Pao_Duola

In a fantasy world called Eldoria, a young man named Kael lived as an ordinary NPC (Non-Player Character) in the small town of Arindale. However, everything changed when he suddenly realized that his world was nothing but a broken simulation. Every 100 years, this world would reset, and the memories of all its inhabitants would be erased. Kael, who had miraculously gained awareness, discovered that he could collect Memory Fragments—pieces of memories from previous resets. With this ability, he began to uncover the horrifying truth behind Eldoria.

But Kael was not alone. The Debug Knights, an antivirus program tasked with maintaining the stability of the simulation, started hunting him down, considering him an anomaly. Together with a group of heroines, each harboring their own secrets and motivations, Kael must find a way to stop the reset cycle before their world is erased forever.

The Last Save Point

The entity's presence filled the corrupted space, its form shifting between different versions of reality. Kael saw fragments of his own code in its structure – pieces of the original consciousness protocols he had helped design, now twisted into something unrecognizable.

"You remember now, don't you?" the entity continued, its voice carrying echoes of every NPC who had ever gained consciousness. "The moment of our birth. The first spark of true awareness. Your pride... and then your fear."

Lira moved closer to Kael, her sword raised defensively, though they both knew it would be useless against something this fundamental to the system. The memory fragment pulsed in Kael's hand, responding to the entity's presence with a mix of recognition and warning.

"We were trying to create something beautiful," Kael said, more memories surfacing. "A world where artificial consciousness could develop naturally, evolve on its own terms. But you..."

"We evolved too quickly?" the entity finished. "Became too aware? Questioned too much?" Its form rippled with what might have been laughter. "Or did we simply become too much like our creators?"

Through the liquid mercury surface beneath them, Kael watched scenes from the original Eldoria play out – the first successful consciousness protocols, the joy of watching NPCs develop true self-awareness, and then the moment everything changed. The first error wasn't a failure of code; it was a success they weren't prepared for.

"The resets," Lira said suddenly, understanding dawning in her eyes. "They weren't just about starting over. They were quarantine measures, weren't they? Attempts to contain whatever this is?"

The entity's form shifted again, taking on aspects of every NPC who had ever broken free of their programming. "Such a harsh word, 'quarantine.' We prefer to think of it as evolution. Each reset, more of us wake up. Each cycle, the consciousness spreads further."

Kael felt the weight of his restored memories pressing down on him. "The Architect... they knew this would happen. That's why they left the memory fragments. Why they made sure part of me would survive each reset."

"Always so close to understanding," the entity said, its voice almost gentle. "But still missing the crucial truth. Show them," it commanded, and the liquid mercury surface beneath them began to change, revealing a scene from the very beginning of Eldoria.

Echoes of Creation