London was screaming.
Not the screams of a city under bombardment, but the sound of millions of people realizing that the ground beneath their feet no longer existed. The "White Wall"—a towering, featureless barrier of unrendered space—was moving through the city at a walking pace. Anything it touched—cars, historic monuments, screaming children—simply ceased to be.
[WORLD STATUS: 12% ARCHIVED]
[SYSTEM DEBT: CRITICAL]
[CURRENT OBJECTIVE: REACH THE ZERO-POINT BEACON]
Arthur stood atop the ruins of the hospital wing, his Architect's Key pulsing with a rhythmic, golden light. Behind him stood Sarah and a handful of survivors—doctors, patients, and a few soldiers who had stopped fighting and started praying.
"It's not eating us," a young soldier whispered, staring at the white void. "It's... it's just making us go away."
"It's compressing reality," Arthur said. His voice was no longer human; it sounded like a thousand whispered lines of code overlaid on a single breath. "The System is running out of memory. It's deleting the 'background' to keep the 'core' alive."
[The Path of Logic]
"Arthur, we can't stay here," Sarah said, gripping her rifle. The weapon felt useless now. You couldn't shoot a void. "The Wall will be here in ten minutes."
Arthur looked at the city through his Level 7 Overseer Eyes. The world was a mess of "Corrupted Data" and "Null Sectors." But he saw a golden thread—the Zero-Point Beacon—pulsing from the center of Westminster.
"Stay behind me," Arthur commanded. "If you step into the White, you won't die. You'll just be 'Unassigned.' You'll exist, but you'll have no shape, no voice, and no end."
He stepped off the ledge into the empty air.
[SKILL: ARCHITECT'S PATH – COMMAND: 'RENDER FLOOR']
With every step Arthur took, a translucent, golden bridge of geometric light snapped into existence beneath his feet. He was literally building the world as he walked. The survivors followed him, trembling, as they walked hundreds of feet above a city that was slowly turning into a white sheet of paper.
[The Glitch Hounds]
The Man in White wasn't done. From the edge of the White Wall, shapes began to emerge. They were "Garbage Data"—monsters made of twisted limbs, distorted faces, and jagged shards of glass. They were the "Deleted" coming back to claim the "Remaining."
"Contact!" the soldier yelled, opening fire.
The bullets passed right through the creatures. They weren't physical; they were "Selection Tools." Anything they touched was instantly marked for deletion.
"Don't let them touch you!" Arthur roared.
He swung the Architect's Key. A wave of blue energy (from the 1st Fragment) rippled out, acting as a "Sonar Pulse." It didn't kill the monsters; it "Re-Identified" them.
[COMMAND: 'DEFINE AS SOLID']
The moment the pulse hit the Glitch Hounds, they became physical. Sarah's bullets finally found purchase, shattering the creatures into black ink.
[The Sacrifice of the Data]
As they reached the center of the city, the White Wall suddenly accelerated. A massive surge of data-debt hit Arthur like a physical blow. He fell to one knee, the golden bridge beneath the survivors flickering dangerously.
[STABILITY: 22% – SYSTEM COLLAPSE IMMINENT]
"I... I can't hold the render," Arthur gasped. A line of golden blood leaked from his eye. "There's too much noise. Too many souls in the 'Forge' trying to get out."
The Billion-Soul Cry from the 5th Fragment began to scream in his mind again. They wanted to be rendered. They wanted to live in this new world.
"Arthur, give them to me," a voice whispered.
Arthur looked up. Elena was there. Not physically, but as a holographic projection from the safehouse's last functioning server.
"I've repurposed the safehouse as a Buffer Drive," Elena said, her digital form flickering. "I can take the 'Soul Data' from you. I can house the ghosts. It'll give you back your stability."
"Elena, if you take them, your mind will be overwhelmed," Arthur argued. "You'll become a server, not a person."
"I was a spy, Arthur. I was a puppet. Let me be the foundation instead," she smiled.
[SKILL: DATA TRANSFER INITIATED]
Arthur felt the weight in his mind lift. The screams died down. His stability shot back up to 55%, and the golden bridge turned into solid, shimmering marble. But in his mind, the light that represented Elena's consciousness faded into a dull, humming green. She was gone. She was the "Drive" now.
[The Zero-Point]
They reached the gates of Westminster. In the center of the courtyard, the air was folding in on itself. A single point of infinite blackness sat there—the Zero-Point.
Standing in front of it was the Man in White, but his porcelain mask was cracked. Behind him stood the Chrome King, looking exactly like Arthur, but older and draped in a cape of falling stars.
"You're late, Arthur," the Chrome King said. "The Archive is 90% complete. In five minutes, I press the 'Final Update' button. Sarah lives. The world dies. And you and I... we finally become one."
Arthur stood his ground, the Architect's Key glowing with the power of all seven fragments.
"The 7th Fragment isn't the Lie, King," Arthur said, his voice echoing with the power of the Regent. "The 7th Fragment is the Undo."