The sudden disbelief of having reached the Blue Labyrinth left me stunned for a few moments—long enough for a new reflection to begin staring back at me.
Still on the ground, doing my best not to use my left arm at all, I pushed myself upright and expanded my system. As expected, my abilities were available again.
—Search V —I whispered, barely more than a breath.
The screen unfolded almost instantly. The information was still incomplete, yet disturbingly revealing.
[Black Team: **** Silver Rank / Player Eliminated / Mr. Nobody Steel Rank][White Team: Player Eliminated / Player Eliminated / Emiliano Zapata Silver Rank]
My memory shuddered. I had already faced Zapata once, but now the automaton had handed me an unfair advantage: he was the last surviving player on the white team.
"If I wait long enough, maybe I can win without ever seeing another player."
It was a hopeful thought… until I remembered that my reflections were no less terrifying.
A version of me with short hair and a waiter's uniform waved cheerfully from the nearest mirror. Beside him, a student version—and another from a different school, wearing a skirt just above the knee—did the same.
I didn't understand why at first… until it clicked.
They were waving with my left hand.
My twisted hand contorted, forcing itself back into its original shape. The pain of resetting the bones was impossible to put into words. It felt as if every joint twisted and scraped against itself until snapping back into place—only to begin a stupid, rhythmic sway.
A wave.
Swallowing the pain, I pressed the large marker at the center of the map to display information on the automaton. The map was outright hallucinatory: terrain segments constantly detached and shifted, just as I had already learned. Any route toward the center of the labyrinth rewrote itself every few seconds, making progress feel nearly impossible.
In a disturbingly twisted way, I should have been grateful. This floor only forced me to maintain the wave with my aching left hand, biting my lip to endure the pain. I waited as the automaton's data finished loading.
It didn't take long.
[Incarnation: GEMINI. Immobile on its platform. Indestructible. Not aware of players, only of its duty to rearrange the mirror labyrinth until disconnected. Elimination method: reach the control panel at the base of the labyrinth and shut it down.]
That last line was laughably optimistic.
The very path leading there was rewriting itself over and over again. The changes were so rapid and constant that even switching corridors was madness. As discreet torture gnawed at my arm, this still felt better than risking something worse.
Or so I thought.
Then a new segment snapped into place.
—If you don't want to die, run.
A beautiful young woman with straight silver hair and large brown eyes sprinted toward me. She wore a military uniform that clashed sharply with her slender, delicate figure.
There was no conversation—just a warning I immediately understood.
Behind her, dragging itself forward with a nauseating, wet sound, came a swarm of flesh and shattered mirrors moving at an unnatural speed. Thousands of figures—copies of the same girl over and over—merged into a massive living mass. Some were mutilated, others deformed, others torn apart and still bleeding.
Without exaggeration, it was the most grotesque thing I had ever seen—inside or outside the Nexo. The stench alone made me recoil, even as my hand continued that idiotic wave.
To my horror, the mass smashed into nearby mirrors, shattering them, cutting itself on the fragments, dragging copies of me or the girl into itself—less like a swarm and more like a human rat king, all fused together into a starving amalgamation.
Panic seized my legs, and I followed the girl without thinking.
—Oh, shit! —I blurted as I picked up speed.
At some point my arm stopped waving, falling limp and dislocated—thankfully no longer twisted into unnatural angles. Without slowing down, I clutched it to my chest, running while fighting not to black out from the pain.
I even managed to glance at the girl, who shot me a quick look and pointed to the right.
I didn't know if she had a plan, but I didn't hesitate. I followed her. She had to be on my team—there was no other option unless Zapata had changed gender since the last time I saw him.
We burst into a new corridor glowing red. In the midst of the panic, I noticed Search was still active. A small comfort, though the terror only intensified. The thing kept advancing, devouring every mirror in its path.
And then, for my misfortune… I crashed.
I don't know what hurt more—my arm or my head. Despite her appearance, the girl was solid as a rock. I wouldn't expect anything less from a Silver-rank player.
She let out a long sigh before turning toward me without meeting my gaze.
—We're trapped.
—What?
I didn't want to believe it, but from the floor I saw the massive hand tearing away the path in front of us, leaving behind a vast, bottomless abyss.
Things only got worse when the monstrous mass of alternates finally entered the red corridor, advancing straight toward us.
I had to jump. It was the only option. If I stayed, I'd become part of that thing.
My analysis was cut short when the girl simply walked past me. She said nothing—only adjusted the hat she wore, adorned with a striking insignia of an eagle devouring a serpent.
—Stay back —she said.
My heart hammered harder and harder as the swarm closed in like an ocean of flesh and broken glass.
Then the girl raised her hand and shouted with military force, making the mirrors tremble.
—Second Star! Railroad to the Revolution!
The ground roared.
A beam of red and green light spread beneath her feet like endless rails, linked by a thin white glow. Suddenly, a metallic thunder filled the air, and behind her—emerging from the infinite void—a train formed out of particles.
Its wheels screeched, spraying multicolored sparks that locked into the glowing track beneath her boots.
And before I realized it, both she and I were standing atop the locomotive as it plowed through the flesh swarm, shredding clones into a storm of fragments and glass that shattered beneath the wheels.
There was no meat.
Only glass.
No blood.
When pieces broke away, they shattered like crystal, melting into nothing under the heat of the steam engine.
—This can't be real… This is actually a… train?
It couldn't be, right?
The eagle. The tricolor scheme.
I turned toward the girl standing firm against the machinery, elegant and composed, staring straight ahead without the slightest tremor. I couldn't leave it unanswered. I expanded the system and—
—You've got to be kidding me…
[Porfirio Díaz – Silver Rank]
The damn girl in front of me was none other than the tyrannical president of the Mexican Revolution.
Porfirio Díaz.
The train kept charging forward, devouring the swarm, smashing corridors, dragging mirrors aside like twigs.
—Every trial is worse than the last…
—Mr. Nobody, I recommend you hold on to whatever you can —the girl said as she secured massive safety belts, allowing her to stand firmly atop the machinery—. We're out of track.
—What?
I really, really hate the Nexo.