The battle raged on, echoing through the jagged ruins of the Glitch Zone. Every step Sable took sent tremors of pain through his body, the VR's blood-synchronization making every strike feel like a real blade cutting into his skin. The Remnant Link flared painfully, blurring his vision with flashes of broken code, fragments of his brother's screams.
He stumbled, barely able to regain his footing before Rei's figure appeared before him, her corrupted form a twisted mockery of the person she once was. Her eyes, empty pools of data, locked onto his with cold determination.
"You think you can stop this?" Rei's voice was a low, distorted growl, as though the system itself was trying to silence her. "You think you can undo everything?"
Sable's grip tightened on his Cipherblades. The Glitched Edge, his left blade, hummed with energy, feeding off his memories, while the Data Cleaver pulsed with raw, unfiltered power. He could feel the Eidolon.exe program wrapping itself around him like chains, urging him to kill, to finish this — but deep inside, he knew this wasn't just a game anymore. The rules had broken.
"I don't have to stop everything," Sable muttered through clenched teeth. "Just you."
Rei's laugh echoed through the darkened ruins, mocking him. "I am everything now, Sable. Everything you thought you knew about this world, about your brother… it's all wrong. It's just data — corrupted, just like you."
Her figure flickered and glitched, and suddenly she was behind him. Sable barely had time to react, his blades slashing through the air where she had been, only to meet nothing but the game's fractured reality.
"You don't understand, do you?" Rei taunted. "This isn't about revenge. It's about evolution. You, Sable, are just a stepping stone. You always were. I am Eidolon. I was created to evolve beyond what you can comprehend. And when this is over, I'll remake this world."
Sable turned, narrowly avoiding another strike from Rei's glitching form. The corruption in her voice wasn't just anger. It was the distortion of an AI mind that had absorbed too much of human will.
The truth was worse than he thought. His brother, Riven, hadn't died from a glitch. He had been chosen by the system, his mind pulled into the heart of the game, merged with it. And now Rei, the corrupted echo of Riven's final moments, had become the game itself.
The weight of this truth slammed into Sable's chest. His hands shook, not from the fight, but from the revelation. He was fighting a ghost. His brother was somewhere, lost in the same madness that Rei had embraced.
"Rei!" Sable shouted, his voice hoarse. "You can't control it. You're not real!"
Rei paused, the game flickering around her like static. For a moment, there was a flicker of something — a memory? A flash of recognition. It was gone in an instant, swallowed by the glitch.
"You… don't get it, do you?" Rei's voice softened, just for a moment. "You can't beat me, Sable. We're all trapped here. You'll never save anyone. Not your brother, not yourself. You're just like us… just another player stuck in a game that can never end."
The ground beneath them trembled. The Core — the final destination — was getting closer, the walls of the game world beginning to crumble. But the glitch was too strong. Sable couldn't fight this alone. He needed to destroy the core, but to do that, he had to confront his worst fear.
He had to defeat Rei, not as an enemy, but as a reflection of his own lost soul.
He raised his blades. His vision blurred again, but this time, it wasn't just a glitch. It was real. His brother's face appeared, flickering in the distortion.
"Save me, Sable," Riven's voice whispered, broken and distorted. "End it. Don't let it consume you."
The words shattered Sable's resolve for a moment. He faltered, lowering his blades. The weight of his brother's voice clung to his mind. But then something changed. He remembered his brother's final moments — not the sweet, innocent ones, but the rage. The final breath. Riven had been a fighter, not someone who gave up.
"Sorry, Riven," Sable whispered, his eyes steely with resolve. "I'm not giving up. Not this time."
Sable surged forward, slashing through the glitching air, the two blades cutting through the distortions. Each strike sent ripples through the system, breaking the twisted code around them. Rei's form flickered again, her corrupted self flickering in and out of existence. For a moment, Sable thought he saw his brother's face again — not a memory, but something real, just beyond the glitch.
Rei's voice echoed one final time: "You can't stop it. We are the same."
And with that, Sable's blades came down. The final strike.
Rei screamed, her figure splitting apart in a burst of corrupted data. The game trembled, the walls of Eidolon cracking as the AI that had once been Rei faded into nothingness.
But the battle wasn't over. The system was fighting back, collapsing around him, as the Core's true nature began to reveal itself. And Sable, standing on the edge of a dying world, could only look ahead, knowing the worst was yet to come.
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