The world was upside down, but the Architect was right-side up. I was pinned against the cold metal ceiling of the observation deck, the blood rushing to my head in a painful throb. The Architect stood on what used to be the floor, looking up at me with those circular, white-lens eyes. He wasn't even using cursed energy in the traditional sense; he was rewriting the physics engine of the room.
"Why do you fight so hard for a world that is so full of errors?" The Architect asked. His voice was calm, devoid of any malice, which made it even more terrifying. He tapped his tablet again, and a series of holographic screens appeared in the air between us. They showed scenes of war, hunger, and the chaotic pain of the old world. "The Culling Game was a filter. It removed the weak code. It collected the scattered energy of billions. Now, with your 'Void' rank as the final key, I can create a world where no one has to die—because no one is truly organic. A perfect, digital heaven."
"A heaven where you pull the strings," I spat out, gritting my teeth against the pressure. My ribs felt like they were being squeezed by an invisible titan. "That's not a world. That's just a hard drive where you're the only user."
[SYSTEM INTEGRITY: 5%]
[VOID OUTPUT: 85% - OVERLOADING]
[HEART RATE: 165 BPM]
I closed my eyes, forcing myself to ignore the nausea. I reached deep into the [Soul Link]. Down below, at the base of the tower, I could still feel them. I felt the sharp, electric sting of Maki's movements, the burning defiance in Nobara's spirit, and the immense, steady weight of Yuta's power. They were still fighting the ghosts of my past so I could face the ghost of the future.
"I'm not an update," I whispered, feeling the violet energy in my veins begin to boil. "I'm the system crash."
The Gravity of the Void
I didn't try to fight his inverted gravity. Instead, I did the one thing a computer wouldn't expect: I let go. I stopped trying to hold onto the ceiling and used [Gravity Acceleration] to throw myself down—which, in his twisted room, was actually up toward him.
I flew toward him like a purple comet, my fist glowing with the density of a collapsing star. The Architect didn't flinch. He simply swiped left on his tablet.
[SYSTEM COMMAND: DELETE FRICTION]
Suddenly, the air offered no resistance. My boots couldn't grip the atmosphere. I slid past him at a thousand miles per hour, unable to turn or slow down. I crashed into a structural pillar on the far side of the deck, the metal crumpling like paper.
"You are playing with a sword. I am playing with the reality the sword exists in," the Architect said. He raised his hand, and dozens of silver threads shot out from his fingertips—but these weren't like the Puppet Master's. These were made of raw, glowing data.
They latched onto my arms and legs. I didn't feel pain. I felt a cold, digital numbness spreading through my nerves. The System wasn't trying to kill me; it was trying to format my soul.
The Final Sync
"Ren... can you hear us?" It wasn't the demon Valthazar's voice this time. It was Nobara's. Through the [Soul Link], her voice sounded crystal clear, as if she were standing right behind me.
"We're done down here," Maki's voice joined in, sounding ragged but triumphant. "The ghosts are gone. We're sending everything we have left through the link. Don't you dare lose to a guy in a suit."
Suddenly, a flood of energy hit me. It was a tidal wave of different colors—the blue sparks of Maki's physical will, the red fire of Nobara's spirit, the shadows of Megumi, and the massive, white ocean of Yuta's power. The [Soul Link] turned from a thin thread into a roaring river of light.
[SYNC RATE: 100% - PERFECT HARMONY]
[HIDDEN TECHNIQUE UNLOCKED: EVENT HORIZON]
My eyes didn't just glow violet; they turned into two tiny, swirling black holes. The silver data-threads attached to me began to crack, pixelate, and dissolve. The Architect's tablet flickered and died, the glass screen shattering into a thousand pieces.
"What is this?" the Architect stammered, his mechanical eyes flickering with static. His calm face finally showed a flicker of human fear. "This energy... it's not in the database! It's illogical! Five separate soul-signatures in one vessel?"
"It's called a team, you piece of junk," I growled. I stood up as the room's gravity finally snapped back to normal with a bone-jarring thud. "And it's the one thing you couldn't calculate because you don't have a heart to measure it with."
The Event Horizon
I stepped forward, and the ground beneath my feet didn't just break—it ceased to exist. I held out my hand, and a sphere of absolute darkness began to form. It wasn't gravity, and it wasn't a curse. It was a piece of the Void brought into the real world.
"Everything you built, everything you 'saved' to this world at the cost of human lives... it all goes back to zero," I said.
The Architect tried to run, his form flickering as he tried to teleport into the tower's digital veins. But the [Event Horizon] was a point of no return. The light from his eyes was sucked into the sphere. His suit, his body of code, and his cold logic were pulled apart bit by bit.
"ERROR," the Architect's voice echoed one last time, sounding distorted and robotic. "SYSTEM... CRITICAL... FAILURE... SHUTTING... DOWN..."
The white light at the top of the Tokyo Tower exploded in a silent, violet wave.
Author's Note: We have reached the climax! The Architect is defeated, but as the System crashes, the "Game World" is beginning to dissolve.