[SYSTEM ANOMALY STATUS: STABILIZED]
[USER-DIRECTED THREAD EXPANSION: APPROVED]
[MIRRORTHREAD INTERACTION LOGGED]
[THREADFALL NODE REMAINS INFLUX]
[EMOTIONAL AUTHORITY GRANTED TO: USER-GENERATED MEMORYROOT SYSTEM]
It began with a root.
Not a programmatic one—no command strings, no branching logic. Just a simple root, black and knotted, slowly making its way through the floor of the Archive Grove.
Kaito saw it first.
He dropped to his knees beside it. Pushed aside the soft sediment of discarded quest logs and abandoned subroutines. The root pulsed feebly—not with code, but remembrance.
He extended a hand.
And when he made contact with it, it didn't sting.
It remembered him.
A sudden memory flickered through his mind—an old spawn point, long gone now, deleted from the system. It was the place where he and Nyra had once practiced falling over and over again until they learned how to survive the landing.
