Chapter 9: Starfall and Sanctuary

Kael’s body moved instinctively.
There was no time to think, to analyze, or even to be scared. As the rollback hunter rushed at him, its limbs twisting like jagged lines of code, Kael called up the only shield he could remember.
Devroot Protocol: Aegis Override.
The golden barrier appeared before him with a metallic shhmm, hexagonal panels clicking together like puzzle pieces. It was an old ability, designed for admin testing—never fair, never balanced. But it lasted only three seconds.
The Hunter struck it on the second.
The impact felt like gravity glitching. Light twisted inward. Sound vanished. For a brief moment, Kael saw a stream of rollback threads reaching for Ezren’s chest, like fingers made from regret and delete commands.
“NO!”
Kael activated the shield, pushing its memory buffer to the limit. The panels flared with white light.
And then shattered.
He was thrown backward, tumbling across the starfield floor that wasn’t really there, scraping data fragments and UI flashes from his limbs. Behind him, he heard Ezren shout.
Kael rolled, groaning, and got to his feet.
The Hunter didn’t pursue. It hovered in place, scanning Ezren again with unsettling patience. It was silent, but the code around it screamed—fragments of rollback logs, purge timestamps, and null-value entries swirled like a deadly halo.
[QUERY: ENTITY #E7-RN][STATUS: NON-CONFORMING][RESPONSE: MEMORY REJECTION // SANITY INDEX BELOW THRESHOLD][SOLUTION: DELETION]
Ezren stood still.
“I’m not afraid,” he whispered. “If deletion brings peace, so be it.”
“No,” Kael rasped. He took a step forward. “You don’t get to give up.”
The Hunter launched another tendril.
Kael struck first.
Debug Pulse: Root Override.
The tendril exploded mid-air in a burst of code. The Hunter reeled—not in pain, but in confusion. Its code flickered, uncertain. Kael knew it wouldn’t last; he’d stunned it for maybe four seconds.
He turned to Ezren.
“You’re not gone. You’re not broken. You’re—”
“I’m tired, Kael.”
Ezren looked at him, his eyes filled with too many memories.
“You made us real. But then you left. You let the system patch us, repurpose us, forget us. Do you even remember what you promised when we completed the final raid?”
Kael felt the words like blades. “That you’d never be just code.”
Ezren nodded slowly.
“Then keep your promise,” Kael said. “Let me anchor you.”
Ezren blinked. “Anchor…?”
Kael opened his hands.
“Merge with me. Sync to my admin root. I can stabilize your thread. We’ll build a sanctuary zone—just like we planned before the rollback. You said healing means remembering pain. So let’s remember together.”
Ezren hesitated.
The Hunter regained its composure.
Three seconds. Two. One.
And Ezren reached forward.
The merge was instant.
Light exploded outward. Kael screamed—not in pain, but from the force of it. Ezren’s data, his memories, his sorrow, and his fragmented code all rushed into Kael like fire through a broken gate. Their minds collided. Their threads intertwined.
He saw—
—Ezren witnessing the rollback event destroy his team——screaming into empty admin windows that never answered——watching his own healing code turn red, corrupt——being sandboxed, over and over, each pocket reality less real than the last——until he forgot what sunlight even looked like—
Kael wept.
But he didn’t let go.
Instead, he stabilized the thread.
> INITIATE SANCTUARY SUBROUTINE  > LOCATION: LIORA CATHEDRAL // SECTOR REBUILD  > PERMISSIONS: ADMIN + ASCENDED  > CONFIRM: [Y]
He pressed yes.
The spire dissolved.
In its place stood a circular chamber of calm light. The Sanctuary.
Its floors shimmered with clear water, and trees grew from glass soil—each leaf flickering between memories, quests, laughter, and loss. A dome of stars arched above them. Peace.
Ezren stood beside him—whole now, though visibly worn.
“I… remember who I was,” he said quietly.
“You are who you were,” Kael replied. “And you’re not alone anymore.”
Ezren looked at him. “But what about the others?”
Kael turned to Lucien’s voice—now audible through a secure link.
“I’m detecting fluctuations across the zones,” Lucien said. “Vail, Serin, Althros—they’re responding to Ezren’s stabilization. It’s like a beacon. They’re remembering.”
“And the Hunter?” Kael asked.
Lucien was silent for a moment.
“It’s regrouping. Learning. Adjusting.”
Kael exhaled.
“It will come for us again,” Ezren said.
“I know.”
Ezren gazed around the Sanctuary. “Then we better make this place real.”
The following days blurred.
Kael and Ezren started rebuilding the Sanctuary layer by layer, using archived admin code, restored memory files, and fragments of old raid mechanics. Lucien managed the network security, setting up firewalls strong enough to protect against the rollback entity.
Sairis returned from the outer perimeter with news.
“They’re coming,” she said. “The others. I saw Serin near Duskvale—she’s moving through time loops, but she stopped burning the threads.”
“And Vail?” Kael asked.
Sairis hesitated. “Still tied to his throne. But… the spikes are rusting.”
They weren’t winning.
But they were changing the fight.
On the fourth day, the Sanctuary shifted. The trees began to sing—soft, wordless hymns remembered from old update events. Players used to hum them at login screens. Now, they returned.
Ezren stood among the trees, robe billowing in the warm wind.
“It’s funny,” he said. “I always thought if I saw you again, I’d be angry.”
Kael chuckled. “You were.”
Ezren smiled. “Yeah. But now… I’m grateful.”
A new notification blinked at the edge of Kael’s vision.
> SANCTUARY NODE STABILITY: 92%  > ASCENDED SIGNALS: 5 of 7 responding  > ENTITY: HUNTER ZERO — STATUS: OUTSIDE GATEWAY
Kael frowned.
“He’s here.”
Ezren’s smile faded. “Then it’s time.”
Sairis joined them, blade drawn.
Kael glanced at his team—new and old, fragmented and whole.
“We don’t fight to destroy it,” he said. “We fight to remind it. Even the rollback was built from something human once. It can remember.”
Ezren raised his staff. “Then let’s make it remember.”
Outside the Sanctuary, the sky split open.
And Hunter Zero descended.
Its form had changed—taller now, cloaked in the faces of the Ascended it had tried to erase. Kael’s own voice echoed from its mouth:
“You abandoned them.”
But this time, Kael didn’t flinch.
He stepped forward.
And raised the memory of what they were.