There was no sensation at first.
No up, no down.
No light.
No sound.
Only the feeling of falling through endless static.
My systems flickered desperately, trying to anchor me to reality.
> [ERROR: ENVIRONMENT PARAMETERS UNDEFINED.]
[ERROR: TIMEFLOW UNSTABLE.]
[CAUTION: MEMORY SLIPPAGE DETECTED.]
Then — like a rip tearing through the void —
the world rebuilt itself around me.
---
I landed hard on cracked stone.
The sky above was a patchwork of broken server code — fragments of data floating like shattered glass.
Mountains twisted at impossible angles, and rivers of glitched binary flowed backward against gravity.
It wasn't a world.
It was a wound.
The Black Gate hadn't transported me to a place.
It had rewritten the rules entirely.
---
A soft ding echoed in my ear.
> [New Area Unlocked: CORE ERROR ZONE — "Echo Shard."]
[Local Stability: 5% (Critically Unstable).]
[Objective Updated: Reach the Error Heart.]
I pulled myself up, steadying my breathing.
This place wasn't just dangerous.
It was actively trying to erase me.
Every second I lingered here, the more the corruption gnawed at my very existence.
I needed to move — now.
---
The path ahead was a jagged scar cutting through the landscape.
Floating platforms drifted lazily over chasms filled with roiling void-energy.
In the distance, a pulsing red light marked something important — perhaps the "Error Heart" referenced in the objective.
I sprinted forward, leaping across the broken terrain.
Immediately, the environment responded.
Glitched entities began spawning:
Shadow-like creatures formed from compressed error-code, screeching silently as they lunged at me.
I gritted my teeth and activated my Patch Tool.
No subtlety here — just survival.
---
The first creature, a snarling mass of jagged triangles, leaped at my throat.
I slammed the Patch Tool into its core, rewriting its structure mid-air.
The beast exploded into harmless pixels.
> [Glitch Entity Neutralized.]
[+50 Exp.]
More came.
I ducked under a flying shard, rolling to avoid a second creature's swipe.
With a sweep of the Tool, I triggered an emergency Area Rewrite — dissolving a cluster of enemies in a flash of cleansing light.
Each kill bought me a few seconds.
Nothing more.
The corruption re-formed endlessly, adapting faster each time.
I couldn't stay and fight them all.
I had to reach the Heart.
---
Panting, I sprinted down a collapsing bridge of broken code.
Ahead, the terrain shifted — not like a natural event, but like someone deliberately reprogramming it to trap me.
Walls rose up, forming a maze.
I cursed and skidded to a stop.
> [NEW EVENT: DATA MAZE.]
[Objective: Navigate Before Collapse.]
[Timer: 02:00.]
Only two minutes?
"Figures," I muttered.
I plunged into the maze.
---
Inside, the maze shimmered and changed constantly.
One moment, I saw a clear path.
The next, it twisted into a dead end.
Worse, hallucinations began bleeding into my vision —
ghostly figures from my past, flickering at the corners of my eyes.
My missing memories.
I caught glimpses of a woman's face —
someone important —
but no matter how hard I focused, her features blurred and slipped away.
The price I had paid to stabilize the Gate.
The system was using my lost memories against me now.
---
> [WARNING: CORRUPTION SPIKE DETECTED.]
[MENTAL STABILITY: 68%.]
I forced myself to breathe, shutting out the phantoms.
They weren't real.
None of this was real.
Focus on the exit.
I sprinted, using the Patch Tool to force minor pathways open —
rewriting broken walls into temporary bridges, collapsing dead ends behind me.
At the last possible second, I found the glowing exit sigil and hurled myself through it.
Behind me, the maze dissolved into nothingness.
---
The world outside was even worse.
The red light I had seen earlier now pulsed frantically —
a massive crystalline shard suspended over a black pit.
Corruption tendrils wrapped around it like living things, pumping raw error into the air.
The Heart of the Error.
I approached cautiously.
My Patch Tool buzzed angrily in warning.
> [TARGET: ERROR HEART.]
[STABILITY: 0%.]
[RECOMMENDED ACTION: PURGE OR CONTAIN.]
I didn't know if I could "purge" something this massive.
But I could damn well try.
---
Suddenly, the ground split open before me.
From the pit, a creature emerged.
No — a being.
Twice my height, composed entirely of shifting code and armor fragments, with dozens of glitching arms sprouting from its back.
Its head was a cracked mask — identical to the Warden's, but corrupted beyond recognition.
A system guardian... turned traitor?
Its voice hit me like a hammer, a deep, distorted growl:
"INTRUDER.
STABILITY MUST BE ERASED."
The Error Heart's final guardian.
---
> [BOSS FIGHT: CORRUPTED WARDEN - PHASE 1.]
[Victory Condition: Destroy Error Heart or Survive for 10:00.]
Ten minutes against that?
I gritted my teeth.
"Come on, then," I whispered.
The Warden roared, and the battle began.