Chapter 2 – Rui's Rules of Dimensional Misconduct
Narrator: Rui
There are only three rules in life worth following:
1. Don't trust someone who doesn't laugh at their own jokes.
2. Never eat stew from a floating temple—it's never just stew.
3. And above all, never piss off your ring.
That last one? I learned the hard way.
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I wasn't always like this—witty, reckless, and ridiculously handsome (Lei insists I say that last part sarcastically, but he's just jealous). In our previous life, I was a data analyst who hated his job, loved his cat, and dreamed of escaping into a fantasy world.
Well, dream granted. Karma clearly has a sense of humor.
When we first woke up in the Temple of Fractured Rings, I thought we'd died and respawned into a high-tier MMORPG. But Lei? He immediately started theorizing dimensional causality and multiversal memory chains like some reincarnated professor. I love him, but the man has the emotional warmth of a granite slab.
So naturally, I took it upon myself to balance things out—with chaos.
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The Ring of Script
While Lei's ring was all about echoes and memories, mine was the Ring of Script. Sounds literary, right? Like I could write magical words in the air and boom—fireball. Turns out... kind of true.
The Ring of Script is tied to Linguistic Dimensional Anchoring. It stores language, knowledge, and history. But more importantly—it lets me rewrite how things work in small pockets of reality.
You know what that means?
Rules bending. Physics breaking. Reality trolling.
But only if I knew the correct glyph commands, which are ancient symbols stored inside the ring.
That's where things got spicy.
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Power System: Script Branch
The Script ring allows tiered access to "Rewrite Nodes." These are lines of logic tied to the dimensional system.
Tier 1 (Lexicon State): Passive ability to read and understand forgotten or encrypted languages. Store and retrieve scrolls, texts, and laws.
Tier 2 (Syntax Layer): Imprint temporary commands onto objects ("Float," "Heat," "Mend"). Must use ancient glyphs, burned into items or air.
Tier 3 (Codex Forge): Fuse glyphs to rewrite local physics (e.g., remove gravity, enhance senses). Drains soul energy and risks backlash.
Tier 4 (Law Binder): Bind permanent effects to people, creatures, or spaces. Requires a soul pact and deep SLR.
Tier 5 (World Editor): You guessed it—write over dimensional constants. Practically divine. Suicidal to attempt without full harmony.\n
My SLR? A humble 7%. Barely past being a glorified Kindle.
But hey, knowledge is power. And power is... well, hilarious in the right hands.
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The Dimensional Misconduct Incident
So there we were, meditating inside the Ring Codex Hall. Lei was levitating a memory shard from his ring while chanting like a monk on Red Bull. I, on the other hand, was bored. So I started scribbling a test glyph on a nearby broomstick.
> Glyph: [INFUSE-AIR: ROTATION+5]
The broom spun in midair. Cool.
> Glyph: [TARGET-SELF: FLOAT+2]
I hovered slightly off the ground. Slight nosebleed. Still worth it.
> Glyph: [UNDEFINED TARGET: EXPAND+∞]
That's when everything went sideways. Literally. The room folded. Time hiccupped. My body vibrated like a phone on a dying battery.
"RUI!" Lei shouted.
"It was labeled undefined, okay?! It was asking for chaos!"
A crack opened midair. A miniature void, swirling with blue fire. Out of it stepped a tiny creature—maybe a foot tall—with a head shaped like a cracked bell and eyes made of blinking runes.
It screamed in binary. I screamed in... very real fear.
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Our First Fight
Lei activated his ring instinctively. The air filled with sound fragments—voices from the past, layered in ghostly echoes. One of them lunged toward the creature, destabilizing its form.
"It's an Unbound Fragment!" Lei yelled. "You summoned a timeline error!"
"You're welcome!" I shouted back, deflecting a rune blast with a sassy flip.
We improvised. He manipulated temporal memories—trapping the creature in a moment it couldn't escape. I rewrote a chain of glyphs to bind its movement:
> [TARGET-ENEMY: ROOT+STATIC+NULLVOICE]
The creature screeched, then froze, flickering into vapor.
When it vanished, our rings both pulsed. A notification burned into our minds:
> +1.2% SLR Increase
New Script Glyph Unlocked: BIND-LAW
I collapsed onto the floor. Lei just stared at me.
"You nearly broke reality."
"And yet," I said, grinning, "I made it more interesting."
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The Aftermath
Master Kuro wasn't mad. Or rather, he was too old to show anger the way normal people do. He just shook his head and handed us two scrolls.
"You boys are dimensional toddlers," he said. "But with potential. From now on, train under Rulekeeper Vara. And Rui... no more glyphs without supervision."
"Define 'supervision,'" I asked.
He sighed. "Someone watching you not break the world."
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Thus began our real training. With Rulekeeper Vara (a woman who could rewrite your soul's bedtime), we'd learn not just to master our rings—but to survive the trials that came next.
The multiverse was wounded.
And our rings? They were keys to the deepest scars.