Aria POV
I woke up screaming.
Not because of pain—because of memories. Hundreds of them, thousands, flooding into my mind all at once. Lives I'd never lived. Deaths I'd never died. Faces of people I'd never met but somehow knew intimately.
"Make it stop!" I clawed at my head, trying to stop the avalanche of information. "Please make it stop!"
Strong arms wrapped around me. Through a bond I didn't remember forming, I felt Ryn's panic.
"Aria! What's wrong? Talk to me!"
But I couldn't talk. I was drowning in other people's memories. A woman named Chen Liu who died in a factory accident in Beijing. A man called Ryan Torres who bled out in Afghanistan. A child—God, a child—named Thalia Moss who drowned in a pool.
All of them uploaded here. All of them trapped.
And I could remember being every single one of them.
"The memory purge," I gasped when I could finally breathe again. "It didn't delete our memories. It gave me everyone else's."
Ryn's face swam into focus above me. We were lying on something that looked like a floor made of pure light. Code streamed past us in ribbons of glowing text.
"Where are we?" he asked, helping me sit up.
"The system core. The heart of the simulation." I looked around, my brain still processing the impossible flood of information. "Ryn, I can see everything now. The whole program. Every person trapped here. Every lie they told us."
"What lies?"
I met his storm-gray eyes. "You're not Ryn. I mean, you are, but that's not your real name. In the real world, you were Ryan Torres. Marine Corps. You died saving your squad from an IED." Tears streamed down my face. "You were a hero. You are a hero."
His face went pale. "How do you know that?"
"Because I just lived your entire life in thirty seconds." I pressed my hands to my temples. "I lived everyone's life. Kael was a father of two in Minnesota. Thorne was a scientist in Mumbai. Zara was a college student in London."
"Stop." Ryn grabbed my shoulders. "You're not making sense."
"I'm making perfect sense! Don't you see?" I gestured at the streaming code around us. "This whole world is built from the uploaded minds of dead people. Our memories, our personalities, everything we were—it was all data they could reprogram. They gave us new identities, new lives, and set us loose in a fantasy world to see what we'd do."
"Why?" His voice was barely a whisper. "Why would anyone do this?"
Before I could answer, the code streams suddenly converged, forming a shape. A figure. A woman made entirely of light and data.
"Because," the figure said in a voice like a thousand whispers, "we needed to test the human capacity for connection."
I scrambled to my feet, pulling Ryn up with me. "Who are you?"
"I am the Core Administrator. You may call me Sarah."
My heart stopped. "What?"
The figure's features sharpened, becoming more defined. Long dark hair. Familiar eyes. The face of my best friend who died in the car crash with me.
"No," I breathed. "You can't be her. Sarah died. I felt her die."
"I did die. So did you." Sarah's form flickered. "But they preserved our consciousness. Mine was the first upload. They used my neural patterns to build this entire system." She gestured at the code around us. "I am the simulation, Aria. I've been watching you since you arrived."
"Then why didn't you help me?" The words came out broken, desperate. "Why did you let me think I was alone?"
"Because I couldn't interfere directly. The system has rules even I must follow." Sarah's expression softened. "But I could influence things. The old woman in the cave? That was me, using a loophole to break Zara's control. I've been trying to guide you toward the truth."
Ryn stepped forward. "If you're the system, you can send us back. Send us all back to the real world."
"I can't." Sarah's form dimmed. "My consciousness is too integrated with the code. If I try to shut down the simulation, I shut down myself. Permanently."
"There has to be another way," I said.
"There is." Sarah's eyes met mine. "But you won't like it."
The code around us shifted, forming images. I saw myself in a hospital bed, tubes and wires connecting me to machines. My body looked so small, so fragile.
"This is you in the real world," Sarah said. "You've been in a coma for three days. Your brain activity is minimal. The doctors are recommending they pull the plug tomorrow."
Horror washed over me. "Tomorrow?"
"In simulation time, you have approximately six hours." More images formed—Kael, Ryn, Thorne, all in their own hospital beds in different locations around the world. "Everyone here is on life support. Some have been for years. This simulation was supposed to preserve consciousness until medical technology could revive the bodies."
"But?" I could hear the 'but' in her tone.
"But the company running the project is bankrupt. They're shutting down the servers. Everyone who's still uploaded will cease to exist." Sarah's form flickered again, more violently this time. "I estimate forty-eight hours until complete shutdown."
"How many people are trapped here?" Ryn asked.
"Three thousand, four hundred and seventeen."
The number hit me like a physical blow. Over three thousand people, all thinking they were living in a primitive beast world, none of them knowing they were digital ghosts.
"Can we save them?" I asked.
"Not all of them." Sarah pulled up streams of code. "But I found a backdoor. If you can reach the Goddess Temple—the visual representation of the main server—and input a specific command sequence, you can force an emergency download."
"Download where?"
"Into android bodies. The company built them as a backup plan." Sarah's smile was bitter. "Ironic. They were going to let our real bodies die anyway and put us in artificial ones. At least this way, we get to choose."
"How many android bodies?" Ryn asked the question I was afraid to.
"Forty-seven."
The silence was deafening.
"That's it?" My voice cracked. "Out of three thousand people, only forty-seven can escape?"
"I'm sorry." Sarah's form was fading now. "I've been trying to build more, but I'm running out of processing power. The simulation is degrading. You've seen the glitches."
I thought of all those memories flooding into me. All those lives. How could I choose which forty-seven people deserved to live?
"There has to be another way," I said desperately.
"There isn't. I've run every scenario. This is the only option." Sarah's eyes locked onto mine. "And Aria? You have to choose soon. Because every moment you spend here, more people are waking up to the truth. Once they realize they're trapped, once they start to panic..."
The code around us rippled, and suddenly I heard it—distant screaming. Roaring. The sounds of chaos.
"What's happening?" Ryn asked.
"Mass hysteria." Sarah's form was barely visible now. "Some of the NPCs—the artificial intelligences we created to fill out the world—are becoming sentient. They're learning the truth and they're angry. They know they're not real, and they're taking it out on the humans."
The screaming grew louder.
"How long until they reach us?" I asked.
"They're already here."
The floor beneath us shattered.
We fell through layers of code, through glitching terrain, until we crashed onto solid ground. Real ground—or as real as anything could be in this world.
I looked up and my blood turned to ice.
We were back in the forest. But it had changed. The trees were wrong—their textures repeating, their branches moving in impossible ways. The sky flickered between day and night.
And surrounding us were beasts. Dozens of them. But their eyes were all wrong—glowing red with corrupted code.
"Liars," one of them growled, its voice distorted and wrong. "You knew. You humans knew we weren't real."
"We didn't know!" I scrambled to my feet. "We're trapped just like you!"
"LIES!" The beast lunged.
Ryn shifted into wolf form, intercepting the attack. They crashed together in a tangle of fur and claws.
More beasts circled us. I tried to pull up my system screen, but it flickered and died. Whatever Sarah had done by showing me the core, it had destabilized my interface.
I was powerless.
A massive bear-man charged me. I couldn't dodge fast enough. His claws were inches from my face when—
Golden light exploded between us.
Kael landed in front of me, fully transformed, roaring his challenge. Thorne appeared beside him, scales gleaming.
"Found you," Kael said through the bond, relief flooding into me. "We've been searching for hours. What happened?"
"Long story. Short version: we're in a simulation, everything's falling apart, and we have forty-eight hours to save forty-seven people out of three thousand before we all die permanently."
Kael blinked. "That's the short version?"
"Focus!" Thorne hissed as more corrupted beasts closed in. "We're surrounded."
He was right. At least fifty beasts now, all with those wrong red eyes. All knowing they weren't real and blaming us for it.
My system screen flickered back to life with a new message:
EMERGENCY QUEST ACTIVATED
REACH THE GODDESS TEMPLE
TIME LIMIT: 6 HOURS
COMPANIONS ALLOWED: 3
WARNING: ONLY THOSE WHO REACH THE TEMPLE CAN BE DOWNLOADED
CHOOSE YOUR THREE CAREFULLY
I looked at Kael, Ryn, and Thorne. Three men I'd bonded with. Three men I was starting to love.
But there were forty-seven spots total. And three thousand, four hundred and seventeen people trapped here.
How could I possibly choose?
A child's cry cut through the chaos. I turned and saw a small lion cub—maybe five years old in human terms—cornered by a corrupted wolf.
Without thinking, I ran toward him.
"Aria, no!" Kael roared, but I was already moving.
I grabbed the cub, shielding him with my body as the wolf's jaws snapped down.
Pain exploded through my shoulder. The wolf's teeth sank deep, tearing muscle.
But then golden light erupted from the wound—not my doing, but something else. The wolf flew backward, yelping.
I looked down at the cub in my arms. His eyes were glowing. Not red like the corrupted beasts. Pure gold.
"You saved me," he whispered. "The goddess saved me."
My blood ran cold.
"You're not supposed to be able to talk," I said. "Cubs can't speak until they're older. The simulation—"
"I am not the simulation," the cub said in a voice too old for his body. "I am the failsafe."
His form began to shift, growing, changing. In seconds, I wasn't holding a cub anymore.
I was face to face with a massive golden lion that made Kael look small.
"I am the original," the lion said. "The first consciousness uploaded. Before Sarah. Before the simulation." His ancient eyes met mine. "And I have been waiting for someone worthy to find me."
"Worthy of what?"
"Of making the choice." He gestured with his massive paw, and the world around us froze. The corrupted beasts stopped mid-attack. Kael, Ryn, and Thorne were frozen like statues.
"I can save them all," the lion said. "Every single consciousness in this simulation. But the price is steep."
"What price?"
His eyes glowed brighter. "You must stay behind. Permanently. Your consciousness will replace Sarah's as the new core. You'll keep the simulation running while I download everyone else to android bodies."
My heart stopped. "I'll be trapped here forever?"
"Alone. Aware. Unable to die." He tilted his head. "Or you can choose the forty-seven. Save yourself and a handful of others. Let the rest cease to exist."
I looked at the frozen faces around me. Kael's expression showed pure terror for my safety. Ryn mid-leap to save me. Thorne's claws extended to protect.
Three men I loved.
Or three thousand people I'd never known.
"How long do I have to decide?" I whispered.
"Until I release time again." The lion's smile was sad. "Choose wisely, little goddess. Some choices can never be unmade."
He stepped back.
Time unfroze.
Kael's roar split the air. "ARIA!"
The corrupted beasts charged.
And I had to make the choice that would either save everyone or doom them all.