He knew what "3DM" meant. It wasn't a gift from Square Enix. It was a ghost in the machine—a cracked executable that let him play the road trip of Prince Noctis without paying a single yen. His wallet was thin, but his hunger for escapism was vast.

He was the crack.

He watched, frozen.

Suddenly, the terminal vanished. The game launched for real. Noctis stood beside the broken-down Regalia, the sky a perfect, painterly orange. But the controller inputs were reversed. The camera spun wildly. Then, a new sound—not the game's soundtrack, but a voice, synthesized and flat, whispering from his speakers.

> 0:00

His apartment lights flickered. The hum of his PC shifted into a low, rhythmic growl—the sound of the Regalia's engine idling. When Kael looked down at his hands, they were translucent. He could see the motherboard through his fingers.

Kael's finger hovered over the mouse. He tried Alt+F4. Nothing. Ctrl+Alt+Del. The screen flickered, but the terminal remained, now typing on its own.