The elevator doors slid open, but they didn't make a sound. There was no ding, no steam, no dramatic whoosh.
Floor 7: The Void of Forgotten NPCs was a world waiting to be rendered. The sky was a flat, static grey. The ground was a grid of white lines on a black surface. There were buildings, but they were just wireframe boxes labeled [HOUSE_ASSET_01] or [TAVERN_GENERIC].
"My eyes," Sarah complained, rubbing her glasses. "The resolution here is terrible. Is this 144p?"
"It's Unfinished," Aryan said, stepping onto the grid. His [Reality Architect] eyes saw the code floating in the air. "This is where the System dumps the characters that were cut from the plot. The drafts. The typos. The ones who never got a name."
Suddenly, a figure approached them. It was a man, but he had no face—just a smooth, grey oval. His arms were stuck straight out to his sides in a T-pose.
"Greeting_Protocol_01," the figure droned mechanically. "Welcome to [LOCATION_NAME]. Would you like to buy [ITEM_NAME]?"
"He's glitching," Rhea whispered, hiding behind the First Son.
"He's not glitching," Barnaby said from his jar. "He's unemployed. Look at him. No backstory. No motivation. Just a prop."
The moment Barnaby spoke, the Faceless Man froze. His grey head snapped toward the group.
"You..." the NPC whispered. His voice changed from robotic to desperate. "You have... texture? You have... main character energy?"
A murmur rose from the grey city. Hundreds of T-posing figures began to glide toward them. They didn't walk; they slid across the ground like chess pieces.
"PROTAGONIST!" a woman with half a face screamed.
"GIVE ME A LINE!" a soldier with no sword shouted.
"I HAVE A TRAGIC BACKSTORY! LISTEN TO IT! MY CAT DIED!"
[SYSTEM ALERT: THE FORGOTTEN ARE SWARMING.]
[OBJECTIVE: DO NOT LET THEM OVERWRITE YOU.]
"They're trying to steal our screen time!" Sarah shrieked as a mob of grey figures surrounded them. "Back off! I have a name! I am Sarah!"
"I am Villager #4!" a grey man sobbed, grabbing Sarah's arm. "Please! Just let me hold your bag! Let me be 'Loyal Sidekick #2'! I don't want to fade away!"
The Director's Chair
"Enough!" Aryan roared.
He didn't draw his sword. He didn't use magic. He used Authority.
He activated his [Coat of the Protagonist] aura to maximum brightness.
"Silence on the set!" Aryan commanded.
The NPCs froze. They recognized the tone. It was the voice of the Author.
Aryan looked at the desperate crowd. He couldn't fight them. They weren't enemies; they were victims of bad writing.
"You want roles?" Aryan asked.
"YES!" the crowd screamed.
"You want to matter?"
"YES!"
"Fine," Aryan said. He pointed to the First Son. "Brother, bring me a chair."
The Giant placed a wireframe chair in the center of the grid. Aryan sat down. He crossed his legs. He looked like a Director judging an audition.
"Stove," Aryan said. "You're the Casting Director. If they bore us, burn them."
"With pleasure," the Stove clattered, heating up its grate.
"Barnaby," Aryan continued. "You're the Agent. Handle the contracts."
"Standard 10% commission," Barnaby noted, pulling a tiny briefcase from... somewhere.
"Line up!" Aryan shouted. "We are holding auditions for Arc 4: The Climb. I need background characters, minions, and one (1) cryptic old man."
The Auditions
The mob instantly formed a chaotic but hopeful line.
Candidate 1: A muscular grey man with a generic axe.
"I... I can grunt," the man said nervously. "Hnnngh!"
"Boring," the Stove declared. "Next!"
FWOOSH. The Stove shot a small fireball near the man's feet. He scrambled away.
Candidate 2: A woman wearing a maid outfit but holding a rocket launcher.
"I was cut from a Sci-Fi draft," she explained. "I can clean, and I can blow things up."
Aryan stroked his chin. "Versatile. Hired. You are now [Maid with Heavy Ordinance]. Go stand by Rhea."
The woman burst into tears of joy. Color flooded into her greyness. She gained a texture: [Pink Hair] and [Steel Armor].
Candidate 3: A chicken.
"Cluck," the chicken said.
"I like his energy," Barnaby noted. "Very profound."
"Hired," Aryan said. "You are now [Emergency Food]."
The chicken looked worried but accepted the role.
It was working. As Aryan assigned roles, the NPCs gained stability. They stopped glitching. They gained faces. The world around them started to render—the grey grid turning into a cobblestone street.
But then, the line stopped.
A small girl stepped forward. She was tiny, wearing a tattered dress. Her face was blurry, constantly shifting features. One moment she had blue eyes, the next brown.
She didn't ask for a role. She just stared at Aryan.
"I know you," Aryan whispered.
He stood up. The System UI flashed warning red text over her head.
[WARNING: REUSED ASSET DETECTED.]
[MODEL ID: SISTER_ARCHETYPE_01]
She looked exactly like Ananya. His sister. The one he had lost before the Tower began. The reason he started this journey.
"Ananya?" Aryan breathed, stepping toward her.
"I am not Ananya," the girl said. Her voice was a collage of a hundred different little girls' voices. "I am the model used to create her. I am the rough draft."
She looked up at Aryan. "The Architect deleted me because I wasn't 'sad enough.' He made the final version... and then he killed her for your character development."
The words hit Aryan like a physical punch.
The Stove stopped clattering. Mira put a hand on her dagger.
"Why are you here?" Aryan asked, his voice trembling.
"I want to know," the girl said, tilting her glitching head. "Was it worth it? Is the story good? Did my death make you a hero?"
The Attack of the Plot Hole
Before Aryan could answer, the sky tore open.
A massive, swirling vortex of black static appeared above the grid. It wasn't an NPC. It was a [Plot Hole].
[EVENT: NARRATIVE COLLAPSE]
[THE SYSTEM IS PURGING UNUSED ASSETS.]
"It's the Eraser!" the NPCs screamed. "Run! We're being retconned!"
Tentacles of static shot down, grabbing the grey NPCs. Whoever they touched simply vanished—deleted from existence.
"Save us, Director!" the Maid with the Rocket Launcher screamed, firing useless missiles at the vortex.
The vortex descended toward the Girl-Who-Looked-Like-Ananya.
"No!" Aryan roared.
He didn't think. He leaped forward, placing himself between the girl and the static.
He raised his mahogany hand.
[SKILL ACTIVATED: THE RED PEN]
[TARGET: THE PLOT HOLE]
"You don't get to delete her twice!" Aryan screamed at the sky.
He tried to edit the vortex, but it was too big. It was raw entropy.
"It's too heavy!" Aryan gritted his teeth. "I need more narrative weight! I need to make these characters important!"
He looked at the crowd of terrified, half-finished NPCs.
"LISTEN TO ME!" Aryan shouted, his voice amplified by the System. "You are not extras anymore! You are the Forgotten Legion! You are the rebellion that the Architect tried to hide!"
He pointed at the Faceless Man. "You! You aren't a villager! You are the Spy with No Face!"
He pointed at the Chicken. "You aren't food! You are the Phoenix in Disguise!"
He pointed at the Girl. "And you... you aren't a draft."
Aryan grabbed her hand.
"You are Anya. The Survivor."
[SYSTEM: MASS EDIT SUCCESSFUL.]
[NEW FACTION CREATED: THE FORGOTTEN LEGION.]
The change was instantaneous.
Golden light exploded from the NPCs. The Faceless Man grew a mask of shadows. The Chicken burst into flames (safely). The Girl, Anya, solidified into a distinct, unique human being with sharp, angry eyes.
"ATTACK!" Anya screamed, pointing at the vortex.
The NPCs didn't cower. They charged. The Spy teleported. The Maid fired a barrage of lasers. The Phoenix-Chicken pecked the static.
Aryan drew Excaliburn.
"They're so brave!" the sword wept. "I want to be brave too!"
SHING.
Aryan slashed the vortex with a beam of golden light, supported by the combined will of a hundred saved characters.
The Plot Hole shrieked and imploded, sealing the sky shut.
The Departure
The grid was quiet. The city was now fully rendered—a chaotic, colorful shantytown of misfits.
Anya stood before Aryan. She didn't look like Ananya anymore. She had her own face now—scarred, tough, and alive.
"You saved us," Anya said. "But you can't stay."
"I can take you with me," Aryan offered. "To Floor 100."
"No," Anya shook her head. "We belong here. We are the outtakes. We will build our own story on Floor 7."
She reached into her pocket and pulled out a small, grey cube.
[ITEM: ARCHITECT'S FRAGMENT #3]
[THE ERASER'S CUBE]
Effect: Allows you to delete one mistake per day.
"The Architect left this here when he threw us away," Anya said. "Take it. And Aryan?"
"Yeah?"
"Make the final chapter worth it."
Aryan took the cube. He looked at the ragtag army he had created. They waved—a maid, a spy, a flaming chicken.
"I will," Aryan promised.
He walked back to the elevator.
"That was emotional," Barnaby sniffled. "I almost shed a tear into my own bowl. Salinity levels are rising."
"We have an army now," Aryan noted, watching the floor numbers climb. "If we ever need backup... we know who to call."
[SYSTEM: FLOOR 7 CLEARED.]
[NEXT DESTINATION: FLOOR 8 - THE OCEAN OF REFLECTIONS.]
Aryan looked at the Reflection of the First Son in the elevator doors.
"Ocean," Aryan muttered. "Barnaby, you're going to love this."
"I despise the ocean," Barnaby said flatly. "It's too big. I have agoraphobia."