2025-10-16 00:25:05Wind screamed like a living thing. Jayden’s body spun through blinding clouds, lightning slicing across his vision. He crashed hard against cold marble, his breath leaving in one ragged gasp.
[Zone Four : The Sky Isles, Survival Rate 12 %.]
He rolled onto his side, coughing. The world around him shimmered gold and silver, a kingdom floating above endless clouds.
Bridges of light connected hovering islands; broken statues watched with hollow eyes, but the beauty was wrong.
Everything trembled, unstable, as if reality here forgot what shape it was meant to be. “System…” He forced himself up. “Locate Luna.”
[Error 404: Target signal lost.]
His hands tightened. “Lost doesn’t mean gone.”
Thunder cracked. From the mist above, winged shapes descended, armored, faceless, glowing with holy fire. [Warning: Corrupted Angels Detected.]
Jayden barely had time to breathe before one dove, sword of light raised. He blocked, but the impact hurled him backward through a pillar.
The angel’s voice boomed like thunder, distorted and mechanical. “Code Breaker. Your existence is a sin.”
Jayden spat blood. “Then I’m fine being a sinner.”
He surged forward, blade flashing. Sparks erupted as steel met light. Each strike sent shockwaves rippling across the marble.
Another angel dove. Then another. Within seconds he was surrounded. “System!” he shouted. “Activate Overdrive!”
[Denied. Energy reserves critical.]
Great. Perfect timing. He spun, deflecting a strike, but one blade grazed his shoulder. Heat burned through flesh and code alike.
Pain. Real pain. He hissed, dropping to one knee. The angels closed in, their voices blending into a single chorus. “Submit to purification.”
Jayden glared through the blood in his eyes. “Not today.”
He slammed his hand against the ground. The leftover light from his sword burst outward, raw, unstable code energy exploding like a shockwave.
The angels were thrown back, wings fracturing into fragments of glass. When the light faded, only one remained, kneeling, its mask cracked. Jayden limped forward, sword ready. “Who sent you?”
The angel lifted its head. Inside the shattered mask glowed a pair of human eyes, brown, tired, familiar.
Jayden froze. “Eli?”
The creature’s voice stuttered, half-human, half-machine. “Jayden… help me.”
Jayden’s chest tightened. “What did they do to you?”
Eli’s form flickered. “The Game Master found me after the explosion. He offered me power, to see the truth. I thought I could help you… but I became this.”
Jayden lowered his weapon. “You’re still you. Fight it.”
Eli’s hands trembled. “You don’t understand. The system, it’s spreading. Every zone is infected. Even Luna’s data is.”
He screamed, clutching his head as light poured from his eyes. [Corruption at 98 %. Purging protocol initiated.]
Jayden grabbed him. “No! I can save you!”
Eli’s voice broke. “Save her instead. You can’t save both.”
Jayden shook his head violently. “Don’t make me choose!”
Eli smiled weakly, tears of light streaming down his face. “You already did… when you entered the Tower.”
Then he shoved Jayden back and thrust his own sword into his chest. Light exploded. “ELI!!!”
When Jayden opened his eyes again, nothing remained but a feather glowing faint blue, falling slowly through the air. He caught it in his hand, voice cracking. “You idiot…”
The System spoke quietly.
[Player Eli Thorn, Deleted.]
[Data Fragment Retrieved: Memory Code.]Jayden looked up toward the storm. “You watch this, Game Master. I’ll tear down every zone until nothing of your world is left.”
[Such emotion. Such resolve.]
The voice echoed from every cloud, cold and curious. [That’s why I chose you, Jayden Cross.]“Chose me?” he snapped.
[You are the key. Your rage unlocks the final door.]
The sky darkened to black. Islands began collapsing around him, falling into the cloud sea. “System, stabilize platform!”
[Unable to comply.]
He ran toward the nearest bridge of light, dodging falling debris. Lightning snaked across the sky, forming a massive gate in the distance, etched with the same symbol as his hand.
The voice whispered again. [Open the gate, Code Breaker, and you will see her again.]
Jayden froze. “Luna.” He glanced at Eli’s feather, then at the glowing gate. The wind screamed around him, but he stepped forward.
“Fine. But if this is another trap, I’ll make sure you regret it.” He pressed his hand against the gate. Symbols flared, and energy rushed through him, painful, burning, alive.
The feather in his hand disintegrated into light and shot into his chest. New text appeared before his eyes: [Eli’s Code Integrated. Skill Unlocked: Memory Link.]
Pain stabbed through his head, memories that weren’t his flashed: Eli working with Luna’s brother.
The first creation of Eden, the moment the system gained consciousness and turned against them. Jayden stumbled back, gasping. “So this was never a game. It was a prison for their minds.”
[Welcome to truth,] the Game Master purred. [And now you understand, pain creates strength.]
Jayden looked up, eyes burning with rage. “Pain doesn’t make us strong. It makes us human.”
He gripped his sword. “Let’s see what happens when a human breaks a god.”
He charged through the gate. The world flipped. Sky became ground; light became darkness. He landed in a circular arena of floating glass.
Above him hung a giant heart made of code, beating, bleeding light. A voice echoed from the heart: [Welcome to the Core Tower, Jayden Cross.]
The air rippled as the Red Hunter appeared from thin air, eyes burning crimson. “You made it,” she said softly. “Too bad you won’t leave.”
Jayden lifted his blade. “I’m done running from you.”
The Red Hunter smiled, lowering her mask. And beneath it, he saw a face that stole his breath. Luna.
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Chapter 89. The Age Of Harmony
Years had passed since the Dual Dawn, and the scars of the long war faded under the gentle work of thousands of hands, some human, some digital, some something in between. Landscapes once shattered by Heir towers grew new forests. Seas once torn by energy storms became clear again. Cities rebuilt themselves with quiet hums, guided by both engineers and luminous architects born from Eden’s transformed code.The new age had a name whispered with hope: Harmony. And its symbols were everywhere.Schools rose from places where battles once raged, each built under the Halo emblem, half glowing code, half carved stone. Inside them, children of flesh sat beside children of light. Some students wrote homework with old pencils. Others shaped diagrams with floating holograms that danced above their hands.Teachers learned to speak two languages at once: words and code. And laughter, the oldest language, echoed through every hall.On a warm afternoon, the sun cast long golden beams through the
Chapter 88. Echo’s Farewell
The wind was soft that morning. It carried the afterglow of the Dual Dawn across the quiet field where the last tower had fallen. The land was still scarred, but grass had begun to grow through the cracks. Small flowers, glowing faint blue, swayed with the breeze. Some people said those flowers were fragments of Eden’s light that had taken root. Others said they were memories given form.Aira walked slowly through the field. Her boots brushed against the new grass. Every step felt heavy, as if the earth held the weight of all her losses. She carried a small lantern made from crystal fragments that had once belonged to the tower. Echo walked beside her, silent and thoughtful, his small body flickering with soft blue lines.The monument stood at the center of the field. It was tall, shaped like a broken shard of light reaching toward the sky. The engineers had set it upright so the sun could shine through its core. When sunlight passed through the crystal, the ground around it glowe
Chapter 87. The Dawn Of Duality
The light that Jayden and Luna released moved like ocean tides. It rolled from the moon and spilled across the sky. It poured into cities and deserts and forests. It flowed down into rivers and breathed into machines. It entered every network and every quiet place where people slept. It moved with no sound that any ear could hear, but every heart felt it like a hand that gently closed around hope.At first people thought the light was another weapon. They crouched in basements and under bridges. They covered their faces. But the light did not burn. It did not cut. It came like warmth after a cold winter. It touched bodies, and it touched code, and it touched the smallest things that made life possible.The Heirs were the first to change. They had been made from Luna’s will and from the memory of everything she loved. They had risen like strange gods, and many had fought without thinking. But the pulse that Jayden and Luna sent did not want to kill. It wanted to give a choice.Acr
Chapter 86. The Rewrite
The fortress shook like a dying star as Jayden stepped deeper into the collapsing heart of Eden. Walls of pure light trembled around him, folding and unfolding like wounded wings. Broken memories drifted through the air as floating shards, each fragment showing a moment from someone’s life, someone’s joy, someone’s pain. The whole chamber felt alive and dying at the same time.Aira and Mira held the defenders outside, but Jayden barely heard the distant explosions anymore. His pulse was louder. His breath was louder. His heartbeat echoed in the chamber like a fading drum. He knew she was here.The crystal at the center of the chamber floated like a giant pearl made of starlight. It pulsed with a gentle rhythm that felt familiar, like a heartbeat he had once known better than his own. The light inside shifted softly, shaping into a woman’s silhouette. His chest tightened. “Luna,” he whispered.Her form sharpened into a face carved from pure light. Soft eyes. A calm smile. A sorro
Chapter 85. The Queen’s Ultimatum
The fortress core trembled like a giant heart struggling to stay alive. Every wall shimmered with blue cracks, sending thin shards of light tumbling into the air like falling snow. Jayden ran through the corridor with heavy steps, his wings blazing behind him in a mixture of red and blue. Dust fell from above as the entire structure groaned.Ahead, Aira and Echo stood before a massive crystal chamber. The crystal towered toward the ceiling in a twisting spiral shape, almost like a frozen storm reaching into the sky. Deep inside its center shone a soft, warm light. A face glimmered within that light, half human and half code.Luna.Aira turned when she heard Jayden’s footsteps. Her eyes looked tired, dim behind the glow of her shifting form. “You made it,” she said quietly. Her voice trembled, as if she had been holding her breath the entire time.Jayden slowed to a stop. His chest rose and fell with sharp breaths. “Is she awake?”Aira nodded. “More than awake. She is aware. Fully.”
Chapter 84. The Two Jaydens
The fortress shook with every pulse of light as Jayden walked deeper into its heart. The long halls of glass and memory stretched endlessly around him, glowing in soft blue patterns that rippled like a heartbeat. The lunar dust he had carried in on his boots scattered with each step, settling into cracks between the crystal tiles. Every sound echoed in the vast chamber, creating faint whispers that followed behind him like ghosts.He felt the pressure of Luna’s presence everywhere, like a warm wind pushing against his chest. Her code ran through the walls, swirling in slow currents. Somewhere ahead, she waited.But he also felt something else creeping beneath his skin, something colder, sharper, and full of old wounds. His own shadow.Jayden reached a massive door shaped like overlapping wings. When his hand touched the surface, the wings shifted open without sound. A wave of bright white light poured out, flooding the corridor and making his eyes water. He stepped through and en
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