The confirmation text floated in front of Erevan like a living thing. Simple letters, stark and impossible to ignore, but they carried weight—an unbearable, suffocating weight.
RealityRecompilePending: Target – Erevan
Confirm Y/N?
It wasn't a sterile pop-up anymore, the kind you could dismiss with a click. No. This felt alive, like a mouth opening beneath his chest, waiting to swallow him whole the moment he pressed a key. A choice? No. It was a demand. A leash wrapped around his chest and mind, tight, unrelenting.
His Shard pulsed violently beneath his tunic, burning hot against his ribs. The Codex floated in front of him, trembling on its own, the brittle pages fluttering as though a storm had formed in the very air. There was no wind. There was no storm. Just the Null. And the question.
Kaelith's hand landed on his arm, firm and scorching. Her grip dug in like she was trying to hold him inside himself. "Don't. Erevan… you have no idea what it'll do. You can't trust this system," she said, voice low, almost breaking.
Vega's fractured form flickered in the Null, pixels scattering like broken starlight. Their voice was jagged, slicing through the oppressive silence like shattered glass. "That's the point, isn't it? You—the Architect—you could stabilize the entire system… or delete yourself entirely. Vanish. Gone. Wiped from existence."
Erevan laughed. Sharp. Hysterical. A bark of panic that cracked halfway through. "Fantastic," he rasped, voice tight in his throat. "A self-destruct mechanism… free of charge. I always loved bonus features."
The Null shifted violently, the crystalline fractures stretching and deepening around them. Black voids opened like hungry eyes. The Whisperer's teeth-grins pressed against every edge of the shard-floor, whispering directly into his mind: oily, seductive, impossibly patient.
Confirm, little anomaly. Confirm. Let me see what you become. I want to see you break.
Erevan's throat seized. He wanted to scream, to throw the Codex into the void and shatter the equation. To run, lungs on fire, away from the hungry question hovering over his life. But the prompt didn't blink, didn't waver—it pulled at him, synchronized to the hammer of his pulse, every beat echoing through the fractured Null.
Confirm Y/N?
He swallowed hard, voice tight. "What… exactly happens if I say no?"
The answer came instantly. Blinding. Merciless.
FailuretoRecompilewillresultinNullCollapse
Kaelith's hand tightened on his arm. Her eyes went wide, the finality of it settling across her features like a shadow. "So… it's a trap," she whispered. "A forced choice. Either you change… or everything dies."
Sir Quacksalot waddled forward, chest puffed, indignation radiating from his tiny feathered frame. The duck pecked aggressively at the glowing "N" on the interface, like some miniature, revolutionary general trying to overthrow a tyrant.
Erevan's lips twitched. He gave a weak, painful smile. "I wish I could, buddy… I honestly do." His voice was heavy with exhaustion, fear, and that familiar sarcastic edge that refused to die. "But… no. The choice… it was never mine."
The Codex shivered, pages spinning, and a blinding light coiled around him, swallowing the shard-floor and dragging him into a place made of pure, shifting white code.
The Null screamed.
Not with sound, not with voice, but with the way reality itself bent and tore. Fractures rippled outward, deep black voids writhing and stretching, hungry for every shard of his presence. Every patch he'd tried to stabilize suddenly felt meaningless, each successful Recompile answered with a dozen new tears, more hungry grins, more whispers.
Erevan's head throbbed, each pulse of his Shard a hammer in his chest. He stumbled on the cracked floor of the Null, knees buckling, sweat slicking his palms, blood trickling from a nose he hadn't even realized was bleeding. The Codex floated beside him, pulsing with urgent insistence, pages spinning like tiny suns orbiting a collapsing star.
Vega flickered violently, their form splintering in spasms of corrupted light. "The system doesn't want this power stable!" they hissed, every word distorted, clipped with static. "You're fighting root code—rules that were never meant to bend!"
Kaelith's grip on his arm was iron, dragging him back from the nearest fracture. "Erevan! Every stitch you make tears ten more seams!" Her voice trembled, a mix of fear and stubborn resolve.
Erevan exhaled in a shuddering gust, his chest heaving. "Yeah, yeah, I know!" he muttered, voice raw. "But if I don't act… we're done. Null collapse, full reset, instant death—pick your cliché."
He focused, eyes scanning the chaos. He didn't dare choose randomly; one wrong patch and his mind—or worse, all of them—would be shredded.
A larger fracture caught his attention. Not a grin, not a whisper—but horror: a pixelated village on fire, screaming avatars dissolving into nothingness, code-bits flickering like broken embers. A system failure in miniature, bleeding into reality.
"Fine," he growled through gritted teeth, trembling fingers pointing at the scene. "That's a problem that needs fixing. Patch that."
[Reality Recompile Attempting…]
The Codex flared violently, light searing through the air like molten metal. Shadows twisted, running away from its brilliance, only to collapse back into the fractures once the flash passed. For a heartbeat, the Null held its breath. Then—success. The pixelated screams stopped. The fire blinked out. Silence, almost sacred, stretched through the space.
[Reality Recompile Success!] [Stability +10%] Current Stability: 25% Progress: 1/3
Erevan collapsed to his knees, chest heaving, the taste of blood and ozone thick in his mouth. The Shard in his chest burned, throbbing with a power that felt too large, too raw.
Kaelith crouched beside him, hands firm on his shoulders. "You can't take much more of this," she warned, voice tense. "Every patch tears at you like this."
He let out a short, sharp laugh, half-cough, half-snarl. "Story of my life, Kaelith… just let me—"
A pulse of terrifying intensity erupted from the third fracture. Larger, deeper, more demanding than any before. Erevan froze. His stomach knotted with a primal dread. It wasn't a game scene this time. It was a city. Glass towers, streets, everything familiar in the strangest, most painful way. His city.
He whispered, voice hoarse, "That's… home."
Kaelith frowned, confusion and fear crossing her face. "What is that place, Erevan? It doesn't belong here."
Erevan's chest tightened, a mix of nostalgia and fear squeezing him in its cruel hands. "…It's where I came from."
The Whisperer's grin stretched across the fracture, impossibly vast. Its voice slithered into his mind, silk and venom: Rewrite it. Erase your cage. Set me free.
The Shard in his chest burned hotter, responding to the surge of temptation. The Codex vibrated in his hands, pleading for him to act. He closed his eyes, grounding himself. "Not today," he muttered, teeth gritted. "I decide what stays weak. I decide what lives."
First, he reached for the "Skills" glyph. It pulsed like a terrified heart, responding to his touch. Cold, formal words etched themselves into existence:
OverwriteOption: RealityRecompile (Lv.0) → RealityArchitect (Lv.1)
Effect: Stabilize and rewrite rules with improved control
Stability Cost: -20%
The math was brutal. Dangerous. But without this upgrade, the Null would devour them all. He had no choice.
RewriteConfirmed
A blinding white-hot light shot from the Codex into his chest, fusing with his Shard. Pain ripped through him, deep and internal, like molten fire eating bone. He gasped, staggered, nearly collapsing, but he held on.
SkillUpgraded: RealityArchitect (Lv.1)
Current Stability: 5%
Erevan swallowed, vision swimming, body trembling. The Codex didn't relent; it pushed forward the ultimate question: Core Identity.
He froze, staring at his reflection in the swirling glyphs. Half human. Half flickering, unstable code. His voice shook, raw and trembling. "…If I change this… will I even be me?"
Whispers and grins pressed against the edges of the white void: You are nothing but code. Rewrite, and be free. Be empty. Be perfect.
Kaelith's voice pierced the static, grounding him. "You are not broken. You are Erevan. Don't let it take that from you."
Erevan's pulse hammered in his chest. He raised a hand slowly, finger hovering over the options.
RewritePending: CoreIdentity
Options: Human (Restored) Anomaly (Stabilized) ??? (Hidden)
A flickering, glitching third option tempted him, a siren of unknown chaos. He reached out—
And then Sir Quacksalot flapped into the white void, feathers blazing in defiance. The duck's quack hit him like a blast, scattering the floating glyphs into chaos.
Error: RewriteProcessInterrupted
Stability −5%
Current Stability: 0%
Erevan collapsed back onto the shard-floor, chest heaving, Shard pulsating like a dying star. Kaelith and Vega looked on, fear and relief mingled on their faces.
"Erevan… your eyes!" Kaelith whispered, horrified.
One eye human, terrified, still holding him… the other a spiraling glyph, coded, hostile.
The Whisperer's laughter filled the Null, triumphant and mocking. The Codex vibrated, insistent.
RealityArchitectActivated
Effect: Anchor chosen rule into local reality
Erevan coughed, tasting blood, and a reckless smile cracked across his face. "Screw you, shadow. My rewrite, my rules."
He slammed the Codex shut, and the Null screamed as reality buckled and re-formed around them.
Erevan's hand hovered over the options, trembling. His chest ached. His mind screamed. The glyphs of the Null reflected his own fractured heartbeat—half panic, half determination, all chaos.
RewritePending: CoreIdentity
Options: Human (Restored) Anomaly (Stabilized) ??? (Hidden)
The unknown third option flickered violently, a tantalizing blur of raw, dangerous possibility. His finger twitched toward it. One choice, one reckless pull, and everything changes.
"You can do this," he whispered, almost pleading with himself. "You have to do this. Stabilize… fix… survive…"
The air thickened. The White Null pulsed like a living thing, hungry and expectant. Shadows slid along the edges of his vision, whispering promises of power and perfection. Erase weakness. Erase doubt. Become something more than you were meant to be.
Erevan's chest tightened, a raw, physical pain, half fear, half adrenaline. He remembered Kaelith's voice, cutting through the static like a lifeline. "You are not broken. You are Erevan. Don't let it take that from you."
He closed his eyes, a shuddering breath rattling through him. The memories came unbidden—childhood laughter, the sterile hum of the lab, the suffocating pod, the faces of those who mocked him, and those who believed in him. All of it—the pain, the fear, the tiny victories—was him.
A tiny quack ripped through his panic.
Sir Quacksalot flapped into the void with unexpected authority, wings spread wide, feathers bristling like a feathery shield. The duck landed squarely on the Codex, pecking furiously at the hovering prompt.
Erevan froze mid-motion. "Duck… you—what are you—?!"
The quack was loud, insistent, almost heroic in its absurdity. The glyphs scattered as if hit by an invisible hammer. For a heartbeat, the Null stilled, stunned by the audacity of a small, stubborn duck.
Error: RewriteProcessInterrupted
Stability −5%
Current Stability: 0%
Erevan collapsed backward, laughter bubbling out of him despite the throbbing pain in his chest. "You… little feathered chaos agent… saved me again." He patted the duck, breath ragged, pulse hammering. "I swear, buddy, you're the most effective part of my party."
Kaelith grabbed his shoulder, eyes wide, trying to mask the relief flooding through her. "That was… that was insane. You could have—"
"I know!" Erevan gasped, cutting her off, voice hoarse. "But I didn't. Thanks to him," he nodded at Sir Quacksalot, who quacked as if to affirm his heroic deeds, "the rewrite… the Null… we're still breathing. Barely."
The Codex floated, its glow dimming slightly, as if acknowledging the temporary truce. Its pages no longer threatened immediate consumption, but the weight of choice still pressed heavily in the air.
Erevan sat back on his heels, trembling, eyes sweeping the Null. Fractures still rippled, but their intensity had lessened. The chaos had been paused, if not healed. He pressed a hand to his chest, feeling the Shard pulse weakly, alive but stable.
"Core Identity… still unresolved," he muttered, voice tight but laced with bitter amusement. "Guess the universe isn't letting me off easy. And I thought paperwork was stressful."
Vega flickered beside him, glitching less violently now, eyes—or whatever served as eyes—focused on Erevan. "You survived that. Somehow. But the Null… it's watching. Waiting. The system… it doesn't forgive weakness."
Erevan laughed softly, a humor edged with exhaustion and disbelief. "Good. Let it watch. Let it wait. I'll deal with it… on my terms."
Kaelith gave him a sharp look, half warning, half pride. "Just… don't make me carry you out next time."
Erevan smirked, letting the corner of his mouth twitch upward despite the pain. "Oh, don't worry. You're never getting stuck with carrying me."
Sir Quacksalot, satisfied with his small, universe-saving role, waddled back to Erevan's side, quacking in what could only be described as triumph.
The Null trembled around them, chaotic and relentless, yet in that moment—a moment of ragged breaths, bruised egos, and absurdly heroic ducks—Erevan felt the tiniest, most fragile thread of control.
A thread strong enough to hold, long enough to breathe, long enough to fight another day.
RealityArchitectActivated
Effect: Anchor chosen rule into local reality
Erevan coughed, tasting iron and ozone. He forced a smile through the blood, through the exhaustion. "My rewrite… my rules."
And with a slam of the Codex, reality itself screamed, buckled, and… reshaped.
For now, they had survived. For now, they were still themselves.
And, thanks to a duck, the universe hadn't broken.