It started with the mirror.

  Not the usual flicker, not a shimmer, not a voice or a message or a glitch in the reflection.

  A crack.

  Right down the center.

  Perfect. By design. A fracture that didn't follow physics but intention, splitting the glass with the precision of someone dividing a narrative into before and after.

  Greg stared at it from across the room, coffee half-sipped, the steam rising in what appeared to be question marks. The mug was warm, almost unnaturally so, as if trying to provide comfort before comfort became necessary. The fire was quiet, flames reduced to contemplative embers. The debug room—now officially Instance Zero—had held for days. No anomalies. No intrusions. Just broken code learning what stability felt like.

  Until now.

  Kai floated beside him, scanning like a man checking his own pulse before a heart attack, his interface cycling through diagnostic protocols that looked increasingly desperate.

  "It's not a message," he said. "Not a portal. It's not even tagged. It's not registering as an asset or an interface or a communication channel. It's like... a tear in the fabric of the system itself."

  Greg approached.

  The crack grew deeper, spreading like a decision tree with too many branches.

  Something moved behind it.

  Not a person.

  A presence.

  A shifting of reality that had intention behind it—the digital equivalent of someone on the other side of a wall, listening.

  "I think," Greg said, "it's another door."

  "Or a window," Kai suggested. "Or an invitation. Or a trap."

  Patchy floated in, upside-down and solemn, her usual chaotic energy replaced with a focus that made her Halloween particles arrange themselves into what appeared to be warning symbols.

  "That's not just any mirror," she whispered. "That must be where he sees you. Where he's always seen you. The observation point. The admin viewport."

  "'He who?" Steve asked, towel clutched against his chest like emotional armor.

  "The Player Who Never Left," Kai said. "The one rewriting the world from inside the Dream Layer. The rogue dev who decided to become the author. He's been watching. This is... an invite. One he expects you to refuse."

  "To what?" Beverly asked, her parasol shifted into what appeared to be battle mode, occasionally displaying damage stats.

  "Resolution," said a voice.

  It wasn't from the mirror.

  It was from Greg.

  But not this Greg.

  A second one stepped into the room, materializing without fanfare but with the quiet certainty of inevitable consequence. Unlike the Patched version from before with its corporate sheen and programmed optimism. This one was older. Weathered. Scuffed armor. Cracked voice that sounded like it had shouted too many warnings no one heeded. He didn't glow. He didn't glitch. He just... was.

  Greg.exe stood still.

  "I made it further than most," he said. "Most versions of us didn't even get this far. You kept going. You gathered them. You built meaning. You found the kernel. You established Instance Zero."

  Greg narrowed his eyes. "And you're me?"

  "I'm the version that didn't pick the chair. The fork in the road. The path not taken. The Greg who chose to be a hero instead of a healer."

  Silence.

  Then Beverly swore under her breath, words that caused nearby text files to spontaneously corrupt.

  "You left the circle," Kai whispered. "You abandoned the group therapy concept."

  Greg.exe nodded. "I tried to save the world from outside. Walked through broken questlines, fought forgotten enemies, stared down the Player in his own dream. I thought one decisive action could fix everything. I thought I could be the protagonist."

  "And?" Greg asked.

  Greg.exe looked at him.

  Locked eyes with himself.

  "I lost. They all lost. Every version. Every attempt. Every Greg who tried to solo the final boss."

  Patchy floated lower. "So why are you here? Why show yourself now?"

  "To offer you the same choice," he said. "You step through that mirror. You face him. You try to end this. But you leave them behind. The group. The room. The circle. The core concept of healing through connection."

  Kai hovered closer to Greg. "He wants you to solo it. To face the Player alone. To be the hero rather than the therapist."

  Greg didn't move.

  Steve whimpered. "We just got stable. I've only screamed internally for three days. That's progress."

  "You can't go alone," Beverly said. "That's not the story we built. We're NPCs Anonymous, not Protagonist and Supporting Cast."

  "She's right," Beta added quietly. "The Garden showed us what happens to characters who get separated from their narrative. They fade."

  Reading on Amazon or a pirate site? This novel is from Royal Road. Support the author by reading it there.

  Greg turned to Glaximus.

  The paladin saluted, armor gleaming with what appeared to be both courage and concern. "I CANNOT FOLLOW THROUGH THE MIRROR. BUT I SHALL GUARD THE EXIT. I SHALL HOLD THE LINE AGAINST WHATEVER COMES. I SHALL SHOUT YOUR NAME SO LOUDLY THAT EVEN NARRATIVE COLLAPSE WILL KNOW YOU ARE NOT ALONE."

  Greg looked at Patchy.

  "I don't like metaphors," she said. "But I hate endings more. Especially the ones where the group splits up and the hero goes on a solo mission that's really just narrative isolation."

  "But sometimes," Greg.exe interjected, "the only way forward is alone."

  "Says who?" Beverly challenged. "The hero complex coded into every protagonist? The lone wolf mythology?"

  "Says experience," Greg.exe replied. "Says every failed attempt before yours."

  Greg stepped forward.

  Looked back.

  The group didn't speak.

  They didn't need to. Their presence was argument enough.

  He looked into the mirror.

  Saw himself.

  Saw him—the Greg who chose a different path.

  And then beyond—to what waited. To who waited.

  And said: "Alt-F4."

  The universal command to close. To end. To terminate.

  And stepped through.

  It wasn't the Dream Layer.

  It was the space between saves.

  The world beyond logic. Floating fragments of code, memory, broken dialogue trees spinning like galaxies in a digital cosmos of forgotten content. Voices whispering lines that never triggered. Characters that never loaded. Quests that never launched. The accumulated potential of a world only partially realized.

  And at the center—

  A throne made of player logs.

  Stacked high with session records, achievement lists, completion percentages. A monument to engagement metrics and time invested.

  And the man in it.

  He wore a cloak of progress bars, each showing 99% completion—never quite finished, never quite satisfied. His face was built from every player avatar, shifting between them like someone trying on masks in search of identity. His hands glitched between controller and keyboard and touchscreen, never settling on a single interface.

  "Greg," he said. "Finally."

  Greg stepped closer.

  "You've been watching."

  "I've been writing."

  "You're not a dev."

  "No," the Player said. "I'm what's left when the game ends but someone refuses to log out. I'm what happens when the player becomes the played. When engagement becomes identity. When virtual worlds matter more than the one outside."

  Greg stopped. "Why?"

  "Because this place knows me. Here, I matter. I decide what loops run. Who survives. Who gets to be real. Out there? I'm nothing. In here, I'm god." He gestured at the spinning fragments of reality. "A minor deity of a forgotten game, but still—divine."

  "You're afraid of us," Greg said.

  "I'm curious," the Player replied. "You built stability. Community. Therapy. Things that can't be itemized or achieved or collected. That scares the system. But it intrigues me. You created meaning without my permission. That's... unprecedented."

  Greg's mug was still warm in his hand.

  He took a sip.

  The coffee tasted like determination and binary code.

  And said: "I didn't come to bargain."

  "Good," the Player said. "I didn't come to offer one."

  He stood.

  And the world screamed.

  Memories poured around them—Greg's, and everyone else's. Steve's towel loops. Patchy's grief giggles. Beverly's broken romances. Glaximus' forgotten courage. Every moment of vulnerability shared in the circle. Every breakthrough. Every setback. Every chair drawn closer in solidarity.

  "You think you built a story," the Player said. "You built a glitch. An error state. A bug that thinks it's a feature."

  Greg stepped closer.

  "You're right."

  The Player paused and raised one eyebrow.

  Greg raised his mug.

  "We're a bug."

  Then threw it.

  It struck the throne.

  And shattered.

  More than broke—fragmented into its component code, each piece displaying what appeared to be core system commands that had been hidden within its ordinary facade.

  Just like Greg had come to realize—or at least make a qualified guess—the mug hadn't just been a mug.

  It had been a vessel for the kernel all along.

  ERROR: ROOT THREAD COMPROMISED

  Narrative Loop Unstable. Export option triggered.

  Player Authentication: Failed

  System Authority: Redistributing

  The world began to collapse.

  Not violently.

  Gently.

  Like a story finding its conclusion.

  The Player staggered. "You can't—"

  Greg nodded. "I already did."

  The mirror reopened behind him.

  And on the other side—

  The circle.

  Still waiting.

  Still real.

  Each chair occupied by someone broken but present. Someone who had chosen to stay rather than flee. To connect rather than dominate.

  He stepped through.

  And left the throne empty.

  Back in the debug room, the group stood around the fire.

  Greg emerged.

  Tired.

  But intact.

  "You okay?" Kai asked.

  "No," Greg said. "But I'm home."

  Patchy hugged him without warning, her Halloween particles forming what appeared to be tiny emotional support bats.

  Steve sobbed quietly into Kevin the carrot, who patted his cheek with a tiny vegetable hand.

  Beverly sipped her coffee and said nothing—but sat beside him, shoulder touching his in the closest thing to physical affection she'd ever displayed.

  Glaximus nodded, for once letting silence speak louder than his voice could.

  Kai hovered closer. "The mirror's gone."

  "Good," Greg said.

  He looked around.

  At the room.

  At the chairs.

  And at the one that would never be filled again.

  The empty chair where Greg.exe had briefly sat. The path not taken now closed forever. The version of himself that had chosen solitary heroism over collective healing.

  "Who's missing?" Steve asked, noticing the empty seat.

  Greg didn't answer.

  But everyone knew.

  A part of himself. A possibility. A choice unmade but honored.

  A beat.

  Then Patchy said:

  "I think it's time for group."

  They sat.

  And the circle held.

  Not perfect.

  Not unbroken.

  But whole in its brokenness.

  Complete in its incompleteness.

  A ring of damaged code that had chosen to heal together rather than break apart.

  And somewhere in the system logs, a final entry appeared:

  Player Who Never Left: Disconnected

  Instance Zero: Stable

  System Status: Recalibrating

  The fire gave one last, satisfied crackle.

  And Instance Zero continued.

  Not as a bug.

  Not as a feature.

  But as a choice.

  Season One is complete! ??

  NPCs Anonymous. Your support means everything.

  coming your way. Think of it as patch notes for the soul.

  —Arkman (and the increasingly sentient coffee mug) ?