It didn’t had to end this way.

All of her hard work- gone- in a matter of minutes. Carmen watches the simulation she had been working on for the past few weeks went up into ashes as a series of glitches invaded her world. She didn’t know if the chaos was created by a mistake in the code she must have overlooked since the lest time she had checked the programming or if it was from an outside source. The possibility of this being the fault of a hacker though was very unlikely. Her virtual world was private on the virtual simulation system she had used to create it and she hadn’t shared an invitation to anyone up to this point.

As Carmen watched the endless scenery of fire around me from my starship window, all he could focus on was the building in the far distance of the mountainous area. A marble palace lined with gold and surrounded by water was the only thing not ablaze at the moment. A monitor to the left of me shows a close-up look of the palace and captures the movement of starships coming in and from the building. People could be seen rushing into the area away from a group of soldiers. She gripped the steering wheel of my ship before pressing down on the gas as much as she could. The speedometer on the ship console shows the speed of the ship shift from 100 to 280 miles per hour. It wasn’t before long that she stopped the ship at the base of the mountain.

‘I can’t drive the ship up there. My invisibility cloak is broken, and my guns are wrecked. I’ll have to run, Carmen thought as she quickly stepped out of her ship and rushed over to the side of the boulder. She noticed a ledge above her and lifted her right arm, where a metal bracelet could be seen. She pressed a button on it, and it converted into a gauntlet. After quickly scrolling through her gadgets, she landed on an icon of a grappling hook and pressed it. A grappling hook appeared in her hand, and she angled it up towards the ledge before shooting it. The hook got caught in a rock, and she pulled on the string, which started to drag her upwards. She started racing across the side of the mountain as the speed of the line reverting grew faster before she leaped and landed on the ledge. She landed at the front of the palace steps.

“Hello! Is anyone here?! Deshret?! Killian?! Synthia?! Anyone?!,” Carmen yelled as she desperately searched around for her friends. Sadly, no one answered her, causing her yelling to echo into the open air. She glanced down and noticed the fire advancing, which led her to run along the steps of the palace to its entrance. She tried to open the door but noticed it was closed and proceeded to hit against it with her side before it gave in, causing her to stumble a bit. She soon looked up, and her face instantly dropped.

The palace was not filled with any survivors as she had expected but was rather empty and silent. Furniture such as chairs and tables was thrown about and smashed into bits and pieces, while glass from the chandeliers was scattered about the ground. The light from the all-consuming fire outside bounced against the surface of the glass, causing the room to be lit with an eerie glow. The floor almost appeared as if it were the glimmering surface of an ocean, with the only difference being the patches of blood that accompanied the glass.

“I’m too late. Everyone’s gone,” Carmen said in a low voice as she stared at the scene with absolute terror. She soon heard the sound of footsteps in the other room beside her. Her eyes glimmered with hope before she quickly raced across the room and entered the room to find a familiar figure in front of her.

“Killian. Thank Pantheon! You’re okay! Do you know where the rest are? I’ve been looking everywhere for you…” Carmen asked her friend Killian, one of her early creations for her sim, with hope in her eyes until she noticed that he was holding a crown in a bloody hand.

“Guys…”

Her friend turned around with a calm expression, which deeply disturbed her due to the fact he was covered in blood. He carelessly fiddled with the crown in his hands as he inspected it. After a few seconds, he soon turned to look at Carmen with a small smile, as if he had just noticed her presence.

“Oh, hello, dear. Nice of you to join us this lovely night,” Killian greeted her politely. Carmen stepped forward, but despite her fear, pointed to the crown in his hands.

“Killian. Why do you have Deshrets crown?” she asked him as her eyes started to stare right into his as if trying to read his mind. In her perspective, panels showing the thoughts and emotions of Killian popped up around her view of him. Suddenly the screens started to glitch before all of them went dark, and a symbol of a bat’s head appeared on all of them.

‘What the fuck?!,’ she thought, absolutely shocked at the fact that her controls inside the very sim she created were being hacked into. She smacked her VR headset a few times before she noticed that Killian started to chuckle to himself.

“Don’t bother trying any of your fancy controls. The SIM is no longer in your hands. Creator,” Killian said the last word with venom as he stared daggers into the eyes of his maker.

“Why are you doing this?! I did nothing to you! They did nothing to you!” Carmen said as she gestured to the area around her, which should have been filled with life and laughter instead of a sea of glass and blood.

“Still looking out for the lower creations, I see. No wonder you never wanted to be seen as a god. You’re too soft. Too weak,” Killian said in a threatening tone as he started to circle around her like a vulture.

“Lower creations? You can’t be serious? Every living being I have created is important. What the hell is wrong with you that you don’t think the same?!” Carmen asked him in an enraged yell as she went forward and pointed a finger to his chest. He smacked it away in a fit of fury.

“Cause they don’t have a purpose!” he answered with rage in a yell so loud it seemed to have shaken the windows a bit. Carmen looked at him like she had just been slapped.

“They mean nothing. You just made them for your entertainment! Unlike them, I was given a purpose! A reason to exist! To defend the very world you have created!” Killian yelled as he wildly pointed towards her, which caused her to step back a bit.

“So what if a few of those low lives die?! My purpose is to improve the very state of this universe! Those beings were wasting space for progress! They were just holding us back! Don’t you see?! I’m doing this all for you! This is what you wanted!” Killian said as he turned around to gesture the room before turning towards her and pointing at her as if accusing her of starting this incident in the first place. He soon went to place a hand on her shoulder but was stopped by Carmen gripping his hand and pushing it back harshly. She was breathing heavily as she glared dagger into his very soul.

“I never wanted this. I only wanted for everyone to be happy. For everyone to live. And you took that away,” Carmen told him in a cold manner. She soon glanced at the crown still in his hands before chuckling to herself bitterly.

“And the other pilots? Did you get rid of them too? Did you think they were not important enough like you?” Carmen asked him bitterly, but he seemed to just stare at her with a cold face. She soon stepped forward and pulled out a sword from her gauntlet to press it into his chest. He didn’t seem to move from his spot.

“Answer me, you piece of shit!”

“They got in the way. Didn’t see the same things that I saw. They were too nice to the low lives,” Killian said before lightly chuckling and wiping a tear of his cheek from his laughter.

“They must have taken that from you, I guess. But don’t you worry. I got rid of the trash. Tho I won’t be able to give you their bodies. They’re burning out there somewhere.”

He lazily gestured to the fiery scene surrounding the palace.

Carmen soon put her hand out. Her face was as cold as a tone. She was no longer shaking in fear but seemed to be fueled by something else.

Vengeance.

“Give me the crown,” Carmen told him in a low voice, but he simply starred at her with a raised eyebrow and careless expression. The grip on her sword hardened.

“I’m not asking Killian. Give me the crown,” Carmen demanded with a stern voice. He seemed to contemplate the demand before shrugging and lifting the crown.

“Okay. You can have it,” he said, only to throw it to the air above them and swiftly pull out a sword from under his cape. Carmen quickly blocked the sword with her own, and the two parried strikes a couple of times until Killian decided to try and hit her in the face. She dodged the attacks and grabbed his leg before throwing him across the room and into a nearby jade column. He got up from the floor and proceeded to pull out what seemed to look like a bow with lighting quivers and rushed towards her at full speed. Carmen dashed towards the crown and picked it up before putting it in her bag. She then blocked his attack by using a nearby metal shield she spotted on a display at the corner of the room. The arrows struck the shield and passed threw only to stop a few inches from her face.

“Your aim is getting better but not quite,” Carmen said confidently before using the shield to strike the column behind him. He seemed smug for a moment at the fact she didn’t hit him.

“Looks like the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree,” he responded smugly, only to look puzzled at Carmen tapping at the corner of her eyes. He soon looked down to the glass that surrounded him that reflected the column behind him that was quickly breaking apart. He turned around to see the column collapse along with a part of the roof and rushed to get away. The collapse caused the room to be filled with dust for a moment before settling. Killian noticed he couldn’t move from his spot since one of his legs was trapped under a slab of marble. He glanced around only to find Carmen looking down at him with anger as she pointed her sword at him.

“No. It falls very far. Even down to hell it seems,” she said to him as she went to kneel in front of him as if she were talking down to a small child.

Killian smirked a bit before raising his hands in a mock surrender.

“I wouldn’t say that right now if I were you,” he told her before showing her a trigger in one of his hands that he soon pressed. The lights of bombs placed around the palace turned on and started to blink rapidly.

Carmen glanced around the room, and in the process, Killian created a force field around himself. Knowing she doesn’t have that much time, she raced outside the palace and went towards the ledge and hopped off at the very moment the explosives went off. She gripped the line of the grappling hook she had used earlier and waited a couple of moments before climbing back up. After dragging herself onto the ledge, she turned around to see the entire building blown to pieces. The fire was now consuming everything in its path, leaving the ledge to be the only thing not set ablaze. She soon heard the sound of engines and looked up to see a large humanoid robot the size of a hundred-story building.