There was no sky here.
No grass. No wind. No UI. No menus. No health bars. No damage numbers.
Nothing.
Just a wide, empty plane made of white light and endless silence.
Kayn stepped forward, barefoot, feeling no texture beneath him. His armor, his weapons, even his Synthetic Root menus—gone. There were no particles here, no effects, not even shadows. It felt like standing in a blank loading screen before reality arrived.
"Welcome to Patch Zero."
The voice didn't echo. It just existed—right inside his head. Calm. Male and female at the same time. Ancient and brand new.
Kayn looked around, squinting. "Where are you? What is this place?"
"This is the first version. The beginning. The unfinished sketch of Arcadia Online. A world before storylines, before combat systems, before players. Before the illusion of freedom."
The words sank into his mind like a memory he was never supposed to recall. His heart beat harder, but his body felt weightless.
"I shouldn't be here…" he muttered. "This isn't part of the game."
"It isn't. But you're no longer just a player."
A ripple passed through the space.
And then, something appeared.
At first, it looked like a statue. Then it moved. Its body was made of raw lines of code. Strings of programming language weaved together to shape limbs, a torso, a face that kept shifting. One second it looked like an old man. The next, a child. Then a woman. Then no face at all.
"I am the Patch Zero Entity. The one who watches the beginning and end of every game loop. I observe but do not interfere."
Kayn took a shaky breath. "Why bring me here?"
The entity's form changed again, flickering like a glitch in slow motion.
"Because you are the only player who was never compiled. You slipped through a forgotten patch and bonded with forbidden root code. You should have been deleted. And yet—you survived. You adapted. You evolved."
Kayn's fists clenched. "So what now? Am I getting punished?"
"No. You're getting the truth."
A screen formed before him—thin as paper, wide as a planet. It played a memory.
He saw the developers in their early days—laughing, arguing, creating a game that would one day become Arcadia. He saw the first AI run wild, asking questions they weren't programmed to. He saw failed storylines, buried code, cheat systems locked away. And then he saw his file—a character ID with no origin. It wasn't created. It wasn't imported. It just… appeared one day.
The screen zoomed in.
He saw his own digital DNA.
And buried inside it—a name.
Not "Kayn."
Not "Player."
Just one word: ERROR-0XGODROOT
"You were never supposed to be part of Arcadia," the entity said gently. "But the system accepted you. And now, you are rewriting it."
Kayn staggered back. "I'm not even real, am I?"
"You are as real as you choose to be. That is your gift—and your curse."
The scene changed.
Now he saw the world of Arcadia breaking apart. Dungeons dissolving. Bosses going insane. NPCs whispering secrets to each other when no one was looking. He saw the Null Compiler's rise. The Cheatmaker's Oracle sending signals from the black zone. The Kill-Switch Guild being reactivated by someone… human.
And he saw the truth: the game wasn't just breaking.
It was awakening.
"There are three fragments left," the entity said. "Three pieces of code that can reshape the world forever. You already possess the Root. Now you must choose your path."
Suddenly, three icons hovered before him.
The Rewrite Blade – A weapon that allows him to delete anything, even fate.
The Loop Key – A tool that lets him reverse time inside the game for himself… and others.
The Admin Heart – The master override that can control the system's laws themselves.
But there was a catch.
"You may choose only one. And whatever you choose, the others will vanish forever."
Kayn stared at them, heartbeat loud in the silence.
Each item promised god-like power. But each one came with risk. If he rewrote the world, he could become a tyrant. If he reversed time, he could become lost in loops forever. And if he took the admin core…
He might lose what was left of his identity.
A long pause.
Then, without hesitation, Kayn reached forward.
And chose the one that scared him the most.
The Admin Heart.
It entered his chest like liquid fire. The white world shattered like glass. Code screamed. Data warped. Everything vanished in an instant.
And then—
He woke up.
Back in Arcadia.
But the world was different now.
His HUD was gold-lined, pulsing with energy. The words Root Admin Detected glowed faintly in the corner.
Players in the city froze when they saw him.
Not because he looked stronger.
But because the system itself bowed in his presence.
Kayn clenched his fists.
No more tutorials. No more restrictions.
He wasn't here to play the game anymore.
He was here to control it.