System: There's Something Wrong With My System.-Chapter 27 - The Echoes & Quest

They tumbled through fog and silence.

The world spun, not physically, but in some metaphysical way, like falling between stories in a book not yet written.

Time didn't pass. It simply stopped.

Then...

A crunch of leaves.

Mikail opened his eyes.

They were no longer in the house.

They stood in the middle of a dead forest. Moonlight filtered through bare branches above, but the sky held no stars.

The air was thick with silence, and the ground twisted subtly beneath their feet like breathing roots.

"Where are we now?" Mikail asked, voice trembling.

Melisa scanned the horizon. "We're deeper. Past the house. Past the gate. We're in the Core of the Zero Zone"

Moona clutched her wand tighter, face pale.

"This... This isn't just a random shadow bleed. Something's drawing us in, this is Dangerous"

Mikail turned slowly, and his heart dropped.

Behind them, at the forest's edge...

A figure stood.

Tall.

Still.

Its head tilted.

Watching.

And it wasn't alone.

The deeper part of the Zero Zone had noticed them.

And it wasn't going to let them leave so easily.

"L-Lisa"

Mikail called, his voice cracked.

Melisa didn't answer right away. She had already felt the presence of the figure.

Her eyes were locked on the figure in the trees. No... Not a figure. Figures. More shapes were emerging from the fog, stepping out from behind trunks that hadn't been there a heartbeat ago. Shadows with weight. With intention.

Moona whimpered.

"They're not moving... But they're getting closer"

Melisa finally spoke, low and flat.

"Don't blink. Don't speak again unless I say"

Mikail swallowed hard.

"W-What are they? They didn't look like Those Shadow Creatures"

Melisa's voice was barely audible.

"... Echoes. Failed ones. Lost ones. Not everything that enters the Core comes back... And not everything that stays stays dead"

Melisa's eyes didn't waver from the encroaching figures.

"They were people once," she continued. "Just like us. Wrong place, wrong time, they follow the whisper of the Shadow and then got pulled in... And the Zone never let go"

Mikail felt his stomach twist. The figures were close enough now that he could see faces... Or what remained of them.

Some were smeared like melting wax. Others were eerily intact, with wide, empty eyes that stared through them like broken glass.

"Are they... Alive?"

"No," Moona said. "But they remember being. That's what makes them dangerous"

One of the Echoes tilted its head further, jaw opening slightly as if trying to speak, but no sound came. Just a dry gasp, like wind through a hollow throat.

Mikail took a shaky step back.

The forest groaned.

Branches above twisted and writhed like veins under the skin.

The Echoes stepped forward in unison.

The Zero Zone had spoken.

And now, it wanted them too.

--------

Melisa moved.

Her hand flicked to her side, and her Gun shimmered faintly, not with light, but intention. Her breath steadied, and her voice was sharp:

"Imbue: Shatterpoint"

The gun pulsed. With a crack, she fired. The Mana bullet tore through the air and hit an Echo straight in the center of its chest.

The creature staggered but didn't fall.

Instead, cracks spiderwebbed across its body, glowing faint red.

Then-

*BOOM*

It shattered like glass, falling in twitching pieces.

More Echoes surged from the trees.

"Moona! Cover left!"

"Already on it!"

Moona yelled, lifting her wand. Light pulsed at the tip, then fractured into several streams of energy that spiraled into the air before slamming into the Echoes.

"Cascade Burst!"

The spell struck with surgical force, exploding in controlled arcs. Trees bent from the pressure wave, and the nearest Echoes were vaporized. For a moment, their whispers filled the air, then were gone.

But there were too many.

"Mikail! Behind you!"

He turned, too slow.

An Echo lunged. Its form is a blur of shadow and malice, shrieking through the air like a living nightmare.

He froze.

Fear gripped him like ice in his veins.

Was he afraid? Yes.

Was he strong? Yes, thanks to the System.

But strength meant nothing without experience, and that was what he lacked.

His body could move, but his mind, his mind hesitated.

Instinct wrestled with uncertainty.

And yet, something sparked inside him.

A flicker. A pulse. Not courage. Not yet.

But the beginning of it.

He didn't have a weapon like Melisa, not yet.

Magic?

He had no idea what kind of spell would even work on the creature in front of him.

So he chose the one thing he could use right now.

"Enhance," Mikail whispered.

The word wasn't loud, but it carried weight.

It rippled through his body like electricity snapping through his veins.

It surged into the air like pressure dropping before a storm.

It echoed through the Zero Zone itself. As if the world had been waiting for him to say it.

Mana surged through his limbs like molten iron in cold veins. His muscles bulged, his vision sharpened. Everything slowed, no, he moved faster.

The Echo's claws came down. Mikail ducked beneath the strike, spun, and slammed his elbow into its side. The impact echoed like a drumbeat. The creature flew into a tree, spine crunching on impact.

Another Echo grabbed his arm, but Mikail turned and, with a roar, lifted it and hurled it into the mass swarming from the mist.

"Keep moving!" Melisa barked. "Don't let them surround you!"

She fired again, "Imbue: Piercer," The bullet tore through two Echoes in a line, ripping holes where their hearts should've been. One crumbled. The other kept crawling.

Moona's wand flared as she spun in place, eyes glowing with layered glyphs.

"Mana Chain!"

Mana Chains burst from the air and wrapped around six Echoes at once, pinning them to the forest floor.

They screamed, no, remembered screaming. The sound scraped inside the skull, full of pain they could no longer feel.

Mikail was breathing hard now, not from fatigue, but from something deeper.

Melisa had told him they were once human. Moona had said they had already died.

But no matter how they looked now, they were human. They had been human.

This wasn't about exhaustion. It was about awareness... About consciousness.

Mikail looked at his bloody hand.

It didn't look like human blood, too dark, too thick.

"I can... I can do this," He muttered as if trying to convince himself.

There was no time to hesitate. Not now.

He wasn't alone, one mistake could put all three of them in danger.

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And he was the only man here, he couldn't afford to look weak.

It wasn't about looking cool... Mikail knew that the System had made him strong, no doubt about that.

But strength alone wasn't enough. Not when it came to a real fight like this. He just didn't know how to use it yet.

"Let's do this. I can do this!"

Mikail whispered the words to himself, eyes locked on the Echoes hurtling toward him.

[System Alert!]

[New Quest Unlocked: Proof of Will]

[Description:

You have entered the Core of the Zero Zone. You stand where few have survived, surrounded by remnants of what once were people.

The System has deemed this a critical threshold. Power alone is insufficient. Prove your resolve. Prove your will]

[Objectives:

- Survive for 5 minutes in direct combat against the Echoes

- Protect all allies (Melisa, Moona) from fatal damage

- Eliminate a minimum of 12 Echoes without assistance

- Resist the Whisper of the Core]

[WARNING: Passive Mental Corruption Rising...]

[Bonus Objective (Optional):

- Awaken a new Trait or Technique during combat]

[Reward:

- System Upgrade: [Trait Slot Unlocked]

- Random Rare Skill Imbue Scroll

- ??? (Hidden Reward)]

[Failure Penalty:

- Partial Lock on System Functions (24 hours)

- Emotional Instability Debuff (24 hours)

- Echo Mark (???)]

- Dead

[Quest Timer: 00:00:01 / 05:00:00 - Begin]

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