THE CHOSEN ERROR

Rain hit the concrete like broken promises cold, endless, and uncaring. Aiden Cross hunched his shoulders, pulling his threadbare hoodie tighter as he slipped past the flickering neon sign of Wheeler Logistics, his third warehouse job this year.

He didn’t look up when a group of coworkers laughed behind him. They always laughed when he passed. Just loud enough. “Hey Cross,” one of them called, voice soaked in mockery. “Careful not to break your back today. Boxes got more spine than you.”

He didn’t answer. Didn’t even flinch. He’d learned long ago attention only made things worse. Inside the warehouse, the air was thick with dust and sweat. Machines groaned like overworked beasts, and the floor trembled beneath shifting pallets. Aiden took his spot at the back, near the metal rollers, where the lights barely worked and no one cared if you collapsed.

He lifted the first box. His fingers were raw from yesterday, his wrists aching. But pain was constant so familiar it no longer surprised him. Time bled forward, hour after hour, the world shrinking to a loop of lifting, breathing, enduring.

Then came the order. “Cross, loading dock. Now.” Aiden looked up. Supervisor Rook stood with arms crossed, the fluorescent lights casting cruel shadows over his permanent sneer. “You deaf, Cross? Move.”

The dock was the worst place in the building open to the rain, freezing cold, and half the equipment broken. Still, he went. What choice did he have? By midnight, his fingers were numb. A truck was delayed, and the loaders had gone home. Alone, Aiden stacked crates of electronics, one after another, soaked to the bone. Then it happened. A scream. Metal tearing. A blinding flash of blue light. The truck exploded before it even touched the dock. The blast knocked him off his feet, hurling him into the side of the building. Pain screamed through his body. Then silence. Nothing but falling rain and the sharp scent of ozone. Aiden’s vision flickered. Blood poured from his side. In the haze, he saw shapes inhuman silhouettes moving through the smoke. Not rescuers. Something else. Something... wrong. He blinked. One of the shapes turned toward him. Its eyes were blank white disks, and something glitched across its skin like static, like code. Then everything went black.

When he opened his eyes, he wasn’t in a hospital. He was somewhere...else. A void. Pitch-black, soundless. No pain. No cold. No time. Until a single glowing panel appeared in the darkness, floating just inches from his face.

SYSTEM BOOTING... Aiden stared, heart thudding. USER DETECTED: AIDEN CROSS STATUS: NEAR-DEATH / INITIALIZATION REQUIRED 

Welcome to the Interface. Do you wish to survive? YES NO

He blinked. The words changed, waiting. His hand moved without thinking, reaching toward YES. As soon as he touched it, pain flooded back. A scream tore from his throat but it wasn’t just pain. It was something being stitched into him. His memories flickered every punch, every rejection, every long, sleepless night and were burned, digitized, processed. Data. Trauma. Fuel. Then came the voice.

INITIATING TASK SYSTEM

“Strength is earned. Missions must be completed. Power comes at a price.” His body jerked as invisible fire raced through his veins. The panel flashed again. [INITIAL MISSION: Stand and Walk]

Reward: System Stabilization 

He gasped. Was this a hallucination? A dying dream? “Walk,” he whispered, trying to move. Nothing happened. “Stand,” he said louder. “Please…” A bolt of white-hot energy surged through his limbs. His legs twitched. He pushed his hands into the invisible ground beneath him and rose.

 TASK COMPLETE 

System Core Stabilized. Welcome, User. You are no longer ordinary. The void shattered.Aiden woke in the ruins of the loading dock. Flames flickered. Sirens wailed in the distance. He was alone.No blood. No wounds. His body was whole. But the panel still hovered in his vision.

Mission Chain Unlocked: System Trials – Tier 1

Punish the guilty. Protect the innocent. Choose wisely. His breathing quickened. Was he dead? Dreaming? Or had something truly changed? He staggered to his feet. A piece of metal crashed nearby startling him.

Then he heard voices. Two men. Arguing in the shadows. “You didn’t tell me it would explode like that!” “It had to look like an accident. Cross was disposable.” Aiden froze. His name. He stepped closer, heart racing.

Behind a stack of crates, he saw them Supervisor Rook and a man in a long coat. Both alive. Both unharmed. One holding a detonator. “You idiot,” the man in the coat snapped. “If the system detected him, he’s not disposable anymore. He’s a threat.” Aiden’s breath caught in his throat.

They did this. They planned it.

And the system had saved him. A glowing message pulsed at the edge of his vision.

New Optional Task: Eliminate Target – Rook Reward: Combat Ability Unlocked

He stared at it, trembling. Another voice echoed in his mind his own, but twisted, deeper: “No more being weak. No more being prey.” His fists clenched. Rook laughed. “Even if he’s alive,” he said, “who’d believe someone like Aiden Cross?” Aiden stepped forward, silent as the grave. He was done being ignored.