There was a space south of Elderfall that didn't exist on the map.
Not because it was hidden—but because the map refused to load it.
Old patch notes listed it as a "placeholder instance." No mobs. No drops. No quests. Just terrain geometry and unstable fog. Most players passed it without noticing.
But I remembered what happened there in my first life.
And what shouldn't have.
[SYSTEM NOTICE: Zone Entry – Unmapped Terrain]Warning: Memory integrity may be compromised.Player tracking disabled beyond this point.
Lyra read the notice and frowned. "You know, there are easier ways to die than walking into debug zones."
"I'm not here for death," I said. "I'm here for ghosts."
The mist grew heavier as we walked, swallowing our sound. Trees flickered between assets. The ground didn't crunch or echo—just absorbed our footsteps in silence.
Eventually, the fog thinned, and we found it.
A chapel.
Or the remains of one—half-sunken into the earth, tilted sideways as though dropped into the world like a misplaced asset. Broken stained glass jutted from its hollow walls. The altar inside glowed faintly with purple static.
And at the threshold stood a figure.
They weren't marked as a player.
No nameplate. No level. No tag.
Just a tall, masked silhouette in grey robes—like dust given shape.
[???] – Tag Data Unavailable
The Lexicon flared at my side, unprompted.
[SYSTEM ANOMALY DETECTED – THREADSIGNATURE: NULLWATCHER]Response: SuppressedCombat Permissions: UnstableObservation: Active
The masked figure didn't speak. It didn't attack.
It simply turned its head toward me—and I felt something tug behind my eyes.
Lyra staggered back. "What the hell is that?"
I opened the Lexicon. The page had already changed.
[Glyph Cast: Threadbind – Emergency Protocol]Target: Null-Tagged Entity – ERROR.Target has no stable thread to bind.Casting Denied.
The Nullwatcher moved.
Not quickly. Not threateningly.
But every time it stepped, the world broke around its feet. Terrain glitched. Trees warped. Textures failed to load.
My HUD flashed red.
[SYSTEM WARNING: You are being unmade.]
Lyra cast a flare spell, the light flaring hot and bright.
It didn't damage the figure.
But it made it pause.
"I can't hit it!" she shouted. "I can't target it!"
"We need to leave!" I grabbed her arm, and we turned to run—
—but the world wasn't letting us.
The path back was gone.
Just more fog. More breaking.
I made a split-second decision.
The Heirloom—still buried in my inventory—throbbed.
I didn't know what it wanted.
But I knew it wasn't ordinary.
I opened the Lexicon one more time.
[Override Spell Cast: REMEMBER – Rank F (Imperfect)]Effect: Rewrites user location to last known safe thread.Warning: May corrupt local instance.
I cast it.
Reality cracked.
And we fell.
When I woke, we were on the outskirts of Duskridge.
A quiet, contested valley just north of Elderfall. Lower-level mobs. Windmills in the distance. The kind of place no one noticed.
Lyra groaned beside me, bloodied, her interface flickering in and out.
I pulled myself upright, vision swimming.
[SYSTEM NOTICE: Memory Echoes Detected – Location Restoration Incomplete]Residual Anomaly Signature Present.Observer Watching.
Above us, in the clouds, the faint outline of the Nullwatcher shimmered.
And then it blinked out.
Lyra coughed. "We shouldn't be alive."
I nodded slowly.
"No. We shouldn't."