The world had rebuilt itself in silence.
For days — or what passed for days in the broken loop of existence — the void spun and settled, threads of code knitting a new reality under Aiden's quiet gaze. He no longer stood within the world; he was the axis it spun around.
Every heartbeat of the system echoed faintly through him — a pulse of digital faith searching for a purpose.
And yet, that faith was not his.
He watched from the edge of a recreated horizon — the dawn of a world he'd already outgrown. Cities flickered back to life, forests regenerated, oceans stretched across grids of clean geometry.
Everything perfect again.
Too perfect.
It was the kind of perfection only fear could build.
> "[System Stability: 99.9%]"
"[World Layer Reintegration Complete.]"
"[User Log-ins Active.]"
The system sang to itself in numbers.
And humanity, blind and grateful, logged in once more — eager to forget the wars, the resets, the deaths.
