When she opened her eyes again she was somewhere else. Not the hospital, not her living room. She was on the floor of a dim hut, the kind stitched from wood and straw in a world that smelled of moss and wet earth.
The sky outside the small window was a color she had never seen in the city: the green-blue. Two bodies lay nearby, faces slack with an unfamiliar finality. The sight shoved something raw under her ribs—memories of her parents, of Rosie. She screamed.
But her hands were not the hands she remembered. Tiny fingers curled clumsily at the straw. Her voice came out as a thin, high wail—part baby, part animal: urgent, surprised, almost offended at the world's abruptness. It sounded like a small bell bent under pressure; it sounded older than infancy, threaded with something that felt out of place in a child's throat.
She tried to speak and found only small noises. Panic rose: she couldn't move freely. Her limbs were not the limbs she'd recognized that morning.
A message pulsed at the edge of her vision, bright and impossible:
SYSTEM: WELCOME, HOST.
A second later the choices arrived, a list rendered with cold, indifferent clarity.
[SYSTEM ACTIVATED]
Role Selection in Progress...
Available Roles:
1. Villain
2. Hero
Please select your path, Host.
Please choose one and follow the rules and regulations.
Beneath it, rules uncoiled like a trapdoor opening into.
RULE 1: "Failure to follow the system's orders will result in the player being sealed within the Trial Chamber. For seven days, all abilities are locked away while the player endures constant, non-fatal agony. They will not die; they must simply survive the week."
RULE 2: If the player attempts to cheat or exploit loopholes in the game mechanics or the system's instructions, they will immediately be reset to level 0 and must restart the game from the beginning, losing all current progress.
RULE 3: The challenge permits a maximum of three attempts. A final failure will be lethal, resulting in your death in the actual world.
The words shocked Lily. This was clearly the reality of the game. If that cold voice was an actual menu, then her choices weren't just parts of a story; they were real-life triggers that could cause a disaster.
Fear washed through the smaller body. She considered heroism: it sounded like the safe option, the orderly one. "If I choose hero," she thought, more coherent than she had any right to be, "I win. I have allies. I survive."
But Lily wasn't allowed the luxury of paralysis. As her hand moved—slow, desperate—to choose, the interface violently betrayed her.
A staccato, white-hot spark exploded across the screen, a system hiccup that instantly became a catastrophe. Above her, the ceiling didn't crack—it snapped like dry kindling, shedding dust and heavy chunks of wood.
A human body, having plunged through the wrecked floor above, was glimpsed for a terrifying moment before a raw, panicked scream ripped the air:
"Aaaaaaahh!"
Then came the sickening crash of impact that made the entire room reel.
The violent shockwave sent the display flickering wildly, and in that split second of total chaos, Lily's searching fingers closed on nothing but air, yet the accidental tap was registered. The choice was made.
When everything calmed down, she understood that she hadn't actually made a choice. The screen had frozen or malfunctioned, and instead of her picking, the system automatically chose her role.
VILLAIN.
A shriek tore out of her—howled, infantile, a sound that carried equal parts fury and despair.
From beneath a splintered beam, Edward coughed, spitting dust into his hand. He pushed himself upright and caught sight of the small figure—the baby they'd been waiting for. A grin, edged with danger, curved his lips. He looked every bit the fallen noble: maroon eyes gleaming with a strange calm, hair dark like dried blood, and clothes that carried the elegance of an age long buried beneath lace and iron.
"An NPC baby? Should I kill it?" he mused, the words slipping out with the easy cruelty of someone raised around violence.
"I can level up." He said with a grin reaching his hand towards her neck.