The words still burned behind Kael’s eyes: [STATUS: PHYSICAL HOST OCCUPIED. ACCESS DENIED.]. He was trapped, well and truly. Not just in Aethernia, but in a digital skin, his real body a ghost of a memory, its fate unknown, unreachable. The small inn room, with its flickering lantern and pixellated walls, had become a cell. All night, he'd stared at the ceiling, the transparent Admin panel a constant, mocking presence at the edge of his vision. Every rustle of the digital bedsheets, every faint, distant sound from the virtual street outside, felt like a reminder of his utter helplessness.
Sleep was an impossibility. His mind raced, replaying the horror: Jayden and Lilly, deleted, their entire existence wiped. Lyra, so brave, so certain in her quest for her sister. And him, Kael, a glorifi
