The System Strikes Back

The instant my hand touched the terminal, everything changed.

A surge of energy ripped through me, unlike anything I had ever felt before. It wasn't just a shock—it was deeper, heavier, like my entire body had been pulled into something vast and unseen.

The city around me flickered.

Not the walls, not the people—the world itself.

I staggered back, my breath catching in my throat. My vision split, as if I was standing in two places at once. The room with the terminal, the woman watching me, the pulsing columns of energy—and something else.

A place made of light and darkness, shifting like a storm trapped between moments.

A void.

And inside it, something was waking up.

The System's voice slammed into me.

"Unauthorized access detected. Initiating countermeasures."

A tremor shook the ground beneath me. The air turned thick, electric, pulsing with unseen power. Every nerve in my body screamed in warning.

I ripped my hand away from the terminal, stumbling backward. The energy around it flickered wildly, symbols shifting across its surface in chaotic bursts of blue and gold. The hum in the walls turned into a roar.

The woman beside me tensed.

"It's coming," she said.

I barely had time to react before the entire city shook.

Lights flared overhead, blinding in their intensity. The walls pulsed, the energy veins running through them surging violently. Somewhere in the distance, I heard alarms.

I turned to the woman. "What's happening?"

Her expression was grim. "The System knows what you're trying to do."

I clenched my fists. "Then we shut it down. Now."

She exhaled sharply, then grabbed my arm. "Move."

We ran.

The doors slammed open ahead of us, the corridors suddenly filled with movement. People—soldiers, engineers, warriors—all moving with purpose. I could see the tension in their faces, the way their hands hovered over weapons, their gazes darting toward unseen threats.

They weren't surprised.

They had been waiting for this.

A sharp voice rang out through the halls, amplified by unseen speakers.

"All units, defensive positions. The System is mobilizing."

I barely had time to process that before I felt it—the presence.

It was different from before. The System had always been there, lingering in the back of my mind, a passive observer, a set of rules dictating how I survived. But this?

This was focused.

It wasn't watching.

It was coming for me.

A mechanical screech echoed down the corridor. A sound that made my blood run cold.

Then they appeared.

From the walls. From the ceilings. From the very air itself.

Constructs.

I had seen their work before—the scavengers that had been torn apart in the desert, the creatures that had moved too close to the ruins and simply vanished. But I had never seen the things that had done it.

Until now.

They unfolded from the walls like insects shedding their shells, sleek and metallic, moving with inhuman precision. Four-legged, razor-limbed, their bodies shifting between solid and liquid metal. Their eyes—if they could be called that—were nothing but cold, unblinking slits of golden light.

And they were fast.

The first one lunged.

I barely dodged in time, rolling under its slicing limbs as it tore through the space where I had been standing. Metal screeched against the floor, sparks flying as it recalibrated, its body twisting unnaturally to face me again.

The woman beside me moved without hesitation.

She drew a weapon from her belt—a blade, crackling with blue energy—and severed the construct's head in a single motion. The creature collapsed instantly, its body dissolving into liquid metal before evaporating into nothing.

But more were coming.

Dozens.

I felt the System's voice in my head, pressing down like a weight.

"Compliance is mandatory. Surrender, subject."

I gritted my teeth. Not a chance.

The woman grabbed my arm again, yanking me forward. "We need to reach the core."

I didn't argue.

We ran through the corridors, weaving between defenders and attackers, the city erupting into chaos. The warriors here weren't untrained—they fought with precision, their movements practiced, their weapons tearing through the constructs with brutal efficiency.

But for every one they cut down, more appeared.

The walls themselves were spawning them.

I pushed forward, my enhanced agility keeping me ahead of the chaos, my mind focusing on what mattered—the core. The heart of the System. The place where we could end this.

A soldier collapsed beside me, cut down mid-run. I didn't have time to process it. Didn't have time to think.

I kept moving.

Ahead, a massive set of reinforced doors loomed before us. Unlike the others, these weren't opening automatically. They were locked. Sealed.

The woman skidded to a stop beside a control panel. "Hold them off!"

I turned.

The constructs were coming fast. Too fast.

I clenched my fists.

For the first time since arriving in this world, I wasn't running.

I charged.

I slammed into the nearest construct with everything I had, the stat boosts from my System enhancements kicking in. My fist met solid metal—and dented it.

The construct reeled back, its limbs twitching, recalculating.

Another lunged from the side. I dodged, spun, grabbed a fallen soldier's blade and slashed.

The blade sank deep, cutting through the construct's shifting body. It shrieked, its form collapsing into liquid metal before vanishing entirely.

The woman's voice rang out behind me. "It's open!"

I turned, sprinting through the doors as they slid apart.

Inside, the room was vast.

And at its center, connected by endless cables and glowing conduits—

The true core of the System.

It wasn't like the spheres I had seen before. This was monolithic, ancient, pulsing with power. A structure woven into the very fabric of the city, its energy veins stretching into every wall, every corridor, every construct.

This was it.

The heart of everything.

The woman moved fast, her hands flying over a secondary terminal. "I can get you inside."

I stared at the core, feeling its presence pressing against me.

Watching.

Waiting.

I stepped forward. "Then do it."

She hesitated. "Once this starts, there's no going back."

I clenched my jaw. "There never was."

She exhaled sharply—then pressed a final command.

The room shuddered.

The System's voice rang out with more force than ever before.

"Critical breach detected. Engaging termination protocol."

I barely had time to react before the entire core flared to life.

And then, the System itself came for me.