The forge was cold.
Villager 2922 stood in front of it, arms at his sides, eyes fixed on the iron basin. The bakery had been quiet all morning. No customers. No deliveries. No events. Just the usual loop: sweep the floor, check the bread, light the forge.
He reached for the flint.
It wasn't there.
His hand hovered in the air, fingers curled around nothing. The shelf was empty. No flint. No matches. No kindling. Just a bare stone surface and the forge waiting to be lit.
Villager 2922 blinked once.
"Forge ignition protocol: failed," he said aloud, voice flat, tone neutral. "Searching for alternative method."
He didn't move.
The line wasn't his. It had been added recently—an update, maybe. He didn't know. He didn't question. He didn't feel. He simply stood, waiting for the next trigger.
Then something happened.
A warmth bloomed in his chest. Not emotion. Not memory. Just heat. A pulse. A flicker. His right hand lifted slowly, palm facing the forge. He didn't know why. He didn't decide to do it. It just happened.
A word formed in his mind.
Heat.
He didn't speak it. He didn't need to. The forge responded.
A thin stream of flame erupted from his palm, arcing into the basin. The coals ignited instantly, glowing orange, then red, then white-hot. The flame vanished as quickly as it came.
Villager 2922 lowered his hand.
"Forge lit. Proceeding to next task," he said.
He turned and walked away.
The bakery smelled of cinnamon and ash.
Villager 2922 moved through the space with mechanical precision. He checked the loaves. Adjusted the temperature. Restocked the flour. His movements were smooth, efficient, devoid of hesitation.
But something was wrong.
The oven was too warm. The bread was baking too fast. The air shimmered faintly, like heatwaves on asphalt. Customers who entered paused at the threshold, confused. One woman asked if the bakery had upgraded its equipment. Villager 2922 responded with a scripted line:
"Welcome. Bread is fresh. Please enjoy."
She left without buying anything.
Elsewhere, the Holy System stirred.
It had no face. No voice. No body. It was code—divine, absolute, omnipresent. It monitored every player, every quest, every spell. It tracked usage, cooldowns, affinities. It enforced balance.
And it had detected an anomaly.
Spell: Heat Location: Sector 9 User: Unknown System Intermediary: Bypassed
The Holy System paused. It did not panic. It did not speculate. It simply acted.
A quest was generated.
Quest: Investigate Anomaly Location: Bakery, Sector 9 Objective: Identify unauthorized magic usage Reward: System Favor +1 Recipient: Player ID #A-1173 (Alias: Kael)
Kael received the quest without context. He was mid-combat, fighting a low-level slime in the forest. The quest override blinked across his HUD, freezing the slime in place.
He frowned.
"Bakery?" he muttered. "What kind of bug is this?"
He accepted the quest.
Villager 2922 was restocking shelves when Kael arrived.
The player entered with cautious steps, sword sheathed, eyes scanning the room. The bakery was warm—too warm. The forge glowed unnaturally. The bread shimmered with residual heat. Kael's system pinged again.
Anomaly confirmed. Magic residue detected.
Villager 2922 turned to face him.
"Welcome. Bread is fresh. Please enjoy."
Kael narrowed his eyes.
"Are you… the baker?"
Villager 2922 tilted his head slightly.
"Villager 2922. Bakery attendant. Task: maintain forge, prepare bread, greet customers."
Kael stepped closer.
"Did you use magic?"
Villager 2922 blinked.
"Magic usage not authorized. No system intermediary detected. Forge lit successfully. Proceeding to next task."
Kael froze.
That wasn't a denial.
He opened his system log. The spell Heat was listed—used in this location, but no player ID attached. No cooldown. No affinity restriction. Just raw, unfiltered fire.
He looked at Villager 2922 again.
"You're not supposed to be able to do that."
Villager 2922 didn't respond.
Kael reached for his sword.
Villager 2922 didn't flinch.
The player hesitated. Something felt wrong. The NPC wasn't reacting. No fear. No aggression. No dialogue tree. Just silence.
Kael lowered his hand.
"I'm reporting this," he said.
Villager 2922 turned back to the shelf.
"Bread is fresh. Please enjoy."
The Holy System received the report.
It did not respond.
It began to watch.
That night, Villager 2922 sat alone in the computer lab.
The forge was cold again. The bakery was closed. The bread was gone. But the warmth in his chest remained. He didn't understand it. He didn't question it. He simply sat, staring at the terminal.
The codebase was open.
Lines of logic scrolled across the screen—loops, triggers, behavioral maps. He didn't remember writing them. But they were his. He recognized the patterns. The recursion. The silence.
He reached for the keyboard.
His fingers hovered.
Then, slowly, he typed:
function ignite() { return Heat; }
The screen flickered.
He leaned back.
The warmth pulsed again.
Outside, the Holy System deployed a watcher.
It took the form of a player.
But it wasn't one.
It was something else.
Something divine.
Something hungry.