broken stats. Feel its last breath burn in your blood.
(Trait Acquired: Undying Ash — Passive regeneration through agony)
[REJECT THE ROOT]
Burn the altar. Sever the echo. Delay the infection. Remain incomplete but hidden from corrupted threads.
(Trait Acquired: Hollow Flame — Immune to first timeline rewind trigger)
[WITNESS THE MEMORY]
Touch the corpse's eye. Experience its death. See what killed it. Risk destabilizing your current sanity.
(Trait Acquired: Eye of Ruin Can sense narrative breaches)
Yoruzen stared. Each choice felt alive as if the system wasn't offering them…but begging him to choose one. And somehow, he knew this wasn't a tutorial. This wasn't safe. Whatever he picked... would scar him forever. The voice echoed again, this time colder:"Your choice will define your class, your curse… and your end."
He stepped toward the altar. The corpse crackled with dried heat and frost."You made a mistake bringing me back," Yoruzen muttered. His hand hovered above the altar. The moment stretched and then... he chose.
[YOU HAVE CHOSEN: "WITNESS THE MEMORY"]
A flash of ice. A scream in a tongue not spoken by mortals. A thousand eyes devouring the chapel. And a white-haired girl… smiling as the world broke. Then everything shattered. Yoruzen fell to his knees, gasping, as black steam poured from his mouth. His vision twisted shapes melted, time reversed, voices collided. The system spoke, almost in awe:
"Narrative sensitivity unlocked."
"You are now able to see hidden scripts."
"But beware they will now see you back."
Yoruzen opened his eyes. The world had shifted. Nothing in the chapel had moved
yet everything now looked less real… and more alive.And somewhere, just beyond the veil something had noticed him. Watching. Smiling. "I shouldn't be here," he whispered.
And the darkness whispered back:
"Exactly."
The wind outside the chapel… wasn't real. It howled like a living thing, yet nothing moved. The trees beyond the shattered doorway stood frozen in a silent forest of ash
their branches stretched skyward like skeletal arms praying for death. Yoruzen stepped forward slowly. His boots cracked bone-dry earth beneath him. Each step echoed longer than it should have
like something was waiting to hear it. The chapel door, behind him, shut on its own.
No sound. No slam. Just... closed.
"Genesis Rift Core syncing with Outer Realm…"
"…Rift Signature Detected: Hunter-Class Entity nearby."
[WARNING: Target exists outside narrative flow. Corruption Level: 6/10]
Yoruzen stopped.
"Hunter-Class?"
Before he could even process the alert, the air shifted. A flicker of distortion like a glitch in reality itself and something stepped into view. Or rather, it unfolded, as if peeling itself from the shadow of a burned tree. It was tall.
Thin. Draped in bandages soaked in static.
Where its face should have been… there was just a script, lines of glowing red text constantly rewriting itself.
"Narrative Breach Detected."
"Unauthorized Character Movement Confirmed."
"Requesting Termination."
Yoruzen's heart pounded. Not in fear but in recognition. He'd seen this before. In that vision. When he touched the corpse's eye.
"You were the one that killed him…"
The Hunter didn't reply. It simply moved
without walking, without motion it was suddenly closer. Two meters away.
The system's voice cracked like a whisper made of broken mirrors:
"Emergency Protocol: Corrupted Choice #02 available."
Three new options flashed before him blindingly fast:
[UNLEASH: Fragmented Flame]
Sacrifice 15% of soul stability to create a blast of cursed fire.
(One-time use. High damage. High risk.)
[DISSOLVE: Name Thread]
Speak your true name aloud. Risk attracting higher entities, but erase yourself from this enemy's script awareness temporarily.
(Trait Gained: Voided Echo)
[EMBRACE: First Rewrite]
Allow the System to take control for 3 seconds. Unknown effect. May permanently alter personality or memories.
(???)
The Hunter raised a hand.
Its fingers if they could be called that
began rearranging the world around it like broken code. The trees twisted. The ash screamed. The sky bled red.
"Pick one," Yoruzen whispered.
"Fast."
He clenched his jaw. And chose.
[You have selected: EMBRACE — First Rewrite]
For a moment… everything stopped. Not paused. Stopped. Even the Hunter froze mid-strike. Then "User control revoked. Beginning override..."
Yoruzen's eyes turned completely black, then blazed with burning script. His lips moved on their own.
"Your thread is broken," he said in a voice that wasn't his.
"Return to the null."
The Hunter's script glitched violently its body folding inward,imploding with a metallic screech.
"Error… Error… this line was never written…"
And then it vanished.
Yoruzen dropped to one knee, gasping. His hands trembled. His skin steamed. And deep inside him, something laughed. A new trait was added:
[Corrupted Core Sync: 3%]
Your soul is now partially rewritten. Results unpredictable.
"What… did you just do to me?" he muttered. But the system…remained silent.
The world was still again. But something in him had changed. Not just the power. Not just the cost. But the realization: He wasn't alone in his mind anymore.
And this system…wasn't just helping him. It was learning from him.