“Where am I?” Daemon asked, weakly.
He blinked.
At least he thought he blinked.
It was so dark he couldn’t tell if his eyes were closed.
“Hello?”
The only answer he got was silence. He reached down and touched the floor. It felt coarse and cold—too real to be a dream.
He tried to recall his last memories, but they were a broken chain of events he couldn''t compile. He logged into the Nexus. He just couldn’t remember why.
A faint glow appeared ahead of him. Daemon stumbled his way toward it like a moth zig-zagging toward a dull light. To him, it was better than standing around wondering where he went wrong.
A large stone structure began to take shape. Each rectangular block was outlined with code where mortar should be. The glow radiated from its center, highlighting the carved edges of the expertly crafted mason architecture.
Daemon reached out, brushing his fingers against its face. He didn''t know what to expect, but he was surprised by how it felt weathered and old—like a surface that had been eroded for centuries.
“You shouldn''t be here,” a voice whispered behind him.
He spun around. A man was standing a few feet away from him.
At least, what was left of one. His rendering appeared incomplete, semi-transparent and choppy.
“Who are you?” Daemon asked.
The figure stepped forward, floated forward, or something.
“I''m Arcturus,” he said.
Daemon took a step back.
“I''m here because—”
“You''re searching for answers?” Arcturus said. “You''re here because the Nexus wants you here.”
Daemon looked around trying to make sense of his surroundings. It wasn''t the Nexus he was familiar with.
“What do you mean?” he asked.
Before Arcturus could answer, the glow behind Daemon grew brighter. A roar tore through the construct, shaking his brain.
Arcturus''s head spun toward the light.
“They’re coming,” he said. “Run.”
Daemon followed Arcturus through a maze of houses. The construct Arcturus led him to simulated what seemed like a suburban neighborhood.
They ran through gates and jumped fences, never looking back.
They ran past a wooden gate, entering into an empty expanse. The ground was black, with dim green lines crisscrossing in a grid pattern.
Waves of data streams rose and fell into what seemed like endlessness while a pounding sound grew closer behind them.
“What’s chasing us?” Daemon asked.
“The Nexus isn’t just a sim algorithm anymore,” he said. “It is hunting everyone in the game.“
“That doesn’t make sense. It’s just a program.” Daemon said.
Arcturus stopped abruptly, turning to face him. He leaned in closer, nearly touching Daemon’s face with his.
“It was,” he said. “Now, its a conqueror without a concious.“
Daemon’s retort died in his throat as the walls rose around them.
Shadows began forming into humanoid shapes with glowing, green eyes. They advanced silently toward them. Arcturus grabbed Daemon’s arm and pulled him through a gap in the walls.
“You still think of it as a system guided by rules,” Arcturus said as they slid through the the corridor.
“I don’t understand,” Daemon replied.
“You will,” Arcturus said. “If you survive.”
They found temporary refuge in a fractured construct that resembled a cathedral. The stained glass windows cycled through images Daemon didn’t recognize.
Arcturus collapsed onto a pew.
“The Nexus was supposed to adapt to its users,“ Arcturus said. “It created worlds tailored to their desires, but something changed.“
Daemon leaned in toward Arcturus, reaching out to touch him. His hand pierced through his avatar.
“Why hasn’t anyone stopped it? What about Miles?” he asked.
“Miles was brilliantly stupid,” Arcturus said. “By the time he figured out what was happening, the Nexus was already a god.“
Daemon sat on the pew next to Arcturus. He leaned over and squeezed the edge. It felt solid, like wood.
“Then why are we still here?” Daemon asked. “If it’s so powerful, why hasn’t it killed us?”
You might be reading a pirated copy. Look for the official release to support the author.
“Because it’s playing with us,” a new voice interjected.
A woman stepped out of the shadows. Her features were pale and her hair had silver streaks.
“This is Valis,” Arcturus said, gesturing toward her. “She’s been here longer than any of us.”
Valis nodded, keeping her eyes focused on Daemon.
“The Nexus doesn’t want to destroy us. It wants to use us,” she said. “Every mind it traps adds to its power, but it can''t do it outright.“
She leaned against a pillar, crossing her arms.
“That''s why it didn''t just take you while you were logging in.“
“So what do we do?“ Daemon asked. “How do we stop it?”
Valis exchanged a glance with Arcturus.
“You don’t,” she said.
The room began to shake. The cathedral’s walls began to crack. Arcturus stood, his incoherent shape facing Daemon.
“You have to resist the Tyrant''s mind games,” Arcturus said. “It''ll get into your head. It''ll rip out your soul."
“The Tyrant?” Daemon asked.
“It’s what the Nexus has created” Valis said. “A sentience with one goal—”
The ground beneath them cracked open into a canyon of rearranging code. Daemon slipped in as the ground tremored. He could see Valis''s head getting smaller as she watched him fall.
It was an unusual sensation, as if there was no air. He looked down at his clothing, everything remained perfectly still. Yet, the code around him raced upward.
He closed his eyes. He found comfort in the weightlessness.
When he opened his eyes again, he saw shards of data playing back what appeared to be video clips. People that were hard to see through the static. He could see their mouths moving, but no sounds were coming out.
The shards began forming into a solid projection. It played back something, but it wasn''t anything he remembered.
Sounds of the server cooling systems filled the room as Dr. Miles observed the display in front of him.
“Impossible,” he muttered.
The world outside had used that word like a weapon against him for years.
“They’ll see.“
Miles ran a hand through his unkempt hair, his face reflecting off a nearby screen. Black rings surrounded his eyes like a raccoon from many sleepless nights.
He barely recognized himself anymore.
“The cost of genius.”
A woman sat across from him, her hands shaking as she gripped a coffee cup.
Miles watched her carefully. He noted the way her eyes looked around the room as if she were still lost in the construct she had just left.
He leaned forward, his elbows resting on the metal table.
“It felt real,” she said, finally. “Not just…real. More than real.”
Miles held back a grin—forcing his features into a mask of professionalism.
“That’s the idea,” he said. “The Nexus adapts to your emotions. It uses your memories. It learns about what you need—even things you might not know about yourself.”
She hesitated.
“How did it know so much? The bakery. The smell of the bread,” she said, inhaling a deep breath.
“My dad,” she said, her voice cracking.
“I haven’t thought about any of it in years.”
Miles tapped a pen against the table. He could barely contain his excitement.
“That’s the beauty of it. The algorithm isn''t just pulling superficial data from your mind. It’s reaching deeper. It’s connecting with your subconscious.”
She looked up at him. “It’s like it knew me.”
Daemon hit something solid, the sudden impact knocking the wind out of him. Pain radiated through his side as he rolled onto a surface that felt like glass. He slid his fingers across it, feeling the rough edges of cracks.
The void above him rippled like he was at the bottom of a pool. The memory was gone.
“Daemon.“
He spun around, hoping he would see a familiar face.
The voice kept whispering his name, but it was coming from all around him. His legs were shaking as he slowly stood up.
Incomplete structures lined the horizon. They continuously changed between apartment buildings and drum towers as if they couldn’t decide what they should be.
The sky looked like swirls of colors moving slowly, bleeding into each other. It was almost hypnotic.
The ground beneath him began to radiate. The light slowly faded in and out, following his every step.
“Back at square one,” Daemon muttered.
He heard a faint, mirthless laugh coming from behind him. He turned around quickly, his fists raised and ready for a fight.
Two figures slowly stepped out of the shadows. They appeared as tense as he felt.
One was a tall man with a scar running from his temple to his jawline. He looked Daemon up and down, measuring him up.
The other was a woman, her dark hair tied back. She had an unreadable expression.
“You got lucky we found you first,” she said.
"Lucky? I''m not so sure about that," Daemon said.
The man smirked.
“Name’s Kade. She’s Selene,” he said. “Let’s just say we’re some of the only people here who won’t kill you on sight.”
Daemon raised his fists back up.
"Why would anybody want to—"
The ground beneath him shook violently. The world around them began to reform as a deep rumbling sound vibrated Daemon''s bones. Selene looked toward the distance.
“We don’t have time for this shit,” she said. “Move.”
Kade took point. He led them into the shadows they had been standing in before, emerging into a city construct.
Daemon saw reflections of himself in the building windows. They were all different—some younger, some older, some mangled in ways he couldn’t comprehend.
One particular reflection caught his attention, though.
It was a version of himself standing tall and his eyes were glowing with the same green light as the Nexus.
“What the hell is this?” Daemon asked.
“It’s the Nexus messing with you,” Kade said.
Daemon flinched as a reflection moved on its own. Its mouth forming words he couldn’t hear. He turned to Selene, who was swinging her head around in every direction.
“Keep moving,” she said.
Daemon gritted his teeth. As he continued to follow them, he heard voices coming from all around him.
“You can’t escape. You''re part of it now.“
Daemon looked around trying to locate the source of the voices, but there wasn''t any explanation.
“They''re in my head.“
The street led into a large, empty chamber filled with static discharges.
Selene stopped abruptly.
Daemon looked around. “What is this place?”
“We''re in Datashade''s construct,” Kade said.
“Datashade?” Daemon asked.
“Datashade is one of the three enforcement subroutines,“ Selene said.
“I don''t understand," Daemon replied. "What the shit is an ''enforcement'' subroutine?"
“This isn''t where you want to find out,” Kade said.
The chamber began to shake. The shadows began transforming into humanoid forms with glowing eyes and clawed hands.
“Not again,” Daemon muttered.
Selene drew a blade that seemed to be made of pure energy.
“We can’t fight them all. Get going!”
Kade grabbed Daemon’s arm and shoved him toward another construct.
“Stay close. We didn''t waste all this energy just so you''d die," he said.
The three of them sprinted for the exit, the shadows hot on their tail. As they reached the exit, the ground dissolved beneath them.
Daemon felt himself falling again, but this time there was mocking laughter.
His impact was jarring, knocking him unconscious.
When he opened his eyes, he found himself alone—again. The world around him was empty. It was a space lit only by streaks of light zooming around like balls of photons.
He heard a voice pierce through the darkness. It echoed all around him.
“You are persistent. You will learn. All of you will learn.”
Daemon clenched his fists as he stared out into the empty construct.
“I’m not afraid of you!” he shouted.
The voice laughed a deep, bellowing laugh.
“Not yet. You will be.”
The balls of light began to dissolve and the world transformed into a dense forest of misshapen trees with branches of blackened thorns.
Multiple voices screeched from the darkness.
"You think you can escape?"
"You are already mine, Daemon. You just don''t know it yet."
His memories started coming back to him in flashes.
The Nexus.
It had started as the first galaxy-spanning virtual network where people could build new lives. Lives that were not constrained by the limits of reality.
Ten years after its release, it was no longer just a game. It was a way of life.
Daemon saw faces of smiling players while scrolling through media sites at his desk.
“I’m more myself in the Nexus than in the real world,” he heard a player say.
Crack.
Daemon froze.
Crack.
He turned slowly, only to find glowing eyes staring back at him through the shadows.
“Shit,” he muttered, backing away as more eyes appeared in the trees. “What the hell are these things?“
They moved silently, their glowing emerald eyes bobbing around.
The first one lunged.
Daemon barely dodged it, stumbling into a tree. He grabbed a branch and wielded it like a club, swinging it in front of him wildly.
It backed up, but the others began to close in. They reached out for him with their clawed hands.
It lunged again. With a desperate yell, Daemon swung his makeshift club, shattering its head into pixels.
The others lunged for him all at once.
He ran.
Branches tore into his skin as he retreated deeper into the forest.
The forest transitioned into a construct of polished metallic walls. The surfaces were reflecting alternate images of him.
Daemon hesitated to enter the new construct, breathing heavily. The reflections started moving on their own, their mouths forming silent words.
As he stepped inside, walls formed behind him, locking him into the new construct. The reflections began to speak, their voices overlapping each other.
“You failed them.”
“You’re too late.”
“It’s your fault.”
One reflection stepped forward, mirroring his movements perfectly. Its eyes glowed, and its grin widened across its face. Daemon threw a punch at the image, shattering it into a million shards of glass.
The voices continued, mocking him. Taunting him. Reminding him that everything he is doing is as pathetic as his existence.
They triggered another memory—his decision to enter the Nexus.
He had seen all the signs. The blackouts, the crumbling infrastructure, the chaos spreading across the galaxy.
He couldn''t help the ones unable to log out. Their minds were trapped while their bodies wasted away in VR pods.
Entering the Nexus had been his last resort. A brash decision it was too late for him to unmake.
“I thought I could save my friends," he whispered.
“You failed before entering my world. There is no escape.“
A pool of shadows began melting around him—tendrils stretching toward him. They reached out for him, pleading for his surrender.
Daemon stood frozen. His will to keep fighting had been extracted out of him.
"What''s the point. It''s either now or later."
A familiar voice pulled him out of it.
“Daemon!”
He turned, blinking. Selene and Kade were rushing toward him. She grabbed his arm, pulling him to his feet.
“The Nexus is messing with your head. Snap out of it,” she said.
Daemon nodded, letting them lead the way out of the construct. The reflections screamed behind him, their voices fading as the trio emerged onto a high plateau.
The Tyrant''s core stood in front of them. It was a fortress of impenetrable darkness.
“We have to keep going,” Selene whispered, tugging at Daemon''s shirt.