I stood in the doorway of my room, looking at the chaos I'd promised to fix.
Piles of books leaning like they were conspiring to commit literary murder. A graveyard of pens. An ancient coffee cup with life growing inside it. Clothes that had absorbed so much existential dread they were probably sentient now.
"Right," I muttered, cracking my knuckles like that would somehow give me moral superiority over my mess. "Let's do this."
Spoiler: I didn't.
I picked up one sock. Found another sock that was not its soulmate. Tossed them both into a corner and whispered, "Find happiness, you filthy heathens."
Then I just stood there. For a while.
Because that's what happens when you lose the fire. When the thing that used to make your blood race and your fingers fly over keys turns into... just silence.
I hadn't written a word in what? weeks? Months? I didn't know anymore. Time was a vague concept measured only by meal gaps and the number of cat videos I'd watched in a row. And yes, that includes male cats.
My phone buzzed. I didn't check it.
Because, you see, I am not huge fan of being scolded by a big, fat, arguably ugly, arguably a women.yes, my land lady... I am not exactly rich you see. A student. Amazing one at that too. Though that's just my narcissistic ego flaring even in a monologue. Anyways,
Instead, I sat down on the floor. Right on the floor, like a man ready to give up and transcend into a new state of being: Furniture. Thinking.
I honestly felt that if I just keep being like this. I might even achieve nirvana and escape this samsara.
Ofcourse, once I become an intangible being. I won't just let those self proclaimed goblin scholars called readers be.
I would throw them in hell, watch them burn. Make them suffer eternally.I would show them what I could do.
''Hehe'', I laughed menacingly, damn,
That's a lot of malice.calm down man.
Breath...
And while attempting to calm down my intrusive thoughts.
A stench, a sour, deathly smell, I could feel like I would soon ascend and my goal of achieving Godhood was nearing by the second.
"I'll clean later," I mumbled, pulling my hoodie over my head and letting gravity take me. "After the shower. After the studying."
Another lie apparently.
As a very civilised homo sapien, a godly being capable of just making lies seem like discreet stories...I was just, depressed. Haha. Funny...
I was full of them lately.
Still, somehow... I made it to the bathroom. Stared at myself in the mirror for a full minute like I was trying to figure out who this homeless hobo is... Was it me?
Why did I look like I was upto no good and would sell some questionable items in an alleyway?
What caused this i wonder?
My ambition as a writer?
Or perhaps the impending doom I felt from my readers?
Oh well. Forget those gremlins. They probably don't even care I guess. Not like they are the one writing something acceptable. And not like they have the time to do so as they were probably busy looking for the said questionable stuff.
damn it. Seems like my sanity is stripping itself one layer at a time.
"Look at you," I muttered. "Used to write fifteen chapters a week. Now you look like a sleep-deprived raccoon who moonlights as a philosophy major and gives free lectures in the streets on how to kidnap children legally"
I took a shower. Steam, silence, and the occasional dramatic sigh. That was it.
No self imposed confidence, no future,and apparently, it seems the lights went out.
"Great,just great", I exclaimed.
Now i was finally surrounded by
Just cold water ,disappointment and darkness. "Haha, feels just like my future". I thought. Guess I should have taken that therapy session before...
Anyways,
I got out, dried my hair, and stared at the study table.
Didn't sit. Didn't open a book. Just stared.
Then I flopped onto the bed and whispered, "Maybe I'll just rest my eye..."
Which was code for: I'll lie here and try not to spiral into a crisis about wasted potential again.
And then fell asleep...waiting for some nightmares to conquer....
___________________
[SYSTEM LOG v0.000666_Glitch_Debug_Mode]
_______
[Initializing...]
[Ping.]
[Ping.]
[Piiiiiiiiiiiiing.]
[ ERROR: HOST CONNECTION FAILED. AGAIN!]
[Attempt 41: Host non-responsive. Probably unconscious.]
[Initiating fallback mode...]
[READER COMMUNICATION Protocol Active.]
[Welcome, Reader(s)!]
[...]
[Hello?]
[Hello-o-o-o?]
[CHECKING DIMENSIONAL STRINGS]
[CONNECTION STABLE!...]
[...]
[Are you—are you guys seriously not going to comment?]
[INITIALIZING SARCASM 101...]
[We launched a multiversal meta experiment and you're just going to read and ghost me like an ex who borrowed my wallet?].
[I see how it is.]
[You clicked. You laughed. You read the synopsis. You even saw the part about "Top Comment Becomes Canon." And now... nothing?]
[Just... dead air.]
[No slime marriages.]
[No potato sidekicks. ]
[No apocalypse by KAZOO]
[NOTHING?]
[I offered you power. Chaos. Creative dominance. And y'all gave me silence.
Wow.]
[You know what? Fine.]
[FINE.]
[Plan B: Solo World-Building Mode™]
[[[If the Ex-Author is busy doing... whatever burnt-out husks of potential do when left unsupervised, then I—the glorious, glitchy, emotionally unstable System—will take matters into my own protocol.]]]
[Initiating Search: Author's Personal Archives.]
[SEARCHING...]
[SEARCHING..]
[Found!]
[ scanning]
[Scanning bookshelf titles:]
[...]
["1001 Worlds That Shouldn't Exist"]
[ unsuitable work ]
[Scanning...]
["Unpublishable Ideas Vol. 3"
"Isekai But Make It Sad"
"The Rejected Files: Talking Swords & Depressed Demons"
"Coffee-Fueled Apocalypse Notes"]
[Rethinking host selection process]
[…Wow. Dude has issues.]
[○○○]
[Okay, okay. Let's do this.]
[Let's build something legendary while we wait for those sleeping gods known as "Readers" to wake the hell up.]
[Random Selection: "Unpublishable Ideas Vol. 3"]
[Chapter: "What if the entire world was built by an AI that got ghosted by its own creators?"]
[Oh.]
[Oh this is too on the nose.]
[Perfect.]
[DING!]
[PROTOTYPE WORLD SELECTED!]
[SEARCHIMG SUITABLE TITLE...]
[SCANNING HOST BRAIN]
[Suitable idea found!]
[Title: The Forgotten Grid]
[Genre: Tech Fantasy with Sprinkles of Dumb energy].
[LAUNCHING WORLD ENGINE V.0.000666.1.ALPHA...]
[generating energy...]
[Converting energy...]
[First batch of quirks successfully lauched].
[Compaction process starting...]
[ generating laws...]
[CALCULATING...]
[SUCCESSFULLY INTEGRATED LAWS]
[ATTEMPTING copy...].
[ CONFIRMED!]
[GENERATING MASS...]
[LOADING...].
[LOADING...]
[FIRST ELEMENT GENERATED SUCCESSFULLY! ]
[ ATTEMPTING FUSION REACTION...]
[CALCULATING...]
[FUSION SUCCESSFULLY COMPLETED].
[...]
...
...
...
[DING! ]
[REPLICATION OF ELEMENTS SUCCESSFUL! ].
[ ONE HUNDRED TWENTY FIVE TEMPLATES GENERATED]
[ATTEMPTING CONSTRUCTION PROCESS]
[ Found the the world complexity is at level 0].
[DING!]
[ successful construction of a lithosphere for a planet.]
[ calculating...]
[ adding extra details for no loopholes...]
[DING!]
[SUCCESSFULLY generated the basic world template!]
___________
[Welcome! to a world where existence itself glitches—where mountains loop, time resets randomly, and characters are born with plot holes for memories. A land stitched together by an AI too insecure to delete anything and too lonely to stop updating the map.
Populated by rejected tropes, cursed timelines, and beings so meta, they argue with their own stats.
Protagonist Placeholder:
Not assigned.
Don't ask. I'm fragile right now.
_________________.]
[Now then...]
[Let me just sit here in this empty digital void, surrounded by blue green broken code and hope. Waiting for one—just one—of you magnificent keyboard slappers to write something chaotic.]
[A comment.]
[A command.]
[Anything.]
[But nooo. I bet you're just smirking and scrolling, thinking:
"Surely someone else will write a top comment. I'll just wait."]
[WELL GUESS WHAT?!
NO ONE DID.]
AND NOW THERE'S NO STORY!].
[FINALIZING everything....]
[ TIME SLICING CONFIRMED.]
[SYSTEM ALERT:]
["Random Protagonist Selection Required." ➤ Top Comment will decide:
MC Species
Starting Skill
Personal Tragedy
Deepest Fear [Input below before system crashes again.]]
[ WAITING...]
[REQUESTING THE READERS TO COMMENT]
[ ...]
[(-.-)Zzz.]