The light from the gate consumed me whole. Falling was no longer falling—it felt like being torn apart, each cell stretched thin, as if my entire body would scatter into ashes within the brilliance.
Then, without warning, I was cast out of the radiance and collapsed into an endless white void. There was no sound, no scent, no texture. Only a pale, all-encompassing light that stripped everything of shape and meaning. I called out to the AI, but silence answered me. What remained was a silver shard of alloy floating before my eyes—the very piece on which I had carved my words.
Its surface shimmered faintly, and from it emerged a familiar, fractured voice:
“I… have opened the gate. A fragment… of the network map… I pass to you. Do not let it… reset…”
The voice dissolved into nothingness, and the shard fell into my trembling hand. As I opened it, lines of light etched themselves across the metal, forming a three-dimensional image: a map of countless realities. Yet most of it was drowned in static, blurred beyond recognition. Only one short path remained illuminated—a single route carved through the chaos.
I leaned closer, desperate to see more, but the void around me began to shudder. The pale light vibrated, collapsing inward, as if this fragile space was also destined to be compressed and rebuilt. My chest tightened. This sanctuary was no sanctuary. It, too, was crumbling.
And so, with the shard as my guide, I knew I had no choice. I had to move forward before this reality folded in on itself, before sacrifice lost its meaning, and before hope was reset into oblivion.
