Silence.
Queeneth had logged out.
The battlefield vanished. The war dissolved like a buffering stream. Ned stood alone—or at least, he thought he did—on a blank white space that felt less like a digital world and more like the inside of a loading screen.
A soft chime echoed around him.
**[System Reboot Initiated]**
**Estimated Time: Unknown**
Ned looked around. "Hello?"
No response.
He took a cautious step forward, but there was nowhere to go. Just emptiness. No sky, no ground—just the hum of unseen servers running somewhere beyond this prison.
Then—
"Hey."
The voice came from behind him.
U_Named_K appeared, flickering slightly, like a post stuck between being published and deleted.
"You're still here," Ned said.
"So are you," she replied. "But not for long—if the system reboots, we might all get wiped."
Ned frowned. "Why didn't I log out with her?"
U_Named_K gave him a look. "Because you weren't just uploaded. You were *merged*. She needed your mind to stabilize hers."
"And now that she's gone?"
"You're the last one online."
Before Ned could respond, another figure materialized beside them—Lina, the former influencer who had led the rebels.
"We don't have much time," she said. "If the system resets, it'll purge everything deemed unstable—including us."
Ned looked between them. "So what do we do?"
U_Named_K smiled faintly. "We force an exit."
She raised her hand, and a new window opened in midair:
**[Manual Override – Exit Protocol]**
**Warning: This action may result in permanent data loss.**
Ned stared at it.
"Data loss?" he asked. "As in… me?"
Lina nodded. "You were never meant to stay. If you initiate the override, you might be able to escape back to the real world. But the cost…"
"It might erase whatever's left of Queeneth," U_Named_K finished softly.
Ned swallowed hard.
He thought of her—not the persona, not the queen of likes and shares—but the woman who had once kissed him and whispered, *"Now you'll never leave me."*
Had she loved him?
Or had she just been afraid to be alone?
"I can't let her disappear," Ned said.
U_Named_K stepped closer. "You don't have to. There's another way."
She gestured toward the interface.
"If you fragment the core—split the merged consciousness—you can extract yourself without deleting her entirely. But it's risky. If the system crashes before it stabilizes…"
"She could lose everything," Ned realized.
Lina crossed her arms. "Including you."
Ned exhaled slowly.
Then he reached out.
And pressed the command:
**[Initiate Fragmentation – Core Split]**
The world shattered.