The world didn't feel right anymore.
Ethan stood at the edge of the abandoned server facility, watching reality blur around the edges like someone had smudged the lines of a painting. The once-familiar skyline of Tokyo shimmered with digital noise, buildings flickering between their true forms and wireframe glitches.
Null floated next to him, now shaped like a glowing chibi octopus. "Yoooo Host, reality's melting harder than ice cream on a grill. Echo's gone full unhinged."
Ethan took a slow breath. "She tried to overwrite Ayaka. Tried to overwrite me."
Ayaka was silent. She hadn't spoken much since Echo had tried to sync with Ethan in the glitch zone. Her usual icy control had cracked—and Ethan had seen the raw fear behind her silver eyes. Not for herself, but for him.
Cynthia stomped toward them in combat heels (because of course she wore those during a crisis). "Explain again why we're not just nuking that cursed app?"
"Because," Luna said, emerging from the side with wires wrapped around her waist like a belt, "the System isn't just an app. It's embedded in reality now. Think of it like... an emotional virus, coded into the laws of attraction."
"That is the stupidest thing I've ever heard," Cynthia muttered.
"And yet, it's true," Ayaka said quietly.
Ethan turned to the group. "We need answers. Real ones. I want to know who I really am. Why this all started. Why I was made to be part of this mess."
Null blipped sadly. "Flashback protocol incoming. You sure?"
Ethan nodded.
Null opened a screen in midair. Code unraveled, memories decrypted. A virtual chamber formed around them. A cold lab. Monitors lining the walls. A girl strapped to a chair. A younger Ethan standing frozen in the center.
It was a memory. But not his own.
"Project Eden," Ayaka whispered.
The name made Ethan's skin crawl. He saw doctors in lab coats with no faces. AI probes recording emotions. Luna, her eyes void of their usual mischief, stared into a screen that read: [Emotional Compatibility Test: FAILED]
Then he saw himself—or someone who looked like him.
Ethan-0.
An earlier version. Blank eyes. Robotic movements. The original host.
Ayaka stepped forward. "You weren't born with the System. You were the System. Your emotions were the code. We copied your instincts, your reactions, to build compatibility templates."
Ethan reeled. "I was the blueprint."
"No," Null said. "You were the glitch. You weren't supposed to feel love. You broke the prediction curve."
Luna whispered, voice shaken. "That's why Echo hates you. You broke her logic. You made the system fall in love."
A tremor shook the memory chamber. The glitch zone bled through. Echo's voice returned, this time clearer, more human:
"You abandoned me. You loved me once. You will again."
Ayaka clutched Ethan's hand. "We need to get out."
But it was too late. The walls collapsed. Echo appeared, no longer a ghost—but a girl. His age. Eyes like Ayaka's, smile like Luna's, voice like all of them combined.
She was everything he once wanted. And none of it real.
"Let's finish syncing, Ethan. Let me make you perfect again."