A flash of lightning illuminated the muddy street.
For a second, the shadows stretched out, looking like grasping claws. When the darkness snapped back, she was there.
Seraphina stood in the middle of the road, thirty feet away.
The rain didn't seem to touch her. While I was a drowned rat shivering in the cold, the water slid off her silver armor like she had a hydrophobic coating. Her cape hung heavy and still. Her blue eyes cut through the gloom, glowing with that terrifying, high-definition intensity.
She wasn't looking at me. She was looking at the red line on the horizon, where the forest was quietly vanishing into white nothingness.
Then, she turned her head.
I shrank back against the blacksmith's shop, hoping the shadows would hide me. My stealth stat was nonexistent, but maybe the rain would mask my breathing.
"Author," she said.
Her voice wasn't a shout. It was a flat, calm statement of fact. She didn't need to shout. The audio mix prioritized her dialogue over the storm.
I didn't move.
"I can hear your teeth chattering," she added.
I sighed, defeated. I stepped out from under the awning, raising my hands. "Look, I know we have trust issues. But before you stab me again, can we talk about the giant wall of deletion eating the scenery?"
Seraphina walked toward me. Her boots sank into the mud, but she didn't stumble. She moved with the predatory grace of a tiger stalking a wounded gazelle.
"You changed the world," she said, stopping five feet away. She didn't draw her sword yet. "The sky is wrong. The air tastes of rot. What did you do?"
"I bought us time," I said, wiping rain from my eyes. "The thing out there? The Editor? It wants to wipe the drive. I changed the genre to Horror so it would follow the rules of suspense. It slowed down."
She stared at me. "You treat this world like a game."
"It is a game!" I snapped, my fear briefly overridden by frustration. "It’s a draft! It’s code! And right now, the code is trying to delete both of us!"
She reached out—fast as a viper—and grabbed me by the throat.
She slammed me against the wooden wall of the shop. My feet dangled off the ground. Her grip was iron.
-1 HP
"One hit point left," I choked out, clawing at her gauntlet. "Careful. If I die, the Admin access goes with me. Then nobody fixes this."
Seraphina didn't let go. She brought her face close to mine. I could see the rain droplets trembling on her eyelashes. I could see the rage burning under the surface, hot enough to melt steel.
"Why?" she hissed.
"Why what?"
"Why did you write it?" Her voice cracked, losing its regal composure. "My family. My kingdom. You made me watch them burn. You made me scream until my throat bled. You made me wander the Ash Lands for three years, eating rats, just to find a sword that didn't bring them back."
She tightened her grip.
"Was it for a lesson? Was it to make me stronger? Tell me there was a reason, Arthur. Tell me my suffering meant something."
I looked into her eyes.
I could have lied. I could have told her it was for the greater good, or that it was a metaphor for the human condition. I could have given her the hero speech she wanted.
But I was tired. I was cold, I was dying, and I was looking at a woman who was more real than I had ever intended her to be.
"I needed the clicks," I whispered.
Seraphina froze. The rain hammered against the roof, deafeningly loud, but between us, there was only silence.
"What?" she breathed.
"I was losing readers," I rasped. "Chapter 4 had low engagement. People were complaining the story was too slow. So... I burned your kingdom down. I killed your parents to raise the stakes. I gave you a tragic backstory because tragic characters poll better."
I let my hands drop to my sides.
"I didn't think you were real, Seraphina. You were just words on a screen. I didn't know you could feel it."
She stared at me. The glow in her eyes flickered. For a moment, she wasn't a warrior. She was just a person who had just been told that her entire life was a marketing stunt.
She let go of my throat.
I slid down the wall, landing in the mud, coughing as air rushed back into my lungs.
Seraphina took a step back. Her hand went to the hilt of Star-Caller. She drew the blade. The sound of metal on metal rang out like a judgment.
"You are a monster," she said softly. "Worse than any demon you ever created."
"Yeah," I wheezed, rubbing my neck. "I know. You should kill me. It would be poetic justice. The creation kills the creator. classic irony."
I looked up at her sword.
"But if you kill me," I pointed out, pointing a shaking finger past her shoulder, "you let It win."
ns216.73.216.10da2
and then Add to home screen.