The screaming outside eventually stopped. Not because everyone was safe, but because the ones who weren't were dead.
Inside the University Library, the air was unnervingly cool. The hum of the air conditioning had been replaced by a low, digital thrumming sound. The rows of bookshelves were still there, but the space between them had warped.
Floating in the center of the atrium was a massive, rotating blue cube.
[SAFE ZONE: ST. IVORY LIBRARY]
[CURRENT OCCUPANTS: 2/100]
[REGENERATION: +5 HP/MIN, +5 MP/MIN]
Elara slid down the wall, hugging her knees to her chest. Her expensive uniform was torn at the hem, stained with goblin blood and mud. She stared at the glass doors. Outside, shadows moved in the twilight—the second wave of monsters prowling over the bodies of her classmates.
"We left them," she whispered, her voice hollow. "Viktor. Sarah. All of them."
Bhy Khay didn't look up. He was sitting cross-legged on a study table, organizing the loot they had scavenged.
"We didn't leave them," he said, his tone clinical. "They failed the entry exam."
"Exam?" Elara snapped, looking up with sudden anger. "They were slaughtered, Bhy Khay! How can you be so cold? You used to be... you used to be so quiet."
"I was quiet because I had nothing to say to people who treated me like furniture," Bhy Khay replied. He held up a small, jagged dagger dropped by a goblin. "Now, the world speaks my language."
He tossed the dagger to her. It skittered across the floor and hit her boot.
[ITEM: GOBLIN SHANK (Common)]
[DAMAGE: 5-8]
[DURABILITY: 12/20]
"Equip that," he ordered. "Your mana isn't infinite. When you run dry, you need to stab."
Elara looked at the crude weapon. She wanted to scream at him, to tell him he was a monster. But then she looked at the glass doors again. A goblin pressed its face against the pane, screeching silently. It couldn't get in. Bhy Khay had gotten them inside.
She picked up the shank. Her hands were shaking, but she gripped it tight.
"Fine," she said, her voice hardening. "What now? We hide here forever?"
"No," Bhy Khay stood up and walked toward the floating blue cube in the center of the room. "We shop."
As Bhy Khay approached the cube, a holographic menu expanded in the air, visible to both of them.
[SYSTEM SHOP: LEVEL 1]
[CURRENCY: 150 COINS (Shared Party Funds)]
The list was standard RPG fare:
* Health Potion (Small) - 50 Coins
* Mana Potion (Small) - 50 Coins
* Iron Sword (Common) - 100 Coins
* Leather Chestpiece (Common) - 120 Coins
* Skill Book: Fireball - 500 Coins
"We have 150 coins from the kills," Elara calculated, reading the screen. "We should buy potions. Or maybe the sword for you."
Bhy Khay ignored the main list. His eyes—glowing with that faint, golden light—were scanning the code behind the menu.
To Elara, the shop looked like a clean interface.
To Bhy Khay, it was a waterfall of data. He saw the item ID numbers, the refresh rates, and the hidden stock.
The System was new. It was buggy. The "Battlefield OS" had been installed on Earth in a rush.
"See anything you like?" Elara asked, impatient.
"I see what they don't want me to see," Bhy Khay muttered.
He reached out, but he didn't tap the 'Buy' button on the potions. Instead, he tapped a blank, glitched pixel in the bottom right corner of the screen.
BZZT.
The menu flickered. The standard items vanished, replaced by a single, distorted entry.
[ERROR: ITEM ID #NULL FOUND]
[NAME: MYSTERY BOX (CORRUPTED)]
[COST: 150 COINS]
[DESCRIPTION: DATA FRAGMENT. CONTENTS UNKNOWN.]
"What is that?" Elara stepped back. "It looks... dangerous. Bhy Khay, don't waste our money. We need potions!"
"Potions keep you alive for ten minutes," Bhy Khay said, his finger hovering over the purchase button. "Glitches make you a god."
He tapped [BUY].
[TRANSACTION COMPLETE.]
[FUNDS: 0 COINS.]
A small, rusty metal box materialized in Bhy Khay's hands. It didn't look special. It looked like trash.
Elara groaned. "You spent everything on a loot box? We could have had three potions!"
Bhy Khay didn't answer. He pried the lid open.
There was no flash of light. No heavenly choir. Just a single, black ring resting on velvet. It looked like it was made of shadows, constantly shifting and smoking.
Bhy Khay picked it up.
[SYSTEM ALERT: ANOMALY DETECTED.]
[ITEM: RING OF THE VOID WALKER (Cursed/Legendary)]
[GRADE: ???]
[EFFECT 1: STEALTH - Become invisible to all enemies Level 10 and below.]
[EFFECT 2: SHADOW STEP - Teleport 5 meters in any direction (Cooldown: 10s).]
[CURSE: USER TAKES DOUBLE DAMAGE FROM LIGHT ATTACKS.]
Elara's jaw dropped as she read the stats floating in the air. "Legendary? How... how did you know?"
"I didn't," Bhy Khay lied smoothly. He slipped the ring onto his finger. It felt cold, like dipping his hand in ice water. "I just know that in every system, the trash bin is where the best deleted files are kept."
He vanished.
"Bhy Khay?" Elara spun around.
He was gone. Completely invisible.
"Behind you," his voice whispered.
Elara jumped, spinning back around. Bhy Khay flickered back into existence, standing right next to her.
"Teleportation," she breathed. "And invisibility. That's... broken. That's cheating."
"It's survival," Bhy Khay corrected. "And now, we have an advantage nobody else has."
He walked back to the table and picked up the map of the campus he had drawn on a napkin.
"Listen closely, Elara. The Safe Zone is temporary. The regeneration buff only lasts for 12 hours. After that, the barrier drops."
He pointed to a building on the map—the Girls' Dormitory.
"While everyone else is crying or hiding, we are going to move. There is a 'Hidden Boss' spawning in the Dormitory basement at midnight. I saw the spawn timer in the code."
"A boss?" Elara looked at him like he was insane. "We are Level 2! A boss will kill us!"
"A boss drops a Guild Token," Bhy Khay said, his eyes locking onto hers. "If we get that token, we don't just survive the game. We can build our own Safe Zone. We can make the rules."
He leaned in closer.
"You wanted to be a Queen again, Elara? This is how you get your crown back. We kill the boss first."
Elara looked at the map. Then she looked at the black ring on his finger. She realized then that Bhy Khay wasn't just playing to live. He was playing to conquer.
She gripped her goblin shank tighter. The fear was still there, but something else was growing underneath it. Ambition.
"Okay," she said. "We kill the boss. But if we die..."
"We won't," Bhy Khay said, turning toward the door. "I have the cheat codes."
[QUEST STARTED: THE FIRST RAID]
[TARGET: BROODMOTHER SPIDER (Lvl 5)]
[TIME LIMIT: 4 HOURS]
Bhy Khay checked his phone. The screen flickered with a new notification.
>> WARNING: ADMIN "ZEUS" HAS NOTICED IRREGULAR DATA PACKETS.
>> HIDE YOUR TRACKS, SOVEREIGN.
Bhy Khay smirked. The Gods were watching.
"Let's go," he said. "Don't blink."