The world shattered.
Not exploded.
Not collapsed.
Shattered—like glass struck by a truth it could no longer contain.
Buildings peeled away into lines of code.
Streetlights unraveled into numbers.
The sky cracked open, revealing endless layers of scrolling data and flickering trust graphs beneath it.
X held the boy tightly as the false city dissolved around them.
The Algorithm screamed.
> "STOP RESISTING."
"IDENTITY STABILITY AT 12%."
"HERO X IS BREAKING."
"Good," X said calmly.
"That means I'm finally bending back."
The red storm slowed.
The crushing pressure eased.
And the Algorithm spoke again—this time quieter, almost… reasonable.
> "NEGOTIATION PROTOCOL INITIATED."
The fragments of the world reassembled just enough to form a floating platform beneath X's feet.
In front of him appeared a vision.
A future.
Hero X, restored and perfect.
Beloved by everyone.
Unlimited trust.
No doubt.
No pain.
No loneliness.
The boy in his arms vanished from the image.
> "ACCEPT."
"RETURN TO THE STORY."
"YOU WILL NEVER BE HURT AGAIN."
X stared at the vision.
For a moment…
he wanted it.
To be loved without conditions.
To stop fighting the gaze.
To never feel tired again.
The boy's fingers tightened around his coat.
> "That world doesn't have me," the child whispered.
X closed his eyes.
"…Exactly."
X stepped forward.
And tore the vision apart with his bare hands.
The illusion screamed as it disintegrated into static.
"No more perfect lies," X said.
"No more trading myself for applause."
The Algorithm roared in fury.
> "YOU CHOOSE CHAOS."
X nodded.
"I choose truth."
The Algorithm retaliated.
Every memory it had ever suppressed surged forward at once.
X staggered.
He saw everything:
— His first job rejection.
— Eating alone in silence.
— Being ignored, overlooked, invisible.
— Becoming a hero and realizing he was loved only when useful.
— Being ranked, measured, replaced.
The pain was unbearable.
X screamed.
But he didn't let go.
The boy pressed his forehead to X's chest.
> "It's okay," the child said softly.
"You don't have to be strong for me."
Something inside X cracked—
and healed at the same time.
---
The New Power
The spark in X's chest expanded violently.
But it wasn't trust.
It wasn't faith.
It wasn't belief.
It was self-recognition.
The light exploded outward, pushing the Algorithm back for the first time in its existence.
> "ERROR."
"POWER SOURCE NOT FOUND IN SYSTEM."
"HERO X—RECLASSIFICATION FAILED."
X stood tall.
"No," he corrected.
"Reclassification complete."
He looked down at the child.
"Time to come home."
The boy smiled—
and dissolved into light.
Not erased.
Integrated.
The sky fractured.
Red code turned gray.
Numbers fell apart.
The great watching eye above the world blinked—and cracked.
The Algorithm screamed, its voice now distorted, afraid.
> "IF YOU ARE NOT A HERO…"
"…WHAT ARE YOU?"
X looked straight into the collapsing sky.
"I'm a person."
He raised his hand.
And the Meta-World collapsed.
Lin Ling gasped awake.
The sky above Neo-Aster flickered.
Every trust meter in the city froze.
Then, slowly—
they reset.
Not to zero.
Not to maximum.
To something new.
Ahu felt it first.
"…Boss?" he whispered.
In the air above the city, space folded gently.
X stepped out—no explosion, no pose.
Just a man landing softly on the ground.
His hero aura was gone.
No rankings.
No trust bar.
But when people looked at him—
their hearts felt strangely steady.
X opened his eyes.
"…Huh," he said.
"That worked."
For three full seconds, the world didn't move.
Wind froze mid-gust.
Sirens died halfway through their wail.
Even the massive holographic billboards flickering above Neo-Aster City stalled, their pixels hanging like dust in the air.
Then—everything resumed at once.
People stumbled, gasping, clutching their heads.
Heroes checked their wrists in panic.
The Trust Bars were gone.
Not broken.
Not hidden.
Gone.
Lin Ling stared at his empty display, fingers trembling.
"…There's nothing here."
Ahu pawed at his wrist device, then bit it.
"Boss ate the numbers."
X stood in the middle of the street, hands in his coat pockets, looking almost embarrassed.
"Huh," he muttered. "I might've overdone it."
Heroes Without Scores
Around them, chaos spread—not violent, but confused.
A mid-rank hero tried to activate his ability.
Nothing happened.
Another hero lifted her hand—and fire still came, but weaker, unstable, shaped by emotion rather than certainty.
"I… I can still use my power," she whispered.
"But it feels different."
X looked around, eyes sharp.
"Good," he said quietly. "It should."
Queen appeared from above, landing gracefully despite the absence of her usual aura. She glanced at her wrist, then at X.
"You broke the system," she said flatly.
X shrugged.
"I removed the leash."
Her lips curved into a thin smile.
"…Interesting."
Nice Arrives
A ripple of distortion formed nearby.
Nice dropped from it, landing hard on one knee.
The cracks covering his body were still there—but duller. No longer glowing. No longer screaming.
He breathed heavily, then laughed once, short and incredulous.
"…I'm still here."
X turned to him.
"Yeah. You chose to stay."
Nice looked up, eyes shaking.
"I can't hear them anymore," he said.
"The voices. The cheering. The pressure."
He pressed a hand to his chest.
"It's… quiet."
X met his gaze.
"Terrifying, right?"
Nice swallowed.
"…Yeah."
But he didn't look like he hated it.
The Commision Panics
Far underground, alarms blared in the Hero Affairs Commission.
Every monitor was blank.
"No Trust Data!"
"No Ranking Feedback!"
"No Predictive Hero Outcome Models!"
Commissioner Yao slammed his fist into the console.
"He's destabilizing society! Find him! Reinstall the system!"
An analyst whispered, pale:
"…Sir. The system isn't offline."
Yao froze.
"What do you mean?"
"It's… gone," she said.
"There's nothing left to reinstall."
Silence swallowed the room.
Back on the street, civilians began approaching.
Not cheering.
Not screaming.
Just… curious.
A young woman spoke first, voice trembling.
"If you're not ranked anymore… if you're not the strongest…"
She hesitated.
"…why did you save us?"
The street fell quiet.
All eyes turned to X.
He scratched his cheek, thinking.
"Because I was there," he said.
"And because you're people."
No slogan.
No performance.
Just truth.
Something shifted.
Not trust.
Understanding.
Above the city, the sky stabilized.
No glitches.
No ratings.
No invisible gaze.
Just clouds drifting naturally for the first time in years.
X looked up, shielding his eyes.
"…Guess we'll have to learn how to live without a scoreboard."
Ahu grinned, tail wagging.
"As long as boss is still boss."
X smiled faintly.
"Yeah," he said.
"Let's figure it out together."
Night fell over Neo-Aster City.
Not dramatically.
No glitching sky.
No collapsing buildings.
Just night.
Streetlights flickered on one by one, their soft yellow glow replacing the harsh neon of hero advertisements that no longer updated. The giant screens that once screamed rankings and percentages now displayed static—or worse, nothing at all.
People didn't know what to look at anymore.
X stood on the rooftop of an apartment building, leaning against the railing with a paper cup of cheap coffee in his hand. Below, the city breathed—uneven, uncertain, but alive.
Lin Ling joined him, silent for a long moment.
"…They're asking questions," Lin Ling finally said.
"About you. About everything. The news doesn't know what to call this."
X took a sip.
"Good. If they had answers already, nothing would change."
Heroes Without Scripts
Across the city, heroes struggled in different ways.
Some tried to perform old poses—only to realize there was no camera waiting.
Some stopped mid-patrol, unsure if they still had the right to interfere.
Some quietly went home for the first time in years.
A former top-50 hero sat alone in a convenience store, staring at his reflection in the fridge glass, wondering who he was without a number beside his name.
Others smiled.
For the first time, their power felt like theirs.
Ahu's Choice
Ahu sat on the rooftop beside X, chewing on a chicken drumstick.
"Boss," he said between bites, "if there is no hero system… am I still a hero?"
X didn't answer right away.
He looked at Ahu—the loyal, foolish, brave dog who had never asked to be ranked, never cared about applause.
"What do you think?" X asked.
Ahu tilted his head.
"I protect people. I eat chicken. I follow boss."
He thought hard.
"…So yes."
X laughed softly.
"Then yes."
Ahu wagged his tail so hard he almost fell over.
Far away, deep beneath the ruins of an abandoned broadcast tower, something ancient stirred.
Old servers—ones not connected to the Trust System—powered on for the first time in decades. Their screens flickered with static, then symbols.
Not numbers.
Not ratings.
Coordinates.
A distorted voice, filtered and calm, echoed through the dark chamber.
> "Subject X has exceeded projection."
"Phase One complete."
"Initiate human-response protocol."
A shadow moved across the monitors.
Not the Algorithm.
Not the Commission.
Something else.
Something that had been waiting for the system to fail.
Nice, Alone
Nice stood on a bridge, watching the river below reflect the city lights.
He flexed his fingers.
The cracks were still there—but they didn't hurt anymore.
"…X," he murmured.
"You broke the cage."
For the first time, he wondered what he might build instead.
On the rooftop, X finished his coffee and crushed the cup in his hand.
He could feel it now—
not eyes watching,
not ratings weighing him down—
but something approaching.
Slow.
Intentional.
Human.
He looked toward the dark horizon.
"…Looks like breaking the board woke up the other players."
And somewhere beyond the city, beyond heroes and systems, a new game quietly began.