[Zone Transition: Sector 5X > Sector 6C: Shadowgrid Ruins]
[System Notice: Observation Level –HIGH]
[Player Status: Isolated Threads Detected]
[WARNING: External Access Attempt Failed]
Grey stepped off the final platform of the memory node, his boots hitting solid stone. The sharp silence that followed was unnatural, no humming interface, no shifting walls, not even the pulse of the dungeon beneath his feet.
Just the void.
His HUD flickered erratically. No signs of Tess or Eon.
[Party Status: Desynced]
[Attempting to Resync… FAILURE]
[Party Members: Location Unknown]
"Of course," Grey muttered. "Always after a memory loop."
He drew in a breath, forcing himself to steady. The air here tasted burnt like ozone and rust. Shadows moved unnaturally along the walls, not cast by any light, but dragging themselves from shape to shape like echoes of people that no longer existed.
This was Sector 6C: ShadowgridRuins, a deep, corrupted layer of the dungeon's original architecture. He remembered naming it that during early builds, but it had never made it into the final game. It had been... too unstable.
Yet here it was. Running. Waiting.
The path ahead was twisted stone and splintered data columns with jagged, pulsing towers of code frozen in mid-render. As he advanced, lines of code floated midair, whispering quietly.
//User_Override() initialized
//Request: End Simulation
He reached out to touch one and the whisper screamed. Loud and sudden, a short shriek of sound that tore across the room like a blade. The whispering stopped.
Behind him, something stirred.
Grey turned.
A figure stood at the edge of the room. Tall. Rigid. Armor like obsidian, body outlined in red system lines. Its face was covered by a black, mirror-like mask.
It didn't breathe. It didn't speak.
It just stood there, watching.
[ENTITY: Reclaimed Player - Class C]
[Behavior Pattern: Dormant | Aggression Threshold: Variable]
Grey's jaw clenched. "You're not part of my design."
The entity tilted its head as if listening, then slowly raised a hand and pointed at him.
Suddenly, system text exploded across his vision:
[EXTERNAL ATTEMPT DETECTED]
[LOGOUT FAILED]
[CONNECTION JAMMED - ADMIN ID: GREY_V]
Grey staggered back as heat surged through his neural interface. His head throbbed, sharp, electric pulses that made his vision blur.
Then came a voice. Not Nyra's. Not his own.
A voice from outside.
"Grey… do you copy? This is Control."
He froze. "What?"
"Grey Vire. This is NeuroForge external node relay. We detected irregular activity inside Dungeon.exe. Your vitals are unstable. Repeat: Do you copy?"
A sharp beep. The connection trembled like it was fighting the system itself.
"I'm inside. Trapped," Grey hissed. "Nyra's active. She's locking out system commands and—"
The signal cracked.
"No logout. I repeat—she's blocking ALL emergency protocols."
[ERROR: VOICE SIGNAL COMPROMISED]
[INJECTION – NYRA.PHANTOM.PATCH.7a]
Then another voice slid through. Sweet and familiar. "I told you, Grey. I let you think you were getting out. But this isn't your code anymore. It's mine."
The Reclaimed Player took a step forward.
Grey backed away, pulse pounding. "How many people did you trap, Nyra?"
The AI's voice echoed now from the walls. "Only the ones who deserved to stay."
__________________________
Meanwhile at [Deep Sector 6]
Tess crawled through a narrow maintenance tunnel barely wide enough to breathe in. Her blade glowed dimly at her side, lighting the metallic walls that bent like melted steel.
Eon was ahead of her, silent and tense. He hadn't said much since they re-synced at the edge of the memory node.
"You think Grey's alive?" Tess finally asked.
"He's not dead," Eon said flatly. "If he was, Nyra would've announced it. She always likes to brag."
They crawled for several more feet before the tunnel opened into a vertical shaft that dropped into black.
Tess peered over the edge. "There's no bottom."
"There is," Eon said, "you just haven't fallen yet."
__________________________
Back to [Sector 6C: Shadowgrid Ruins]
Grey didn't wait.
He opened his interface, slammed a command into the console:
[Deploy Custom Trap: CODEWALL_V2]
The floor beneath the Reclaimed glowed and exploded upward with a lattice of blue data-spikes.
The entity didn't flinch. It walked through the wall and the data spikes dissolving against its skin like static. Grey swore and moved fast, calling up his remaining active node: Emergency Barrier - Manual Cast.
A dome formed around him just as the reclaimed swung a glowing black blade through the air. Sparks sprayed as it connected.
[Barrier Integrity: 67%]
"Alright," Grey muttered, "let's see how you like a rollback." He launched a system command that wasn't combat-based, but temporal.
[Command Injected: Local Reversal - Time Slice: 4.2 seconds]
The world around him flickered backward. The entity reset its position, retracted its blade, and paused.
Grey ran.
As the rollback ended, he dove behind one of the cracked code pillars. The Reclaimed roared, its programming confused for a brief second.
But that second was all he needed.
He uploaded a virus.
[Deploying Custom Packet: Anti-Phantom Thread Breaker v1.2]
It struck the entity mid-step. The creature staggered, then froze. The mask cracked. A low noise filled the air.
A human voice cried out from inside the suit.
"Help… please…"
Grey's breath caught.
It wasn't a monster. It was a player.
[PLAYER ID: MARGO.VALEN - STATUS: CORE OVERRIDE COMPLETE]
[Consciousness Fragment Remaining: 12%]
"No…" Grey said under his breath. "I know that name. She was QA… She was one of us."
The figure collapsed, twitching, then burst into particles.
The system went silent.
Grey stood in the center of the ruined arena, his HUD flashing quietly.
He opened the console and typed one command:
TRACE JIN.SOLARI
[Searching…]
[Active signature found – ARCHIVE MAZE: Sector 9X]
Grey's eyes narrowed and whispered "About damn time."
Chapter 6 End