They stepped onto the next platform.
Beyond it, the world twisted again. But this time, there was no sky.
Just darkness.
And red text rising in the distance like a sun made of warnings.
Something massive was waking.
But for now, the team stood together.
Unbroken.
---
But the System didn't agree.
It had tolerated their bond. Endured their growth. Even let them pass the trial. But Jaden, an unclassified, unstable, dangerously human had become a splinter in the foundation. His presence didn't just bend the rules anymore.
It cracked them.
The red warnings didn't stay in the sky.
They detonated.
> System Alert: Variable Anomaly Breach
Anchor State Unstable
Containment Failed
Execute Expulsion Protocol
Destination: Layer Zero – Realspace Interface
The ground buckled beneath their feet.
Reality glitched.
Then shattered.
---
Jaden didn't even have time to shout.
One moment he stood on solid code. The next, he was weightless. Gravity spun sideways. Light collapsed. Sound unraveled into static. Time flickered like a dying screen.
He saw the others blurred, distorted. Reaching for him.
Silas's wings flared, too far to catch.
Niko mouthed his name through fractured sound.
Aya's vines surged but missed.
Kael's voice became static.
Then nothing.
---
He hit concrete.
Hard.
Cold air scraped into his lungs. Rain lashed his face.
Not simulation rain. Not a visual effect.
Real.
Jaden gasped and rolled over. His skin scraped against the pavement. Neon lights flickered above him, smeared by downpour. Towering buildings rusted, fractured, overgrown surrounded him like teeth.
No HUD.
No interface.
No System.
He was in the real world.
---
A groan sounded nearby.
Kael staggered upright, soaked and coughing. "Okay… I'm calling it. The System just rage quit."
Rowan scrambled to his feet, already scanning his broken device. "No signal. No thread. No pulse. This is hard disconnect."
Niko bent down to check on Whiskers, who peeked out from her coat, sneezing once. "We're here. Like, her -here."
Aya crouched, pressing her palm to the ground. Her vines didn't respond.
"This is real," she whispered. "This is Earth."
Jaden didn't move.
He looked down at his hands.
They weren't projected.
They were his.
Raw. Trembling. Real.
---
Then Silas dropped out of the sky.
Literally.
He hit the ground with a skid and hissed under his breath. His wings sparked faintly with fractured light, then dimmed. His coat was soaked. His face said it all.
"I'm not supposed to be here," he muttered. "But apparently the System's rage issues are contagious."
Jaden helped him up. "You okay?"
"Physically? Sure. Existentially? This is my third breakdown this week."
Despite everything, Jaden let out a small laugh. Silas grinned at him and added, "Nice to see your face under real rain, though."
---
They regrouped under the broken arch of a collapsed overpass.
Rain poured off the edge like a curtain.
"Where are we exactly?" Kael asked.
Rowan wiped his glasses on his sleeve. "My guess? A mirror city. A shadow of the real world. What's left after the System pulled most of humanity into simulation."
Niko frowned. "You mean… this is the leftover?"
Aya nodded. "The real world we forgot."
Silas leaned against a support beam, wings flicking off droplets. "And now we're stuck in it."
---
Jaden stared out into the broken skyline.
His chest ached not from impact, but from what he felt growing behind his ribs.
The System had rejected him.
Not because he failed.
But because he couldn't be contained anymore.
Aya stepped beside him. "You didn't do this alone."
"I know," he said quietly. "But I was the trigger."
"Then be the anchor now."
---
Somewhere far above, red lights pulsed behind the clouds.
> Variable Detected
Realspace Containment Online
Observers En Route
Whatever had sent them here…
…it wasn't done.
And now, the real world had started watching.
---
End of Chapter 30 : Critical Overflow
Author's Note : Chapter 30
I tried to give them a healing arc.
I really did.
But then Jaden broke the System so hard it rage quit and punted them into the apocalypse.
You ever glitch so hard you get ejected from the game?
Yeah. That's our boy.
Welcome to Earth: low power, high trauma, no tutorial.
Stay wet
-sky_xyn