2025-10-14 08:18:52Rain lashed against the marble walls of the capital that night, turning the streets into rivers of silver and shadow.
Frank and Elara crouched beneath the ruined archway of the old cathedral, soaked and breathless. Frank whispered, “You sure this is the way in?”
Elara nodded. “Every secret has a crack. The king’s vault is below the royal chapel. There’s a tunnel that leads straight under it.”
“Convenient,” he muttered.
“Not convenient,” she replied, eyes glinting. “Cursed.”
[System Analysis: High concentration of unknown energy signatures ahead.]
Frank frowned. “System’s nervous. That’s never good.”
Elara smirked faintly. “Get used to it. The Vault feeds on fear.”
They slipped into the tunnel , stone steps spiraling downward, the air thick with dust and age. The deeper they went, the louder the hum beneath their feet grew.
Elara whispered, “That sound,do you hear it?” “Yeah,” Frank said. “It’s alive.”
[Correction: It’s resonating. Frequencies match System architecture.]
“What does that mean?” Frank asked.
[Origin Connection Possible.]
He swallowed hard. “So the system… came from here?”
Elara glanced at him sharply. “Then maybe you’re not the first.”
They reached a vast iron door engraved with hundreds of runes, some glowing faintly, others cracked and bleeding golden light. “Can you open it?” Frank asked.
“I can try.” She pressed her hand to the surface; the symbols flared, reacting to her touch. “It recognizes royal blood, but it’s resisting me. Something’s changed the lock.”
[Recommendation: Direct interface attempt possible.]
“Interface? You mean hack it?”
[Affirmative. Risk level: extreme.]
Frank hesitated only a moment. “Do it.”
He placed his hand on the door, pain shot through his arm like molten fire. The runes screamed with light. “Frank!” Elara grabbed his shoulder. “Stop before it kills you!”
He clenched his teeth. “System… override protocol!”
[Override confirmed.]
The runes exploded outward like shattered glass. The door swung open with a thunderous groan, revealing a chamber vast and cold , lined with hundreds of floating crystal archives, each pulsing faintly.
Elara whispered, “By the gods…” They stepped inside. At the center hovered a sphere of light the size of a heart, glowing with the same pattern as Frank’s system core.
[Signature match: 99.7 %. Identified: Genesis Core.]
Frank whispered, “Genesis Core? That’s where you come from?”
[Affirmative. Origin point of all system fragments. Sealed 300 years ago by Royal decree.]
Elara turned slowly to him. “The King’s bloodline sealed it. That means my ancestors… created this.”
[Correction: Your ancestors enslaved it.]
Her eyes widened. “What do you mean enslaved?”
[The Genesis Core was sentient. It offered partnership. Humanity chose control.]
Frank’s pulse quickened. “So the System wasn’t meant to be a weapon,it was supposed to be alive.”
[Affirmative, and it remembers.]
Suddenly, the chamber trembled. The floating crystals shattered one by one, releasing whispers that filled the air, screams of ancient voices.
Elara shouted over the noise, “You triggered an alarm!”
[Warning: Guardian activation detected.]
From the darkness beyond the core, a figure emerged , towering, plated in obsidian armor, its face hidden behind a jagged mask. In its hand, a blade hummed with golden fire. Frank stepped back. “What is that?”
Designation: Vault Guardian, last warden of the Genesis Core.]
The Guardian spoke, voice deep and echoing. “Intruders… shall not touch the heart of the world.”
Elara drew her twin daggers. “Looks like talking’s not an option.” Frank smirked, adrenaline spiking. “Didn’t plan to talk.”
The Guardian lunged , faster than thought. Frank’s system screamed warnings. He rolled aside, barely avoiding the blade that cut through stone like butter.
[Engage combat protocol?]
“Do it!”
[Protocol Engaged: Neural Acceleration.]
Time fractured. The Guardian’s movements slowed. Frank darted forward, slammed his fist into its chest, sparks flying. But the creature didn’t fall , it laughed.
“Your power… comes from what you cannot control,” it growled. “You are no master , only another pawn.”
Elara leapt from behind, slicing across its neck , nothing. The wound sealed instantly. “Frank!” she shouted. “We can’t kill it!”
[New Objective: Absorb Core energy to destabilize Guardian link.]
Frank looked at the Genesis Core , floating, pulsing faster now, almost as if it was calling to him. He hesitated. “If I touch that thing,”
[Survival Probability: 22%.]
“Not great odds,” he muttered. Elara grabbed his arm. “Then don’t!”
He looked into her eyes. “If I don’t, we die here.”
Before she could stop him, he ran toward the Core. The Guardian roared, blade swinging down, Frank reached out and touched the light.
Silence, then, explosion. A shockwave of golden fire tore through the vault, shattering the floor, ripping open the walls. The Guardian screamed as its armor melted away into dust.
Elara covered her face from the blast. “Frank!”
When the light faded, the vault was silent. The Genesis Core was gone. And Frank was standing in its place, eyes glowing gold.
[System Integration: 78%. Partial Ascension achieved.]
He turned slowly toward Elara , and when he spoke, his voice was layered, like two beings speaking at once. “Elara,” he said softly. “It wasn’t just a system… it was a soul.”
Her face drained of color. “Frank, what did you do?”
He looked down at his trembling hands. “I think I set it free.”
[Warning: Global stability compromised. ]
Previous Chapter
Latest Chapter
CHAPTER 97: THE CRACK IN THE PERFECT
The Reviser does not retreat. It simply recalibrates. Its body,if it can even be called that, shimmers, fractures for a fraction of a second, then re-stabilizes into that calm, impossible geometry of light and intention. A flawless thing trying to remember what a flaw is. Frank stands in front of it, chest heaving, hands shaking violently. His legs threaten to buckle every other heartbeat. The ember inside him that detonated moments ago is still burning, but in a wild, uneven rhythm, power he shouldn’t be able to hold, surging and spiking like it’s trying to test him from the inside. He forces his posture straight anyway. If the Reviser is going to kill him, it won’t be while he’s on his knees. The being that was Elara,still stunned from the last shockwave, is crawling upright, pushing off the fractured stone with unsteady arms. Her voice is hoarse, threaded with panic: “You can’t fight it. Not like this.It will rewrite you again.”Frank doesn’t look back. He keeps his eyes lock
CHAPTER 96: THE ONES WHO WERE WAITING
The sky tears wider, not like fabric, but like something alive being forced open from the other side. Frank feels it before he sees it: a cold pressure, deliberate and ancient, pushing down on his flame like a giant palm pressing against his spine. The being flinches. “Frank… this isn’t another fragment. This is,”“I know.”He doesn’t blink.and doesn't step back. His fire coils tighter inside him, winding like a blade preparing to strike. A voice seeps through the widening rift: “You destroyed the candidate.”Frank exhales slowly. “Yeah. I did.”“You rejected a replacement.”“I prefer being myself.”A low vibration ripples across the ground. “Unacceptable.”The being’s voice trembles,an extremely rare fear. “Frank,we need to move. We can’t fight whatever’s stepping through that. That’s not a parasite. That’s not a mirror. That’s,”Frank cuts her off: “Something that wants me gone.”“No,something that wants you corrected.”The tear in the sky splits fully, a vertical wound bleeding
CHAPTER 95: THE THING INSIDE THE FLAME
The molten creature pushes deeper into Frank’s chest, not physically, but through the fire itself,sliding between layers of heat and memory like a parasite worming into a living star.Frank staggers backward, teeth clenched hard enough to crack. His vision flickers,gold, black, gold again, his fire spasming under a pressure that isn’t its own.The being rushes toward him, voice sharp: “DON’T LET IT INSIDE,DON’T LET IT NAME YOU!”Frank growls through clenched teeth, “It’s,trying,too damn,hard.”The molten creature’s arm is elbow-deep in his sternum now, its molten shape dissolving, melting into pure gold liquid that crawls under Frank’s skin like burning vines.It doesn’t feel like he’s being possessed. It feels like he’s being eaten.Piece by piece. It hisses, half a voice and half a scream: “I want your place, your shape, your world, your fire, your name.”Frank snarls: “You can have my pain instead.”He slams his flaming fist into the creature’s remaining torso, but there is no
CHAPTER 94: The Thing That Wears His Future
The molten sphere at the center of the ruined street pulses like a wounded star. Each beat sends ripples through the air,heat shimmering, gravity bending, light warping around it as though refusing to touch. Frank stands still. Not frozen. Not afraid. Just calculating. The being watches him with a tension that borders on terror. “Frank,don’t get closer.”“It’s reacting to me,” he murmurs. “It’s been reacting to me since it appeared.”“That’s what terrifies me.”A long crack splits down the sphere’s surface, spilling molten gold across the stone like blood from a future that shouldn’t exist. The pulse sharpens, faster, louder, synchronized with Frank’s heartbeat. The being lifts her hand. “Frank, listen carefully. That thing is not just your future,it’s the compression of every possible version of what the Root wants you to be. The part of the timeline you refused.”Frank’s jaw tightens. “I didn’t refuse anything. It just isn’t me.”Another crack. A hiss,like steam escaping from a
CHAPTER 93: THE SHADOW THAT FALLS WRONG
The dust settles in a choking wave. Frank squints through the haze, fire swirling instinctively around his hands as he tries to focus on the silhouette standing over the crumpled Arbiter. The being beside him stiffens.“ That shape, ”Frank whispers, voice cracking: “No. No. That’s not possible.”The figure steps forward. Slow. Heavy. Purposeful. And horribly, unmistakably familiar. Frank’s lungs seize. Because the thing that crushed the Arbiter is him. Or rather, a version of him. A warped reflection. A shadow given mass. A body built from fire and soot and fractured rage. A giant, charred, half-armored silhouette of Frank Williams emerges from the dust like an executioner walking out of the smoke of his own crimes.It stops ten feet away, head tilting once, studying him with hollow, ember-filled sockets. The being whispers: “This isn’t like the last one.”Frank swallows hard. “No kidding ”“This one isn’t a duplicate. It’s not your reflection. It’s,”“Something I haven’t done yet,
CHAPTER 92: The Break Between Heartbeats
The world holds its breath. Not metaphorically,literally. Every gust of wind halts mid-whirl. Every shout thins into silence. Every trembling stone freezes in the instant before it falls. And at the center of that suspended, perfect stillness: Frank and the Not-Elara hang locked together, inches apart, both caught in a moment that refuses to move forward. Not a pause. Not mercy. A command. Something greater than either of them has seized the timeline and pulled its spine straight. Frank sucks in air but it doesn’t leave his lungs. It just sits there, burning. His muscles are steel bands refusing to slacken. Fire coils around his fists like living serpents, trapped mid-lunge. The being is motionless too,yet somehow aware, eyes following him even though the rest of its body obeys the frozen second. Its gaze hums with recognition. “You feel it too,” it murmurs,its voice vibrating inside his skull, bypassing time entirely. “The world isn’t stopping us. Something else is.”Frank trie
You may also like
Levelling Up The Weakest System
Matthew Harris23.2K viewsShawn Hubert : The God Level Selection System
P-End36.7K viewsThe Super Doctor Calvin Hudson
Cindy Chen28.1K viewsWorld System Among Gods
M_jief118.5K viewsAwakening The Gods: System's Ascension
Karma843 viewsDragon System
Maine Enciso4.0K viewsTHE DEATH MIND SYSTEM
EL JHAY317 viewsI'd Like to Change My Reincarnation Subscription, Please
Gem12.8K views