2026-01-20 06:21:03Evans floated in a dark ocean. The water was warm. It was soft. There was no noise here. There was no pain. He felt heavy, sinking deeper and deeper into the black water. It felt good to sink. It felt like sleeping after a very long day.
He wanted to stay here forever. The darkness was kind. It did not ask for anything.
“Just let go,” he thought. “Just sleep.”
But the darkness cracked.
It was not a sound. It was a feeling. A sharp, electric buzz went through his mind. It was like biting on a piece of tin foil, but a thousand times worse.
[WARNING: HOST VITALITY CRITICAL.]
The words were not spoken. They appeared inside his head. They were bright red letters burning against the back of his eyelids.
Evans tried to push them away. He wanted the warm water back. He tried to keep his eyes closed.
[SYSTEM ALERT: UNCONSCIOUSNESS UNAUTHORIZED.]
Go away, Evans thought. Let me sleep.
[INITIATING PAIN PROTOCOL.]
The warm water turned to ice. Then, it turned to fire.
A spike of pure agony shot through his left side. It was not a natural pain. It felt like a wire had been hooked directly to his nerves and plugged into a wall socket.
Evans’s eyes snapped open.
He was not in an ocean. He was on the ground. The dirt was cold and hard against his cheek. The air smelled of smoke and wet leaves.
He gasped, sucking in a breath of cold air. The breath turned into a choke. His chest felt like it was made of broken glass.
"No..." he whispered. The sound was weak. It was barely a breath.
He tried to close his eyes again. The pain was too much. The world was spinning. Gray shapes of trees twisted above him. The sky was a dull, angry gray.
[HOST AWAKE.]
[DIAGNOSTIC SCAN: ACTIVE.]
The text appeared in the air in front of him. It was a blue box, floating like a ghost. Evans blinked, but the box did not move. It was locked to his vision. Wherever he looked, the box followed.
Then, the world changed.
Lines of red light drew themselves over his body. It was like a map. He looked down at his chest. He could see his clothes, dirty and torn. But over the clothes, the red lines showed what was underneath.
It was a picture of his own skeleton.
Most of the bones were white. But on his left side, two ribs were flashing red. One of them was cracked. The other was not just cracked; it was moved. It was not where it should be.
[INJURY DETECTED: DISPLACED RIB (LEFT 7TH).]
[INJURY DETECTED: DEEP LACERATION (ABDOMEN).]
[BLOOD LOSS: 18%.]
[STATUS: DYING.]
"Dying," Evans thought. The word felt heavy.
He felt the wetness on his side. He moved his hand slowly. It shook. He touched his side. His fingers came back wet and red. Blood.
He was bleeding out.
The panic started to rise. It felt like a cold hand grabbing his throat. He was going to die here. Alone in the dirt.
[CALM DOWN.]
The System’s voice was text, but it felt like a command.
[PANIC ACCELERATES BLOOD LOSS.]
"I... can't..." Evans tried to speak, but his voice broke. Tears stung his eyes. He was just Evans. He worked in an office. He played video games. He did not know how to survive this. He was soft.
[YOU DO NOT HAVE PERMISSION TO DIE.]
The red light on his ribs flashed faster.
[EMERGENCY OVERRIDE ENGAGED.]
Suddenly, Evans’s arm moved.
He did not tell it to move. He did not want to move. But his right arm lifted up. His hand grabbed the front of his shirt.
"What?" Evans gasped. "Stop!"
His hand ripped the shirt open. Buttons popped off. They hit the ground with tiny clicks.
The cold air hit his skin. He looked down.
The wound was ugly. It was a long cut, oozing dark blood. Below the cut, the skin was purple and swollen where the bone was wrong.
Evans felt sick. He wanted to vomit. The sight of his own meat, his own inside parts, made the world spin again. He started to drift back to the darkness.
ZAP.
Another shock hit his brain. It was sharp and cruel.
[FOCUS.]
"You... you are hurting me," Evans whimpered.
[PAIN IS NECESSARY. PAIN KEEPS YOU AWAKE.]
The blue box changed. New text appeared. It scrolled down fast, like a computer code.
[TREATMENT PLAN GENERATED.]
[STEP 1: REALIGN BONE.]
[STEP 2: STOP BLEEDING.]
[STEP 3: STABILIZE.]
"I can't," Evans said. He was crying now. "I'm not a doctor. I can't fix this."
[I WILL GUIDE. YOU WILL ACT.]
A new overlay appeared. It was a ghost image of his hand. The ghost hand moved to his side. It positioned its fingers over the broken, wrong rib.
[PLACE HAND HERE.]
Evans stared at it. He did not move.
[COMPLY.]
The System spiked his pain again. A red hot needle in his spine.
"Okay! Okay!" Evans screamed, though it came out as a wheeze.
He lifted his shaking hand. He put his fingers where the blue ghost-hand showed him. He could feel the lump under his skin. It was the bone. It was sticking out.
It felt wrong. It felt like a rock under a carpet.
[APPLY PRESSURE.]
"It hurts," Evans sobbed.
[SURVIVAL IS PAINFUL. PUSH.]
Evans closed his eyes. He pushed.
A scream tore through his throat. It was a raw, animal sound. The pain was white and blinding. It felt like being stabbed.
[HARDER. THE BONE MUST RESET.]
"I can't! Please!"
[DO IT OR DIE.]
The text was blinking red now. A timer appeared in the corner of his vision.
[TIME TO SHOCK: 3 SECONDS.]
[2...]
Evans knew the shock would be worse than the rib. The System was a cruel master.
He gritted his teeth. He bit his lip so hard he tasted copper.
"Do it," he told himself. "Just do it."
He took a jagged breath. He grabbed the lump of bone.
And he shoved.
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Chapter 10
The sound was the worst part. Crunch.It was a wet, grinding pop. It vibrated through his chest cavity. It echoed in his ears.Evans’s back arched off the ground. His mouth opened wide, stretching his jaw until it popped too. He screamed, but no sound came out. His lungs were empty. The pain had stolen his air.He collapsed back into the dirt. He lay there, gasping like a fish on a dock. Gray spots danced in his eyes.[RIB REALIGNED.][EFFICIENCY: 68%. ACCEPTABLE.]"Acceptable..." Evans wheezed. He felt like laughing, but that would hurt too much. The System called that torture "acceptable."The sharp, stabbing pain was gone. Now, it was just a deep, throbbing ache. Every time his heart beat, his side throbbed. Thump-throb. Thump-throb.[STEP 1 COMPLETE.][STEP 2: CAUTERIZATION.]Evans looked at the text. He knew that word. Cauterize. It meant to burn. It meant sealing a wound with heat."No," Evans whispered. "No fire. I don't have fire."He looked around. He was in a small clearing.
CHAPTER 9
Evans floated in a dark ocean. The water was warm. It was soft. There was no noise here. There was no pain. He felt heavy, sinking deeper and deeper into the black water. It felt good to sink. It felt like sleeping after a very long day.He wanted to stay here forever. The darkness was kind. It did not ask for anything. “Just let go,” he thought. “Just sleep.” But the darkness cracked.It was not a sound. It was a feeling. A sharp, electric buzz went through his mind. It was like biting on a piece of tin foil, but a thousand times worse.[WARNING: HOST VITALITY CRITICAL.]The words were not spoken. They appeared inside his head. They were bright red letters burning against the back of his eyelids.Evans tried to push them away. He wanted the warm water back. He tried to keep his eyes closed.[SYSTEM ALERT: UNCONSCIOUSNESS UNAUTHORIZED.]Go away, Evans thought. Let me sleep.[INITIATING PAIN PROTOCOL.]The warm water turned to ice. Then, it turned to fire.A spike of pure agony shot
Chapter 8
Snap. The cold wind vanished. The hard rocks vanished. The gray sky vanished.Evans was standing. He looked down. He was not wearing his torn, bloody robes. He was naked, but he felt no shame. His body looked clean. There were no bruises. No blood.He looked around. Everything was white. It was an endless, bright space. There were no walls, no ceiling, and no floor. Just infinite whiteness. It was sterile. It smelled like rubbing alcohol and ozone.It was quiet. Not the lonely silence of the cliff, but the heavy silence of an operating room before the surgery begins."Am I dead?" Evans asked.His voice was strong. It echoed, though there were no walls to echo off of."Is this the afterlife?"No angel appeared. No demon appeared.Instead, the air in front of him shimmered.Text appeared.It didn't fade in. It snapped into existence. The letters were black, sharp, and blocky. They floated in the air, motionless.[MEDICAL HEALING SYSTEM ACTIVATED]Evans blinked. He reached out to touch t
Chapter 7
Thump. Thump. The sound was slow. It was too slow.Evans lay on his back. The ground beneath him was hard and uneven. Sharp rocks dug into his skin, but he could barely feel them. The pain was distant now. It felt like a heavy blanket covering his body.He tried to take a deep breath. He failed. His chest felt like it was filled with water. A wet, gurgling sound came from his throat.My lung, Evans thought. His mind was surprisingly clear. It was the clarity of a doctor looking at a patient. Punctured left lung. Internal hemorrhage. Rib fractures—at least three. Probable rupture of the spleen.He analyzed his own death. He knew the timeline. He had minutes, maybe less.Above him, the sky was a dull, angry gray. Clouds moved slowly, indifferent to the man dying below. The edges of his vision began to blur. Darkness crept in from the sides, making the world look like a tunnel.He tried to move his hand. His fingers twitched. That was all. He could not lift his arm. He could not wipe the
Chapter 6
"Weak," another voice whispered. It sounded like Baret, the enforcer. "Look at him crawl. Like a worm.""No," Evans whimpered. He covered his ears. "Go away.""You are nothing without your power," a third voice said. It was his own voice. "You are just meat."Evans squeezed his eyes shut. "Shut up! Shut up!"He scrambled forward, crawling blindly. His hand slipped over the edge of a drop.He tumbled.He fell into a shallow ravine—a dried-up riverbed cut into the rock. He landed in the soft, silty dirt at the bottom. The walls of the ravine blocked the wind. It was slightly warmer here.But Evans didn't care. He was done.He curled into a ball. He pulled his knees to his chest. He shivered so hard his muscles cramped.The voices were gone, replaced by a high-pitched ringing in his ears.He stared at the dirt in front of his face. He saw a tiny pebble. It was white, perfectly round. It looked like a pearl.He focused on the pebble. It was the only thing in the world that made sense."I'
Chapter 5
Silence. The silence of the Red Wastes was heavier than the noise of the city. There were no birds. No crickets. Only the wind, whispering over the sharp rocks.Evans lay against the boulder. He counted his breaths. In. Out. In. Out. He had to stay calm. Panic was a killer. He knew this. He had studied medicine. He had studied survival. He was smart."Assess," he whispered to himself. "Assess the damage."He tried to sit up. A sharp pain stabbed his left side. Broken rib? Maybe just bruised. He pressed his hand against his side. He flinched. Bruised, definitely. Maybe a hairline fracture.He looked at his legs. His pants were torn. Blood oozed from a long cut on his shin. The blood looked bright red against the dusty ground."Stop the bleeding," he thought.He reached for his inner power. He reached for his Qi.For years, it had been as natural as breathing. He would focus his mind, and a warm current would flow from his belly to his hands. He could use that energy to seal wounds, to
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