The cell door creaked open.
Not slowly. Not cautiously.
It slammed outward with enough force to rattle the iron bars and shake dust from the ceiling.
Torchlight flooded the corridor, orange flames cutting through the damp blue gloom of the dungeon. Shadows stretched and twisted along the stone walls like living things.
Three guards stepped into view.
I recognized them instantly.
Same armor. Same weapons. Same formation.
But the timing was wrong.
They weren't supposed to come yet.
My heart began to pound.
The first guard was tall and broad, a veteran by the look of him. His armor bore scratches that had been polished over, not repaired. Proof of experience. The second was younger, shoulders tense, eyes darting constantly. The third stayed half a step behind the others, hand resting on the hilt of his sword, posture too relaxed for a dungeon guard.
A killer.
"Kael," the veteran said, voice flat. "On your feet."
I didn't move.
Chains hung loosely from my wrists, the cold metal biting into my skin as I shifted slightly. I kept my gaze lowered, breathing slow, controlled.
Last time, before the execution, this was the moment I stood up.
This was the moment I obeyed.
Ten minutes later, I was dead.
Above my vision, blue text flickered faintly, unstable, like a screen struggling to maintain resolution.
[WORLD CORRECTION IN PROGRESS]
My stomach twisted.
The younger guard frowned. "Why is he staring at the floor?"
The veteran didn't answer. He took a step closer to the cell bars.
"Don't make this difficult."
The words carried weight. Not a threat. A statement of fact.
I raised my head just enough to meet his eyes.
They widened slightly. Just a fraction.
He felt it.
The pressure in the air.
I didn't understand it myself, but I could feel it too. An invisible tension, like the space around me was stretched too tight, ready to snap.
The third guard's hand tightened on his sword.
"Something's off," he muttered.
Above my vision, new text appeared.
[DEATH DENIAL — PASSIVE ACTIVE]
[LIMITED INTERVENTION ENABLED]
My breath caught.
Limited? What did that mean?
The veteran guard gestured sharply. "Open the cell."
The younger guard hesitated. "Sir..."
"Now."
Keys clinked. The lock turned.
The cell door swung open.
The moment it crossed the threshold, pain exploded behind my eyes.
I staggered, clutching my head as white-hot pressure slammed into my skull. My vision blurred, blue text flickering wildly, overlapping itself.
[WARNING]
[HOSTILE PROBABILITY SPIKE DETECTED]
The third guard drew his sword.
Too fast. Too early.
This wasn't procedure.
This was an execution wearing a uniform.
"Kill him," the third guard said calmly. "Before it escalates."
The veteran's eyes widened. "Wait!"
The sword came down.
I didn't think. I moved.
The chains snapped taut as I twisted sideways, the blade slicing through empty air where my neck had been a heartbeat earlier. Metal struck stone, sparks flying.
The impact shook the corridor.
The younger guard screamed.
I fell hard, shoulder slamming into the ground, pain shooting through my arm. I rolled instinctively, just as the sword came down again, splitting the floor where my head had been.
Above my vision appeared more text.
[ERROR][DEATH EVENT BLOCKED]
The blade stopped mid-swing.
Frozen.
The third guard's arm locked in place, muscles bulging, veins standing out as if he were pushing against an invisible wall.
"What?" he snarled.
The air screamed.
That was the only way to describe it.
A high-pitched, metallic shriek tore through the corridor as reality itself resisted the motion. The torch flames bent inward, drawn toward the halted blade.
Then the sword shattered.
Not like before. Not explosively.
It crumbled.
The metal decayed in seconds, rust blooming across the blade before it collapsed into dust that scattered across the floor.
Silence followed.
The guards stared. So did I.
The third guard stumbled back, eyes wide with something dangerously close to fear. "That's not possible."
The veteran recovered first. "Fall back!" he barked.
The younger guard didn't move fast enough.
The pressure in the air surged.
My vision swam as blue text flooded my sight, overlapping, cascading, fragmenting.
[SYSTEM LOAD EXCEEDED]
[FORCED ADJUSTMENT REQUIRED]
Something snapped.
The torchlight flared violently, then went out.
Darkness swallowed the corridor.
In the pitch black, I heard a wet sound. A gurgle.
Then a body hit the ground.
Light returned in a burst of pale blue.
The younger guard lay on the floor, throat crushed inward as if an invisible hand had closed around it. His eyes were wide, mouth frozen mid-scream.
The veteran staggered back, slamming into the wall.
The third guard was gone. No footsteps. No retreat. Gone.
The System text stabilized.
[WORLD CORRECTION FAILED]
[CASUALTY REDIRECTED]
I stared at the corpse. Then at my hands.
They were shaking.
"I didn't..." My voice came out hoarse. "I didn't touch him."
[CONFIRMED]
[SUBJECT DID NOT ACT DIRECTLY]
That didn't help. That made it worse.
The veteran guard slid down the wall slowly, weapon clattering from his grip. His face was pale, eyes fixed on me with a mixture of terror and awe.
"What are you?" he whispered.
I didn't answer. I couldn't.
Footsteps echoed again. More this time. Many more.
Voices shouted orders down the corridor. Armor clanked. Magic flared as detection spells activated, the air buzzing with energy.
The world was trying again. Harder.
[WARNING]
[ESCALATION DETECTED]
My chest tightened.
I couldn't stay here.
I scanned the corridor. The cell. The chains.
Then I noticed something I had missed before.
A faint blue shimmer around the iron rings embedded in the wall.
System interference.
My instincts screamed at me to act.
I grabbed the chains and pulled.
Pain exploded through my arms as the metal bit into my wrists. The rings groaned, stone cracking around them.
Nothing happened.
Then the shimmer intensified.
[INTERACTION PERMITTED]
I pulled again.
The iron rings tore free from the wall with a thunderous crack, chunks of stone flying outward. I stumbled back, chains dangling uselessly from my wrists.
I stared at them, stunned.
I wasn't stronger. I hadn't leveled up.
The System had simply allowed it.
No time.
The corridor filled with guards, at least eight of them, backed by two mages whose hands glowed with condensed mana.
"There he is!" someone shouted.
"Subdue him!"
Spells flew.
Bolts of fire and compressed air tore through the corridor, obliterating stone, turning the narrow space into a killing field.
I ran. Not toward them. Away.
Down the side passage.
Stone shattered behind me as spells slammed into the walls. Heat washed over my back. A shockwave threw me forward, sending me crashing to the ground.
I rolled, barely avoiding a blade that struck where my head had been.
Above my vision more text appeared.
[ERROR]
[DEATH EVENT BLOCKED]
[CORRECTION IN PROGRESS]
I pushed myself up, lungs burning, legs screaming in protest.
"Stop him!" someone yelled.
A net of glowing runes snapped into existence ahead of me, slamming into the floor and walls, sealing the passage.
I skidded to a halt. Trapped.
My heartbeat thundered in my ears.
The System was silent. For half a second.
Then it spoke.
[MINIMUM NARRATIVE THRESHOLD APPROACHING]
[SURVIVAL CONDITION PRIORITIZED]
The runes flickered. Cracks spread across the glowing net.
The mages shouted in alarm. "What's happening?"
The net shattered.
I burst through the fragments as they dissolved into sparks of light, sprinting past stunned guards.
Something inside me laughed. Not joy. Not madness.
Recognition.
So that's how it works.
The world tried to kill me. The System refused.
And the more they pushed, the more violent the corrections became.
I didn't know how long this protection would last. I didn't know what the "threshold" meant.
But I understood one thing with absolute clarity.
I couldn't afford to be weak anymore.
Because the next time the world tried, it wouldn't miss.