CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX: The Card That Shouldn't Exist
Location: [BLACK ZONE – UNMAPPED]
Time: Unknown
Status: Player: Noah – [FLAGGED]
Noah fell through static.
But it wasn't falling.
It was dismantling.
Light curled into spirals around him, then shattered.
His HUD vanished. His comms. Even gravity gave up.
He landed in silence—then sound came rushing back in, like an ocean being remembered.
He stood alone in a vast room made of black mirrors.
Each step he took rippled across the floor, showing reflections that weren't his own.
> [System Notice: You are not authorized for this Zone]
[...Yet here you are.]
---
The Game Master Appears
A figure emerged from the dark—a dealer in an old-fashioned tuxedo, with a mirror for a face and skeletal hands.
"Welcome to the Fold," the dealer said.
"What is this place?" Noah asked.
The dealer offered a bow. "The House of Lost Cards. Where rules go to die, and players come to remember."
A table rose from the ground. Four seats. Only one was occupied.
Sable.
She looked... wrong.
Her eyes were too calm.
Her card floated above her hand. Black Joker.
---
The Trial Begins
> TRIAL: REFLECTION PROTOCOL
Players: 2
Card Type: Identity Game
Objective: Reveal which version of you is real
Penalty: Dissolution
Sable smiled at Noah. "You remember me the way I was. But that's not who I am anymore."
Noah's own card rose above him. A distorted Ace of Eyes, the same symbol he saw in the Glass Field trial.
The dealer snapped his fingers. Two more Noahs appeared—one wounded, one smiling, both slightly wrong.
Sable stood. "Only one of you can leave. Choose."
---
The Game: Which Noah is Real?
Each version spoke.
Version A: "You're here because someone rewrote the code. The Black Card is a key. Don't waste it."
Version B: "She's not Sable. She's Echo—Grayson's shadow. Ask her what the word maquette means."
Version C (Noah): "I don't trust either of you."
Sable folded her hands. "You always hesitate, Noah. That's what makes you easy to manipulate."
The dealer: "One must be destroyed. Choose."
---
Noah Chooses
He looks at Version B. The one who knew maquette.
He points. "You're the anomaly."
Version B nods—and smiles.
"Correct," he says. "But also unfortunate."
He dissolves into data fragments shaped like feathers.
---
Aftermath
The mirrors shudder. The table vanishes.
The dealer leans close.
> "You've passed a test not meant for you."
"So now you will carry the cost."
> [Tag Updated: PLAYER NOAH – BLACK CARD / SHADOW PROTOCOL PENDING]
Sable approaches.
But she's glitching now. Her voice loops, fragments.
"I wanted… to warn you. But they rewrote me. I'm… a failsafe now."
Noah reaches for her hand—but it passes through his.
"I'll find you," he whispers.
Her last words before she vanishes:
> "Then find the original deck."
"Before they deal the final hand."
---
End Scene
Noah awakens in a cold chamber—outside the Black Zone. Alone.
But something's changed.
He now holds a card that shouldn't exist.
The Void Suit — a card that belongs to no house, no trial.
It pulses with living ink.
And in the distance, alarms are sounding.