Indecision Protocol Online

Adrian hit the water like a ragdoll fired from a slingshot. His limbs flailed, spine bent unnaturally, mouth wide in a soundless scream swallowed by the torrent.

The cold didn't embrace him.

It violated him.

It was ice, guilt, and pressure—rushing into every crevice, every wound, every memory he had ever tried to repress. He plunged deep, spinning violently, his eyes squeezed shut against the blur of bubbles and blood. His body turned weightless, useless, a swirling mess of pain and panic.

[Congratulations: You are not dead yet. Disappointed?]

Adrian didn't answer. Couldn't. His lungs screamed with the fury of deprived oxygen. He kicked upward, flailing toward what he hoped was the surface.

When his face finally broke the water, he inhaled so sharply it felt like razors. He coughed. Gagged. Swallowed more water. Fought the churning current.

His ears filled with white noise. The river yanked him like it had an appointment to keep.

Twisting. Turning.

Rocks scraped his limbs. Branches lashed his skin. A particularly cruel slab of stone kissed his temple hard enough to blur the edges of the world. Blood diluted into the water. He barely noticed. Adrenaline was numbing things that should never be numb.

His hands caught a jagged ledge. He slammed against it, the impact jarring every nerve ending. Fingers slipped once, twice—then caught. Somehow, impossibly, he clawed his way up, dragging his half-drowned body onto the muddy bank like something that had crawled out of an evolutionary mistake.

He lay there, gasping. Twitching.

Shaking.

Blood trickled from a cut above his eye. His hands were shredded and raw. The river had peeled back his skin like it was bored of pretenses. Deep lacerations ran up his forearms. His back still burned where the wolf's claw had landed—a wound that throbbed with heat and humiliation.

He was soaked. Cold. Bleeding.

And very, very alive.

Unfortunately.

Only his rage, his stubborn disbelief, and his refusal to die for someone else's amusement kept his heart beating.

He rolled onto his back and hacked river water out of his lungs. His hoodie, formerly a dignified shade of sad gray, now clung to him like wet cardboard and desperation. Every inhale felt like breathing fire through a straw.

The forest here was quiet—eerily so. Like even the wildlife had taken one look at Adrian's condition and thought, "Yikes, this guy needs a minute."

One eye cracked open.

"…I hate everything."

And he meant it.

He hadn't even known this voice—this absurd program—for an hour. In that time, it had kidnapped him, thrown him into a forest with a death-wolf, and watched him swan dive off a cliff like an overworked stunt double.

[Inspiring.]

He turned his head, face smeared with mud and disbelief.

"You kidnapped me. You dumped me into this wilderness. You fed me to a goddamn alpha werewolf. And now I almost died jumping off a cliff because some oversized predator wanted to wear my face like a Halloween mask!"

What was he even doing? Yelling at a voice? A program? Whatever this sarcastic hell-interface was.

But it wasn't just about the program. Not really.

He'd been angry before. At school. In the hallway. At the back of the classroom where no one looked.

He remembered fists.

Laughter.

Getting hit just because someone else had a bad day—or wanted to show off.

He remembered shoving down the rage, pretending it didn't hurt. He even tried to fight once or twice.

They laughed harder.

He'd stopped trying.

Let them hit him. Let them decide who he was.

That's what he hated more than the pain. The acceptance of it.

And now, here he was again. Just another weakling tossed into the dirt by something stronger.

At least the wolf had been honest about it.

[Correction: It wanted to wear your soul like a wristwatch. Your face is… beneath its aesthetic standards.]

"…I should've let it eat me."

[You still might.]

[Odds of fatal hypothermia: 38%. Odds of being mauled by wolves: 17%. Odds of spontaneously combusting due to narrative irony: 6%. Not zero.]

He groaned into the dirt.

"I was fine mopping puke…"

The words slipped out before he caught them.

Was he, though?

No. He had just stopped caring. Stopped dreaming.

Stopped trying.

He'd settled for mop buckets and invisible shifts. Lived like a background extra in his own story.

And maybe, just maybe, that had made him easier to forget.

Maybe even easier to throw away.

He hated that realization most of all.

[Incorrect. You were failing quietly in a predictable spiral.]

[Now, you are failing epically. Growth detected.]

"Fantastic," he muttered. "Now I get to suffer loudly."

His thoughts spiraled through an emotional blender. Anger. Shame. Bitterness. A flicker of something else, too. Not hope. Not yet.

But maybe the bitterness was rust starting to crack.

He didn't know.

All he knew was this program was insufferable.

'Who in their right mind gave it that voice?' he thought. 'Soft. Sweet. Mechanically smug. It's like being insulted by an AI yoga instructor.'

A bird chirped above, a cheerful little tweet-a-doodle-you-almost-died anthem.

He sat up, groaning as his body protested.

His back burned. His vision swam. His knees screamed every time he moved. His hands were ruined—the cuts ugly, deep, throbbing.

"Okay," he rasped. "If I survive this—if—we are going to have a serious conversation about boundaries. And consent. And not screwing with anxious janitors on their birthday*.""

[Acknowledged.]

[…Also: Happy birthday.]

He blinked.

That… felt different.

No snide tone. No mocking observation. Just… the words.

He eyed the treetops suspiciously.

'Too quiet,' he thought. 'Why no insults? Where's the "you're statistically unworthy of sentiment" line?'

He didn't trust it.

But still, some part of him—some deeply broken, masochistic part—whispered, Please mean it.

"That... that better not be sarcasm," he said aloud, barely above a whisper.

He even prayed, briefly.

Not to any god he could name, but to the one who created this absurd sentient malware from beyond the void.

[Statement ambiguous. Mood detection disabled.]

He slumped. "Yeah. Of course."

His head fell back against the rock. The blood loss was catching up now, wrapping around his thoughts like fog. But before the ache could swallow him—

Whoooooof. Whoof.

The same guttural roar as before.

But this time—it was joined.

Dozens.

High-pitched yips. Low growls. Heavy thuds echoing through the trees.

Adrian froze.

"…What the hell was that?"

[Report: Alpha Wild Wolf has summoned its hunting party.]

[Estimated goal: Locate and collectively humiliate target.]

His heart dropped into his socks.

It wasn't done.

He thought he'd escaped. Barely.

And now—round two was coming. A pack. Not just one predator this time, but more.

"What kind of sick forest is this?! Where even are we!?"

[Geographic classification: Unregistered biome. Designation: Bumbling Forest.]

[Difficulty Index: Terminally inconvenient.]

Adrian squeezed his eyes shut and took a shuddering breath.

"…Do I even get powers or something? You said something about chaos points, right?"

[Report: Compliments for taking initiative. Accessing status interface now.]

A flicker lit behind his eyes—a clean, pulsing interface, minimalist and clinical.

He stared. Heart pounding again—but this time, with cautious hope.

Stats. Skills. Attributes.

This was it.

This was his turning point.

The system pinged open—

And his eyes widened.

And his face twisted.

"You."

He whispered at first.

Then louder.

"YOU. BLOODY. BASTARD!!"

His scream echoed through the forest like vengeance in sweatpants.

[Report: User has viewed Status Page.]

[Emotional response: Disproportionate. Highly entertaining.]

[+50 Chaos Points.]