Lumi mumbled in her unconsciousness, her voice hoarse and fragmented. "Too... much... code... broken..." Then her eyes closed, and her body went limp. The child's body was hot like embers, sweat soaking her clothes. Her heterochromic eyes flickered rapidly, like a damaged screen. Her breath was labored. "What's happening?" Nyxaria demanded, kneeling beside her.
[System Feedback]
Anomaly Detected: System Overload.
Vital Signs: Critical.
The world narrowed to a palm-sized space.
Lumi lay limp in Nyxaria's lap, her small body blazing like freshly forged iron. Her pale skin flushed unnaturally, covered in cold sweat that glistened in the crystal light of the throne room. Her breath—fast, shallow, jerking—tore through the room's silence like a dull saw. But what stabbed most were her eyes. Those two heterochromic orbs that marked her uniqueness now blinked wildly, out of sync. The golden one shone too bright, flaring like molten metal, while the gray one dimmed, died, a monitor screen losing signal. Both blinked in random rhythm, a flicker of light signaling damage behind the screen of flesh.
No. No, no, no.
Those words spun in Mara's head like a bad mantra. Panic—something foreign and disgusting to Nyxaria's constitution—flooded her nervous system. It felt like extreme input lag, where commands from the brain were stalled by tremors of fear before finally being executed. She, a level 999 entity with statistics that could break mountains, now felt paralyzed by a child's fever.
"Lumi!" Seris was already kneeling beside her, her pale face of recently recovered exhaustion now covered again by shadow. Her cold hand touched Lumi's forehead, then quickly pulled back. "She... it's like she's burning. But this isn't ordinary heat."
Lazarus, with his right hand still wrapped in temporary bone structure, pushed his body closer. Dark green energy—the hallmark of his life and death magic—flowed from his bone fingers, enveloping Lumi's body like diagnostic fog. "No poison. No curse detected. The system gives no [Poison], [Curse], or [Disease] status whatsoever." His voice, usually dramatic, was now flat and confused. "Her vital signs are chaotic, but the system log is clean. This... doesn't make sense."
[System Feedback]
Anomaly Detected: System Overload.
Vital Signs: Critical.
"System Overload?" Seris read the notification with a trembling voice. "What does that mean?"
It means she's not an ordinary human, Mara screamed internally. It means she's a Glitch-Linked Observer, a walking system sensor that we brought to a pure temporal zone and to a room filled with Legendary artifact resonance. We flooded her processor with too many voices.
"She mumbled earlier," Nyxaria whispered, her outward voice sounding calm, a frightening contrast to the storm inside. "'Too much code. Broken.'"
Lumi writhed, sighing long and ending in a choke. Her dry lips trembled. "Lines... all lined... broken..." Then her body arced, shaken by stronger tremors. Seris held her shoulders, preventing her from falling.
"We need a healer!" Seris stared at Nyxaria, her eyes pleading. "Call the best from Eclipse, from anywhere!"
Mara nodded, her deepest logical instinct trying to pierce the fog of panic. Right. Standard action. Find an expert. Within Nyxaria, a command formed. Her voice echoed, filling the room with authority that compelled the world to obey. "[Sovereignty Mark]."
A faint purple symbol—a glowing cracked crown—appeared briefly above Seris before merging with the elf's aura. "Go to Eclipse's communication center. Use my name and authority. Bring back the best healer they have, one skilled in handling... system anomalies." She didn't say 'disease'. This wasn't a disease.
Seris nodded quickly, her body already turning before Nyxaria finished speaking. She shot out of the room, leaving a trail of swirling wind.
"And us?" Lazarus asked, staring at the increasingly restless Lumi. "We can't just wait."
"Deeper diagnosis," Nyxaria muttered. She lifted Lumi gently, feeling how light that body was, how fragile. She carried her to a side room functioning as an emergency infirmary—a room with a simple stone bed and shelves of potions. With one hand gesture, a controlled [Shadow Step] brought pillows and blankets from Lumi's private room. She laid the child down.
Lazarus wasted no time. His green-energied hand began moving ritualistically above Lumi's body, drawing complex necromantic diagnostic patterns. "I'll scan the soul layers, the essence layers. If there's external interference, I'll see it."
Nyxaria stood beside, silent. Nyxaria's hands clenched tight at her sides, but Mara's hands inside wanted to reach, wanted to hug, wanted to do something. She forced herself to analyze.
System Overload. Overload means excessive load. Lumi has [Glitch Sight]—the ability to see code and system anomalies passively. What did she see today?
She compiled a mental timeline at superprocessor speed. Morning: Treaty Stone bleeding, emitting intense historical wounds. Noon: Journey to Lake of Stillness, entering Chrono-Locked Zone with pure temporal distortion. Afternoon: Watching a level 95 elemental Guardian die, Essence of Eternity core taken. Evening: Witnessing the ritual merging Essence with Legendary artifact.
She spent many days witnessing events with extraordinarily high system 'data load'. Like placing a delicate seismic sensor next to consecutive nuclear explosions.
"There's... misalignment," Lazarus whispered, breaking her reverie. The green light from his hand formed a faint image above Lumi's chest—an energy silhouette pulsing irregularly. "Her soul is intact. No traces of corruption, parasites, or mental attacks. But there are gaps, small cracks in her energy pattern. Like... like a net stretched too tight until the threads start to separate."
"The cause?"
"Not an external cause. This is... essential exhaustion. But not ordinary physical or mental exhaustion. This is deeper." Lazarus sighed, pulling back his energy. His face looked more wrinkled. "My necromancy reads life and death. But what's happening to her... this is like 'life' bearing too much 'information'. I don't have the vocabulary for this."
We do, Mara thought bitterly. Bandwidth overload. Processor burnout.
Fast footsteps sounded. Seris returned, followed by two figures. The first was a middle-aged human in gray robes patterned with silver spider webs—the symbol of the Healer's Guild. The second was... a gnome? A small creature with thick glasses and an alchemist practitioner's outfit, carrying an instrument box almost as big as himself.
You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.
"Master Healer Arion, from the Clear River Protector Guild," Seris introduced quickly. "And this is Zix, senior Artificer-Medic from Eclipse Merchants, specialist in... system abnormalities and biomechanical interfaces."
Arion, the healer, immediately stepped forward. His hand glowed soft white, extending standard healing energy toward Lumi. The light touched Lumi's skin—and immediately shattered, scattering like glass hit by a stone.
"What—?" Arion gasped, then tried again with a stronger spell. The result was the same. His healing energy was rejected, couldn't stick, as if Lumi's body had an antibody layer against conventional healing magic. "I... I can't. It's as if her body doesn't recognize my magic as something compatible."
Zix the gnome snorted, pushing his instrument box forward. He pulled out a strange crystal lens connected with aether cables. "Allow me. Eclipse often handles... unique items." He directed the lens at Lumi, and the crystal was instantly filled with unstable white-blue static light, hissing. Zix squinted behind his glasses. "Interesting. Very interesting! Patient's energy reading shows excessive activation in magical-emanation perception channels. Not sick. Not wounded. But... saturation."
"Explain," Nyxaria hissed, one word that made the room temperature drop several degrees.
Zix was undaunted, too absorbed in his findings. "Imagine the mind is a vessel. This vessel normally holds water—normal sensory impressions. Now, pour an ocean into it. Or more precisely, pour... raw reality code. Her perception channel is wide open, possibly innately, and today she was flooded with system-class data. Ordinary healing magic doesn't work because this isn't a physical problem that needs fixing, but a circuit problem that needs... to be shut down."
Shut down. The word hung in the air.
"Then what's the cure?" Seris asked, her voice hoarse.
Zix shrugged, a gesture that suddenly felt very flippant. "Cure? This isn't the flu. This is computational overload. You need a way to disconnect her from the data source, or at least install a firewall. Eclipse has energy dampeners, but for living organic cases... the risk is high. Could cause permanent damage." He stared at Nyxaria. "Or, perhaps you have a more... authoritative way."
The experts stared at her. Arion with helplessness, Zix with academic interest, Seris and Lazarus with hope beginning to crack. All of them, with all their expertise, had reached a dead end.
And on the bed, Lumi suddenly screamed.
Her voice wasn't a cry of physical pain, but a scream of pure fear, high-pitched and full of suffering. Her flickering eyes now opened wide, staring at a ceiling invisible to her. "Don't! Too many! All numbers—all light—too many!" Her hands clawed at the air, as if trying to push away something invisible.
That was enough.
Nyxaria moved. All the silence, all the analysis, all the helplessness melted into one cold and sharp decision point. She pushed Master Healer Arion and Artificer Zix aside without roughness, but also without hesitation. She sat on the edge of the bed, taking Lumi's clawing hand and gripping it tight.
"My lord?" Lazarus asked, confused.
"All of you," Nyxaria said, without looking back. "Get out."
"But—"
"[Sovereign's Barrier]."
A transparent purple energy dome appeared with a whoosh, separating Lumi's bed and Nyxaria from the entire room. Sound from outside suddenly muffled, becoming unclear murmurs. Inside the dome, there were only the two of them.
This is crazy. This is absolutely crazy. But that gnome was right. She needs to be shut down. She needs a reboot. And I have one skill designed to isolate, wrap, protect from all external interference... by sacrificing everything else.
She stared at Lumi's moaning face, brushing her wet white hair. "Calm down, dear," she whispered, Nyxaria's voice for the first time sounding soft, cracked. "Ghost Mama will help."
She raised her left hand. Her black nails glowed with pure darkness energy. Not the destructive energy of [Void Severance], but the absolute isolation energy of [Corruption Cocoon]. That skill was designed to envelop herself in an impenetrable cocoon, total regeneration at the price of being unable to move or act.
But what's the definition of 'self'? Mara thought, her game logic spinning fast. This skill is bound to the user, Nyxaria. But if I expand the definition of 'self' temporarily... if I consider Lumi as part of my defense circle...
That was a violation of skill rules. That was an incalculable system risk. But the countdown in her head wasn't a countdown of cooldown or damage, but the rhythm of Lumi's shortening breath growing weaker. She was no longer thinking about system consequences. She was thinking about the child in front of her crying because the world was too bright, too loud, too much. With crystallized intent—not to isolate herself, but to wrap and protect—Nyxaria activated the skill.
[Corruption Cocoon] usually formed a solid cocoon around her. This time, the black-purple energy crept from her hand, like gentle shadow roots. They coiled around Lumi's body carefully, not pressing, but wrapping. Forming a loose energy oval around the bed. The cocoon was opaque, blocking the view from outside, and from inside, the world also dimmed.
The effect was instant.
Lumi's scream cut off. Her tense body suddenly went limp. Both her eyes—the golden and the gray—slowly closed. The wild blinking stopped. Her labored breath began to slow, becoming deep and regular inhales-exhales. The furrow in her forehead disappeared.
From inside the cocoon, Nyxaria could feel it. The crazy pressure radiating from that small body, the wild data waves that had previously tried to tear from within, now slowly subsided. The [Corruption Cocoon] acted like a soundproof room for the soul. It cut her off—temporarily—from the relentless flood of system input.
[System Feedback]
Anomaly Shielded: Temporary Disconnect.
External Data Stream: Blocked.
She succeeded.
The cocoon held. Nyxaria didn't move from her position, continuing to hold Lumi's now limp hand. From outside, Seris, Lazarus, and the two experts could only see a slowly pulsing dark energy mass, and the faint shadow of the Demon Queen bending within it.
Time passed. One hour. Two hours. The crystal light on the ceiling dimmed toward night.
Lazarus and Seris waited outside the barrier, not budging. Arion the healer had left, shaking his head. Zix the gnome sat on the floor, absorbed in noting observations about "authoritative application of high-class isolation skills on system-sensitive entities" in his notebook, occasionally exclaiming "Extraordinary!" in a shrill voice.
Inside the cocoon, the world was silent. There was only the sound of Lumi's calm breathing, and the heartbeat of Mara—not Nyxaria—beating softly in her own ears. In that silence, fear slowly transformed into exhaustion, then into a deep acknowledgment. She's not a tool. Not a magic radar. She is Lumi. The child who clings to me, calls me Ghost Mama, and smiles eating my disaster soup cooking. And I... I'm more afraid of losing her than losing the Treaty Stone, Sanctuary, or even control over this raid boss scenario.
That was a realization more frightening than facing a level 180 Inquisitor.
After six hours, the cocoon began to thin. The [Corruption Cocoon] energy was exhausted, dissolving into the air like smoke. Nyxaria still sat there, her back straight, but there was exhaustion in her usually unshakeable shoulders.
On the bed, Lumi drew a deep breath—the first truly calm breath since arriving—and opened her eyes. Those two heterochromic eyeballs returned to normal. The golden one sparkled gently, full of awareness. The gray one clear, reflecting the room's light. No more wild blinking. Her fever had dropped. Her skin returned to its natural pale color. She looked around, then stared at Nyxaria. Her dry lips formed a small, weak smile. "Ghost Mama," her voice hoarse, but clear. "I... strange dream. Dark. But also quiet."
Nyxaria nodded, not trusting her own voice to speak. She reached for a cup of water that Lazarus had prepared on the side table, spooning a little to Lumi's lips.
Lumi drank, then looked at her with a gaze suddenly very adult, very understanding. "I saw too much. Everything vibrating, noisy. The sad stone, the slow lake, the blue light that... full of time." She furrowed her brow, trying to remember. "Then dark. Mama's dark. That... helped."
"Don't force yourself," Nyxaria could finally say, her voice low.
"No," Lumi shook her head. She extended her small hand, touching Nyxaria's cheek. That touch was warm, not blazing hot. "I'm fine now. But..." Her eyes, both of them, sparkled with worrying focus. "When sick... when dark... I saw something else. Not code. Pictures."
Nyxaria froze. "What pictures?"
Lumi brought her lips close to Nyxaria's ear. Her whisper was as soft as wind, but each word stuck like ice nails. "Bad people. Many bad people. They wear robes... white? But dirty. Their aura... sharp. Like swords. And they... want to come here."
She pulled away, looking at Nyxaria with wide eyes full of pure fear, fear not originating from system overload, but from understanding. "They want to take the Stone that doesn't cry anymore. And they want to... hurt Mama."
That whisper hung in the air that suddenly felt very thin, very cold.
Outside the barrier, Seris and Lazarus saw the cocoon disappear and stepped closer, faces full of relief. But that relief froze when they saw the expression on Nyxaria's face—not anger, not sadness, but an absolute vigilance deeper and more dangerous than both.
Lumi hugged Nyxaria's neck, hiding her face in her shoulder. The hug was tight, full of trust. And Nyxaria, the level 999 Demon Queen, returned the hug, while her red eyes stared blankly toward the room's door, as if able to penetrate the obsidian walls, penetrate the night's darkness, and see the new threat marching neatly in the distance, carrying their truth sharp as swords.