The transition from "Lunar Hero" back to "Ibadan Landlord" was a jarring bit of environmental storytelling. One day you're negotiating with a sentient celestial tuning fork, and the next, you're arguing with a market trader about whether his [Mana-Infused Tomatoes] qualify as "Fresh Produce" or "Bio-Hazardous Weapons."
Bhy Khay sat in the cockpit of the Iron Horse, which was currently docked at the newly renamed Ibadan Interstellar Terminal. The train looked different now; the lunar dust had bonded with the black armor, giving it a shimmering, pearlescent finish that shifted between purple and charcoal.
"Boss, we have a problem," Zayn said, sliding into the co-pilot seat. He was wearing a pair of high-tech goggles he'd looted from the Lunar Relay. "The Mars Node isn't just under construction. It's being overwritten."
"Overwritten by who?" Bhy Khay asked, his hand hovering over the [Master Shard].
"Not 'who'. 'What'," Zayn pointed to the long-range scanners. "The System didn't leave Mars empty. It left a Legacy Backup there. An older version of the apocalypse. It's like a hidden partition on a hard drive that's suddenly started to boot up."
[ZONE DETECTED: THE RED PLANET (Legacy Server)]
[VERSION: SYSTEM 0.5 (ALPHA)]
[TRAIT: HARDCORE PERMADEATH]
"Alpha version?" Bhy Khay frowned. "That means the physics aren't patched. No safety rails. No respawns. Just raw, unoptimized carnage."
THE MARS EXPEDITION
"We can't let that backup reach Earth," Bhy Khay announced to the team. "If the Alpha code merges with Earth 2.0, we lose the 'Open Source' patch. We go back to being Level 1 trash fighting for scraps."
The Godfather (Razak) walked in, holding a blueprint for a gravity-assisted rail gun. "I've stabilized the G-Rail. We can hit Mars in three hours, provided Elara can keep the engine from turning into a supernova."
"I'm an Ice Mage, not a coolant technician!" Elara yelled from the engine room, though the sound of ice crystals forming on the manifold suggested she was already on the job.
"Tomiwa," Bhy Khay looked at the artist. "We need something for the vacuum. Something... intimidating."
"I drew a Void Dragon skin for the train," Tomiwa said, showing her sketchbook. "It's not just paint; it's a living texture that eats cosmic radiation and turns it into thrust."
[LIFT-OFF: T-MINUS 10 SECONDS]
The Iron Horse didn't just launch; it folded space. Using the Godfather's gravity wells and Bhy Khay's admin-access to the lunar coordinates, the train vanished from Ibadan and reappeared in the orbit of Mars.
THE ALPHA WORLD
The Mars that greeted them wasn't the red desert of science books. It was a shifting, geometric nightmare of red voxels and unrendered plains.
"Look at the horizon," Tomiwa whispered, her hand trembling. "It's... it's 2D."
She was right. The distant mountains of Mars were flat sprites that flipped to face the train whenever it moved. The sky was a repeating texture of red clouds and black scan-lines.
"Welcome to the Alpha," Bhy Khay said, checking his HUD. "Where the world is flat until you stand on it."
As they descended toward the Olympus Mons Node, a swarm of enemies emerged from the red dust. They didn't look like monsters. They looked like Mannequins—low-poly, grey humanoids with no faces.
[ENEMY: TEST_SUBJECT_01 (Lvl 30)]
[TYPE: SYSTEM PROTOTYPE]
[STATUS: AGGRESSIVE]
"Level 30?" Zayn gasped, raising his bow. "Bhy Khay, these things are higher level than the Godfather!"
"Level doesn't matter in the Alpha," Bhy Khay realized, noticing how the Test Subjects moved in rigid, frame-by-frame animations. "They don't have AI. They have Scripts. They can only move in straight lines and 90-degree turns."
"So they're predictable?" The Godfather asked, charging his gravity orb.
"Worse," Bhy Khay said. "They're Infallible. If you're in their path, they don't miss. Physics doesn't apply here—only the Script."
THE DESERT OF DELETION
The Test Subjects sprinted across the red voxels, their movements jerky and unnerving. One of them threw a spear. It didn't arc. It traveled in a perfectly straight line at a constant velocity.
THWACK.
The spear hit the train's armor and simply Deleted a 1-meter square of the hull. No explosion. No dent. Just a hole.
"They're erasing us!" Elara screamed.
"Zayn! Don't shoot at them!" Bhy Khay yelled. "Shoot at the Ground!"
"The ground? Why?"
"Because in the Alpha, the ground isn't an object—it's a Tile! If you delete the tile, they fall into the void!"
Zayn understood instantly. He swapped his arrows for [Explosive Voxel-Breakers].
TWANG. TWANG.
The arrows hit the red tiles beneath the feet of the Test Subjects. Instead of an explosion, the tiles turned into "Missing Texture" squares (purple and black checkers) and then disappeared.
The grey mannequins, unable to change their script, walked right into the holes.
"AAAAAH—" one began, but its audio file was cut off as it fell out of the world map.
[ENVIRONMENTAL KILL: +5000 XP]
"It's like playing Tetris but with more screaming," Zayn noted, continuing to 'un-draw' the floor.
THE CORE OF MARS
They reached the center of the Olympus Mons crater. In the middle sat a massive, pulsating red cube—the Alpha Kernel.
Standing in front of it was a figure that looked like a blurred version of Dr. Balogun. He was flickering between ten different character models.
[BOSS: THE ARCHIVE_GUARD (Lvl ???)]
"You... should not... be... here..." the Guard's voice was a distorted mess of audio clips. "This... version... is... deprecated..."
"We're here to shut you down, Dr. Glitch," Bhy Khay said, stepping forward. "The world moved on. We're in Earth 2.0 now. We don't need your 'Hardcore' settings."
"The... System... must... be... pure..." The Guard raised his hand. The sky turned into a falling wall of red code. [SKILL: SYSTEM_RESET].
"He's trying to format the entire planet!" Elara shouted. "My ice is melting! It's turning into numbers!"
"Godfather! Gravity! Now!" Bhy Khay commanded.
The Godfather didn't use a sphere. He used his mana to create a [Compression Wall]. He slammed the gravity down on the Alpha Kernel, trying to crush it into a single point of data.
"Tomiwa! Draw a 'Cancel' button!"
"A what?"
"A Cancel Button! Target the Kernel!"
Tomiwa used her [Mercury Ink] to draw a giant, red 'X' in the air.
Bhy Khay didn't attack the Boss. He lunged for the 'X', grabbing it and slamming it onto the pulsating red cube.
[ERROR: ACTION_NOT_SUPPORTED]
[ADMIN_OVERRIDE: DETECTED]
[CONFIRM SHUTDOWN? (Y/N)]
"Yes," Bhy Khay whispered, his hand glowing white. "Shut. Down."
The red voxels of Mars began to dissolve. The scan-lines in the sky faded. The Test Subjects turned into grey dust.
[SHUTDOWN COMPLETE.]
[LEGACY BACKUP: ARCHIVED.]
[STATUS: MARS SERVER CLEANED.]
The world snapped back into high-definition. The red dust became actual sand. The jagged mountains became smooth, geological formations.
"We did it," Elara breathed, looking at the now-empty crater. "The Alpha is gone."
"Not gone," Bhy Khay looked at the Master Shard. "Just stored where it can't hurt anyone. But look."
He pointed to the center of the crater. Where the Kernel had been, a new structure was forming. It wasn't a cube. It was a [Gateway].
[NEW DESTINATION: THE ANDROMEDA HUB]
"Oh, come on!" Zayn threw his bow down in frustration. "We haven't even had lunch on Mars and you're already showing me the next galaxy?!"
"The System is expanding, Zayn," Bhy Khay laughed, looking at the distant stars. "And it looks like it wants us to be the scouts."
Bhy Khay walked back to the Iron Horse.
"Next stop: The stars. But first," he looked at the Godfather, "we really need to find a way to get some decent Jollof rice in space."
"I'll draw some," Tomiwa offered. "It might taste like ink, but it'll look 10/10."
[QUEST COMPLETED: THE ALPHA SHUTDOWN]
[NEXT ARC: THE INTERGALACTIC TRADE ROUTE]