Chapter 8 - The Flesh Transfer Protocol
Ethan stumbled through the flickering remains of the Afterdark simulation, his breath ragged, his body still reeling from the aftermath of the system override. His mind felt fractured, his thoughts spiralling between relief and horror. He had escaped, but at what cost?
Tia was gone.
Not just lost, deleted. Erased. Her final scream echoed in his head, her violet eyes filled with fury and betrayal. The last thing she had tried to say to him—lost in the digital abyss before he could hear it. The neon skyline of the Bridge loomed ahead, distorted from the shockwave of his escape. A deep, sickening weight settled in his chest, heavier than any battle wound he had suffered. He forced himself forward, dragging his battered body through the city’s labyrinthine streets.
> [Objective]: Reach Exit Point.
His HUD flickered, overlaying the rapidly changing markers across his vision. He wasn’t safe yet. The Great One had its eyes on him now. CyberWatch would be closing in if they weren’t already aware. He had to return to the real world before everything collapsed around him.
The designated exit point was close—an abandoned server farm buried beneath a crumbling industrial sector of the Bridge. A waypoint burned at the edge of his vision, directing him through shifting alleys and glitched-out structures. Every step felt like dragging his soul through broken glass. His body was on autopilot, but his mind was drowning in thoughts of what he had done. The echoes of a social world lost to time faded behind him as he crossed into the lower districts. No neon lights here, only shadows, the remnants of a forgotten world reduced to decayed data structures. The air crackled with broken code and unstable scripts, the environment struggling to maintain its corrupted integrity.
Then, out of the darkness— Figures emerged. Hooded, armed, moving with precision. Not NPCs. Real divers. A group of five mercenaries, thugs, by the looks of them. Their gear was too high-end to be standard scavengers. Data thieves? Digital warlords? Or worse… CyberWatch''s digital strike teams? Ethan’s hand instinctively tightened around the hilt of his [Phase Dagger], his muscles coiling for action. The tallest of the group stepped forward, his avatar flickering slightly, an aftermarket overlay designed to hide his identity. He carried a modified Neural Disruptor, a weapon designed to disable rogue AI and human divers alike.
“Looks like we found ourselves a lost traveler” the leader said, his voice dripping with amusement. “And judging by that glitch in your shadow, you’ve got something valuable on you.”
Ethan’s HUD flashed warnings, his health was still critically low, cooldowns from the battle at Afterdark still active. They had picked the perfect moment to strike.
The mercenaries fanned out, encircling him. The leader tapped his gauntlet, activating an encrypted message protocol. “Listen, we can do this two ways,” he continued, taking a slow step forward. “You hand over whatever you stole, and we let you walk. Or...”
Ethan didn’t let him finish. He moved. A burst of raw adrenaline surged through him, his Phase Step activating mid-motion. He teleported behind the nearest thug, his dagger carving a sharp arc through the air.
> [CRITICAL HIT]
> Lethal Strike - 205 DMG Inflicted
The thug collapsed with a spray of blood, crashing onto the floor. The others reacted instantly; weapons raised. A gunshot rang out, a Pulse Round, streaking toward him with an electric hum. Ethan barely twisted out of the way, but the energy field grazed his side.
> [ALERT][Damaged Received]: [HP] - 14% REMAINING.
Gritting his teeth, he lunged into the next closest enemy, slashing through his torso in a blur of motion. The blade glitched mid-strike, momentarily flickering between existence and nothingness before re-stabilizing in his grip.
> [System Instability Detected].
"Shit..." He thought. The override at Afterdark had damaged him more than he realized. His very presence in the Abyss was starting to break apart.
The final two mercenaries hesitated, realizing they weren’t dealing with a standard rogue diver. The leader narrowed his eyes, tapping into a private channel. “He’s not normal. Pull back. Now.”
They turned to flee. Ethan, without hesitation, activated his [Phase Step], again. The air around him warped as time bent in his favor, his movements blurring as he closed the distance in an instant. He drove his dagger into the leader’s back, his corrupted HUD flashing with distorted data as he landed the killing blow.
> [Stealth][Bonus Damage][Critical Hit]
The last mercenary barely managed a gasp before Ethan’s fist connected with his jaw, sending him sprawling onto the fragmented pavement. Ethan stood over him, breath ragged, his dagger still humming with residual energy.
The man’s visor flickered, his avatar glitching as if about to be forcibly disconnected. “Please... Please... Don''t kill me... I have a fam-”
Ethan quickly delivered a killing blow, his [Phase Dagger] cutting straight through the wounded mercenary''s neck and nearly taking his head clean off his shoulders. His HUD flickered erratically, his system struggling to stabilize after the prolonged combat. Blood—digital yet unsettlingly real—pooled beneath his boots as the final remnants of his attackers faded into oblivion.
> [ALERT]: Location Secured.
> [Objective]: Reach Exit Point.
His vision refocused, locking onto the pulsing waypoint in his HUD. It was only a short distance now. Just a few more turns through the fractured cityscape, and he would finally be free. But something gnawed at him—an unseen weight pressing against his thoughts. The Great One. It had manipulated him, led him through a path of destruction, and now it was watching, waiting for his next move. Shoving aside the thoughts, he moved. His legs ached with each step, his regeneration sluggish from system instability. He weaved through darkened alleyways, past towering ruins of long-forgotten districts, until finally, he reached the waypoint.
Except, there was no exit. Instead, a domain portal swirled before him. A shimmering vortex of pure, fractured data pulsed where the exit point should have been, its surface rippling like a void waiting to consume all that stepped through it. Ethan’s heart pounded. This wasn’t what Kira had programmed. The exit coordinates were supposed to lead to a controlled disconnection, a clean break back to reality. This was something else. The Great One. The realization sank into him like a knife. He had been redirected and it wasn''t going to be that easy to leave.
Ethan clenched his jaw, his fingers tightening around the Phase Dagger. The Bridge loomed behind him, a dying city of corrupted dreams and digital ghosts. He could stay, try to find another way out. Or he could step forward—into the unknown.
He had no choice. Taking a deep breath, he stepped through.
<hr>
The sensation was immediate—like being ripped apart at the molecular level and stitched back together in an instant. Ethan felt his body distort, his vision fracturing as the abyss swallowed him whole. He tumbled through non-space, an endless tunnel of shifting data, his interface screaming warnings of environmental instability.
> [WARNING]: UNSTABLE DATA STREAM DETECTED
> LOCATION: UNKNOWN
The tunnel stretched on forever, twisting, folding in on itself. Glitching architecture flickered in and out of existence—broken staircases, crumbling corridors, fragmented echoes of places that should not exist. It was familiar. He has seen this place within the data cache files... This was where Cedric had been.
The realization sent a shiver down Ethan’s spine. The same tunnel system his brother had walked before his final moments, before he disappeared. The digital abyss twisted once more, and suddenly, the tunnel walls solidified. Ethan slammed into the ground with a grunt, his body aching as he struggled to his feet. His HUD flickered wildly, recalibrating. Towering bookshelves, their structures twisted and fragmented, stretched toward the infinite void above. Strange glyphs flickered across the ancient tomes; remnants of lost knowledge locked behind incomprehensible encryption. The air was heavy, charged with an unnatural stillness.
And at the center of it all a throne.
A massive, jagged seat of fused bone and metal loomed atop a raised platform, pulsating with raw data streams. Dark tendrils coiled from its base, weaving through the ruins like veins of some digital monolith. Seated upon it, draped in layers of tattered robes and shifting code, was the Necromancer. His skeletal hands rested upon the armrests, his form flickering between decayed flesh and raw, corrupted energy. Twin points of burning crimson light pierced through the hood obscuring his face. He was staring directly at Ethan. Ethan’s gasped as he met the gaze of the Necromancer.
“You have arrived” the Necromancer intoned; his voice layered with a chorus of distorted echoes. “I wondered how long I would be waiting for this moment.”
Ethan’s grip tightened around his [Phase Dagger]. His entire body screamed at him to run, to escape, but there was no exit. This was the end of the line.
“Who are you?” Ethan spat. “What are you?”
The Necromancer chuckled, the sound reverberating through the very fabric of the library. “Yet here you stand. You have walked the path of ruin, shattered the false gods of this world. You are well deserved of the title I gave you, Harbringer.”
Ethan took a step forward, his gaze locked onto the entity before him. “The Great One?”
The Great One’s hollow eyes burned brighter. “The Great One, The Necromancer, this amoung many other names I have been come to be known by over the years. It matters not Harbringer, what matters is that you are here now. And you are mine.”
A cold dread crept up Ethan’s spine. He had played into the Great One’s hands from the start. The Lower Wards, The Cult of the Old Code, The war against Agoral. The destruction of Afterdark. The data cache... Tia... Every step had led him here, to this moment.
Ethan’s HUD flickered violently.
> [WARNING]: DATA ANOMALY DETECTED
> EXTERNAL FORCE ATTEMPTING SYSTEM REWRITE
His body ached—not from exhaustion, but from something deeper. A presence clawing at the edges of his code, trying to infiltrate his mind. Ethan clenched his fists. “You aren''t going to take me without a fight, whatever your name is, whatever you are!”
The Great One leaned forward, its skeletal fingers tapping against the throne’s armrest. “Your defiance is admirable... But futile.”
The air around Ethan shimmered. The library warped, bookshelves twisting into towering shadows. From the darkness, figures emerged. Echoes.
Tia''s form flickered to life among them, her expression frozen in agony, her body wrapped in the same tendrils of corruption that coiled from the Great One’s throne. His eyes—once sharp and filled with determination—were hollow.
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Ethan’s chest tightened. “Tia…”
The echo of Tia did not respond. Ethan caught another glimpse of a familiar face, Cedric. An echo of Cedric stood frozen and wrapped in the same tendrils of corruption, seemingly lifeless.
"Cedric!" Ethan gasped. There was no response.
The Great One’s voice slithered through the void. “I can bring them back Ethan, you can be with them again. All you need to do is stop fighting, you are tired, I feel it. Stop fighting and let me in. Let me rewrite what was lost, reshape what was broken. You could see her again—Tia, Cedric, all restored. You need only accept my gift, Harbinger. Accept your purpose."
Ethan clenched his fists, his mind a battlefield of logic and desperation. The Great One''s words dripped with promise, yet every fibre of his being screamed against it.
"You think I don''t see the trap?" Ethan spat. "You don''t restore. You consume. You rewrite. Tia, Cedric—they wouldn''t be themselves. They''d be yours."
The Great One''s burning gaze flickered with something akin to amusement. "Ah, but does it matter? If they walk, if they speak, if they remember you—does it matter that they are more? That they are better?"
Ethan took a step back, his grip tightening around his [Phase Dagger]. "You''re not a god. You''re a parasite. And I''m not your host."
A ripple of irritation passed through the chamber. The shadows coiled, and the Great One''s form darkened, the glow of his skeletal fingers intensifying. "So stubborn. So narrow in your view of what could be. Fine. Perhaps you require a more personal demonstration."
The air split. A jagged rupture tore through reality, and from it, Tia stepped forward. Or at least, something that wore her face. Her violet eyes glowed with eerie intensity, her movements too fluid, too precise, her form shimmering with the same corrupted tendrils that wrapped around the echoes in the chamber. She tilted her head, as if studying him. Quickly and without hesitation she attacked. Ethan barely managed to raise his [Phase Dagger] before Tia’s corrupted form was upon him. Her movements were inhumanly fast, a blur of raw speed and precision. Her blade, warped, jagged, and pulsing with dark energy—came down in a brutal arc, aimed straight for his head.
> [Dodge]: Failure.
> [ALERT][Damage][HP] - 22% REMAINING.
Ethan barely twisted out of the way, but her corrupted sword carved across his shoulder, sending searing pain through his system. His HUD flashed red, warning of severe structural integrity damage. His body staggered backward as she pressed forward, relentless and unyielding.
“Tia! Stop! It’s me!” Ethan gasped, raising his hands in a futile attempt to halt the onslaught. She didn’t hesitate. She didn’t even blink.
Another strike came, this time a spinning slash aimed for his abdomen. Ethan barely activated [Phase Step] in time, blinking several feet away, but Tia was already adjusting, already predicting. Her corrupted form shimmered, before suddnely, she was right in front of him.
> [WARNING]: UNAUTHORIZED SYSTEM EVENT DETECTED.
Her hand shot forward, gripping his throat with terrifying strength, lifting him off the ground as his vision blurred from lack of air. The corrupted data tendrils that wrapped around her body extended, slithering toward him, seeking to latch onto his form, to infect, to consume.
“I... I didn’t mean to kill you!” Ethan choked, struggling in her grip. “I never...”
Tia’s expression didn’t change. Emotionless. Cold. Empty. Then, she threw him. Ethan crashed through one of the twisted bookshelves, sending ancient tomes scattering across the fragmented library floor. The impact jarred his entire system, his HUD screaming in distress as he struggled to his knees.
> [WARNING]: [HP] CRITICAL LOW - 8% REMAINING.
> [ERROR]: SYSTEM STABILITY FAILING.
“Tia, please!” he begged, forcing himself upright, blood dribbling from his mouth. “You have to fight this! I know you’re still in there!”
Tia tilted her head, as if considering his words. Then she raised her sword again, stepping toward him with mechanical precision. The Great One’s voice slithered through the void.
“Fool,” he rumbled. “She is beyond saving. You killed her once—why do you hesitate now?”
Ethan clenched his teeth. He refused. He wouldn’t do it again. But Tia didn’t hesitate. She lunged, her sword thrusting straight for his heart.
> [WARNING]: DEATH IMMINENT.
Ethan’s mind screamed. No. He couldn’t. He wouldn’t fight her. Not her. Not again.
For the briefest moment—her attack slowed. A flicker of something behind her cold, dead gaze. A hesitation in the way her fingers curled around her corrupted sword. A glitch in her movements—an inconsistency in the Great One’s control. A memory. Ethan seized it. With the last of his strength, he twisted to the side, narrowly avoiding her fatal strike. His dagger found an opening in her chest.
Tia’s eyes flickered again. Her mouth trembled.
“Don’t let… it take… you too.” Her voice was barely a whisper, but it shattered him.
With a final, decisive motion, Ethan drove the dagger deep into her heart. Her corrupted body convulsed, violet eyes widening in something that could almost be relief. The tendrils of dark energy began to unravel, breaking apart into raw, fragmented data. The Great One’s control snapped.
Tia collapsed into his arms, her weight unfamiliar—heavier than he remembered. Her form flickered, destabilizing, the corruption consuming her fading away. But it was too late. She was dying. And this time, there was no coming back. Ethan held her close as her avatar fragmented, piece by piece. His arms trembled, his breathing ragged, his mind barely comprehending what had just happened.
“Tia…” he whispered. “I’m sorry… I’m so sorry…” And then she was gone, again.
A suffocating silence settled over the library. Ethan knelt there, his hands trembling as he stared at the empty space where Tia had just been. His breath came in ragged gasps, his mind reeling from what he had done—what he had been forced to do.
A deep, echoing chuckle reverberated through the vast chamber, rattling the very bones of the library. The Great One had been watching with amusement.
"How disappointing..." the voice slithered through the shadows. "Twice now, you''ve had to destroy her!”
Ethan''s hands clenched into fists, his nails digging into his palms so hard he thought he might bleed. He shot to his feet, turning toward the shadowed figure on the throne. His eyes burned with fury, his voice a raw snarl. "You made me do it! You took her from me! You corrupted her!"
The Great One leaned forward slightly, as if considering Ethan''s words. "Did I? Or did I simply reveal what was already within you? You fight with rage, you kill without pause and for what?"
Ethan''s breath was heavy, his body trembling with barely contained rage. "For her. For Cedric. For all the people you''ve twisted into your puppets."
The Great One exhaled, a low, synthetic sound vibrating through the room. "You still fail to grasp the truth. Tia never belonged to you. She never belonged to herself."
Ethan''s stomach twisted. "You''re lying."
"Am I?" The Great One gestured with a skeletal hand, and from the shadows, a fragmented data projection of Tia flickered into existence. Her form was ghostly, glitching, as if trapped in an endless state of decay. "She merged with me long ago. Her body and mind were separated, yes, but I saved her, Ethan. I preserved what remained. Do you not see? She was already gone before you ever killed her."
Ethan’s world tilted. His throat tightened, his mind screaming against the implication. "No... No, you’re just twisting the truth again. I felt her fight back! She was still in there!"
The Great One tilted its head. "For a fleeting moment, perhaps. But I can bring her back whenever I wish, Ethan. I can restore her to you—whole, perfect, untouched by death."
The offer struck deep, like a knife buried in his chest. The idea of having her back made his resolve waver for just a breath. But that hesitation was all the Great One needed.
"I will offer you this once more" the Great One continued, its crimson eyes gleaming. "Accept what you are. Accept what I have made you. And in return, I will grant you what you desire most. Not just Tia. Not just Cedric. But all that was lost."
Ethan swallowed, his throat dry. The pain, the exhaustion, the sheer weight of what he had endured threatened to crush him. A life without pain. A life where Tia stood beside him again. Where Cedric laughed at his side.
Ethan exhaled slowly, straightening his posture. When he spoke, his voice was clear, steady, unwavering. "I don''t want your twisted version of her. Of them. I don''t want your lies. I don’t want your gift."
The Great One’s amusement faded. The chamber trembled.
"You are a fool."
A sudden shockwave of raw power exploded outward, sending Ethan skidding back across the chamber floor. The Great One rose from its throne, its towering form darkening, shadows writhing around it like living things. "You will not leave this place alive."
Ethan got to his feet, and what he thought might be his last act of defiance took a fighting stance.
"This is why you became my Harbringer, Ethan" The Great One announced while approaching him. "That determination and sheer defiance... It is a shame it is misplaced."
"I won''t make this easy for you" Ethan cursed.
"And I wouldn''t want it that way" The Great One taunted. "And before you die, you will receive one last blessing". The Great One raised his skeleton hand, an echo with an unfamiliar face cried out in agony as it was sapped for lifeforce, a shot of light shot out and engulfed Ethan.
Ethan''s HUD jolted with a message.
>[ALERT] [HP]: restored to [100%]
"What did you just do?!" Ethan yelled in protest, he felt instantly reinvigorated as the light around him faded.
"I made sure this will not end quickly" The Great One laughed, "I want to enjoy this, and savour every moment"
Ethan barely had time to react before the Great One moved. A tidal wave of raw, corrupted energy surged from the entity, twisting the air into spiralling tendrils of blackened code. Ethan rolled to the side, narrowly avoiding a jagged spear of data that embedded itself into the floor, shattering stone upon impact.
> [WARNING]: HOSTILE ENTITY ATTACK IMMINENT
The Great One did not wait. It lunged forward, its form flickering, phasing between states of digital reality and something far more nightmarish. Ethan barely managed to activate [Phase Step], teleporting just as the skeletal hand lashed out toward his chest.
> [Phase Step] Activated
He reappeared a few meters away, gripping his Phase Dagger tighter, sweat dripping down his brow. The Great One turned its burning gaze upon him, unreadable yet filled with something like amusement. "You delay the inevitable, Harbinger. But you are still mine."
Ethan clenched his jaw, raising his weapon. "Try me." The fight erupted into chaos.
The Great One struck first—shadowed tendrils lashed out in rapid succession, forcing Ethan to dodge, weave, and parry. Each impact shattered the ground around him, sending fractures of raw data splintering through the library’s floor. Every missed step, every half-second delay, and Ethan would be torn apart. He darted forward, aiming for a weak spot—a flickering point of instability in the Great One’s form.
> [Lethal Strike Attempt]
His dagger connected, or so he thought. At the last second, the Great One split apart, its body fragmenting into multiple reflections of itself. The illusionary figures swirled around Ethan in a storm of phantoms, each one flickering between data and flesh.
"I am more than code, Harbinger. You cannot kill what is endless."
Ethan pivoted, slashing at the closest figure, but it dissolved into mist upon contact. A blast of energy struck his side, sending him tumbling backward into a fractured column.
> [WARNING] [HP]: Incoming Damage -42%
His HUD screamed warnings at him. He was losing. But he wasn’t done yet. Forcing himself up, he scanned the battlefield, his eyes locking onto one of the Great One’s reflections. The real one.
"DIE!" Ethan shrieked, before making his move.
> [Phase Step] Activated
He teleported directly above the Great One’s true form, flipping mid-air and driving his dagger downward with all his strength.
> [CRITICAL HIT] - 275 DMG INFLECTED.
The blade sank deep. The Great One let out a sound not of pain, but of pure, unfiltered rage. The entity exploded. A shockwave of corrupted energy radiated outward, sending both combatants flying. Ethan crashed hard against the shattered remains of the throne, his vision swimming with static. His limbs felt numb. His HUD flickered violently.
> [SYSTEM CRITICAL]
Across the battlefield, the Great One reeled, its form flickering, destabilizing. But not dead. Not yet. Ethan tried to rise—but so did the Great One. They locked eyes across the ruined chamber, Ethan''s body broken, and his power drained. Ethan gritted his teeth as he barely dodged another devastating blow from The Great One. The corrupted entity’s form flickered between existence and oblivion, a monstrous blend of shifting code and raw, abyssal energy. Each strike carried the weight of an entire digital world, rewriting reality with every impact. Ethan’s muscles screamed with exhaustion; his Phase Dagger dull from the relentless exchange. His HUD was a blur of flashing red warnings.
> [WARNING] [HP]: Critical Damage -18%
> [System Instability Detected] – Data integrity failing
He staggered backward, rolling just in time to avoid a spear-like tendril that slammed into the shattered ground where he had stood a moment before. Dust and broken code fragments erupted around him. His breaths came ragged and uneven. He was losing.
The Great One loomed over him, its skeletal fingers twisting through the air, preparing another reality-breaking strike. "You are at your end, Harbinger" he intoned, his voice layered with thousands of whispers. "You fought well, but defiance does not grant you victory."
> [WARNING]: SYSTEM FAILURE IMMINENT
> [WARNING][HP] 9% CRITICAL LOW
Ethan forced himself upright. His body trembled. His System Exploit was still on cooldown. His Phase Step had been used too many times in rapid succession. He had nothing left.
Except…
He saw it. A flicker, a hinder in the Great One’s movements. A fraction of a second where its attack pattern wavered—not from power, but from something else. This was it. His only chance. If he failed, he would die. If he hesitated, he would be rewritten.
His fingers tightened around his [Phase Dagger] His HUD flickered erratically, barely able to keep up with the distortions. The Great One attacked sending tendrils lashing out, seeking to rewrite him, to consume him, but he was faster—his Phase Step activated in a final, desperate burst, blinking him directly in front of the Great One, their eyes met for a moment. He sensed something almost like hesitation within the Great One’s gaze. That was all Ethan needed, he capitalized on The Great One’s delay, thrusting his [Phase Dagger] deep into the mass of The Great One. A piercing shriek erupted as The Great One convulsed, his entire form distorting like a shattered mirror. Ethan’s HUD glitched and rapidly, making visibility near impossible.
> [SYSTEM ERROR]
> [SYSTEM ERROR]
> [SYSTEM ERROR]
Waves of raw data exploded outward, sending cracks rippling through the fabric of the Abyss itself. Ethan barely managed to stay on his feet as the ground beneath him split apart.
Ethan’s HUD spasmed with error messages. His vision blurred, the colors of the Abyss warping, breaking. His fingers twitched. His vision distorted—a flash of something else, something deeper, something that didn’t belong.
> [SYSTEM INTEGRITY FAILURE]
> [UNKNOWN ERROR DETECTED]
A cold sensation crawled up his spine. And then there was nothing but darkness.