Augmented Aspects: Chapter 404: Error 404 (Story Not Bound) (Two Weeks Later) (Patreon)

<<<Author's Note: As stated earlier, there are still two more chapters remaining, both of which I hope to get through by today April 10th, 2026.>>>Chapter 404: Error 404 (Story Not Bound)

(Two Weeks Later)

“Cheating, we were flagged and disqualified for cheating?” Gwen grumbles loudly, speaking the words that have been spoken by many about our world since the start of the real Planetary Alignment games.

“It doesn’t matter, the budget for the three aprons and continuing to maintain our Legacy Servers failed by a wide margin,” Jhonny replied, packing up a cooler worth of supplies as he began tidying up around the central office building. A building where we were all demanded to come and have a final briefing before we were to go to our final location before watching the world burn.

“Well, it didn’t help that the Government is absolute shit about trying to actually earn money and make something profitable,” Gwen chided, focusing on the fact that viewer ratings continued to drop with each round of competition, as more and more of the top competitors either left of their own, after winning a particular ranking in matches, or were flat out killed in their competitions. The entire process was clear to show diminishing results, almost like having March Madness, where the winners killed the losers, then having the same schools support April Madness, and June Madness tournaments back-to-back, and then wondering why no one cared to show up.

“To put it simply, the government messed and now it is our duty to deal with the fallout,” Mallory cut in, her voice seeming to break through the almost suffocating air of work and litigation that always seems to permeate this room. A room so frequented by work proposals and budget talks, that I feel dirty just by stepping into the room. Almost as if just by my being here, I am somehow opening myself up to both litigations, a ROI investment portfolio, and reasonable expectations of providing surefire solutions. Though, to be fair, I think most of my animosity from being in this room comes from a deep seeded fear that most of the solutions that come from this room involve me doing more, or creating new ways to do things more often, and faster.

“I guess we should start with the agenda items,” Gwen said, bringing her no-nonsense demeanor to this room that both makes me proud for the woman she has turned into, but also makes me concerned as invariably this will somehow get back to me.

“Right, we just have one agenda topic for today, before we can begin with our end of the world party,” Mallory states. Then low and behold, I am completely shocked when she turns her attention fully to me. As she turns, everyone else’s heads in the room all turn in unison, like a school of sharks that suddenly realized a goldfish spontaneously combusted and was now bleeding out wildly in the water near them. Seeing them all turn their gazes to me, I knew my fears were both met, and that as expected this meeting will now come down to the question of whether I did enough.

“Yes?” I ask, feeling flustered by all the sudden attention, though I think I know what they are talking about.

“The agenda item?” Mallory pressed.

“We talk about a thousand agenda items, each time I am here. You need to be more specific,” I press back.

“The only one that matters for today, Operation Better World?” Mallory asks.

I pause, trying to understand exactly what she is talking about, as I was not tracking that I needed to do anything. From my understanding my docket was clear, which is why I now feel suddenly confused by this line of questioning. Only after a second, do I realize the confusion.

“Yeah, I took care of that a month ago. Or two months after Operation Stabilizing the Arcanarus Tower was completed.” Only now do I remember what they were talking about, this was the operation for me and my Simulacrums to go around the world and essentially terraform the world without Terra herself to help. Ironic that we were much faster without her, but that had a lot to do with the fact that once we all reached the thousandth floor of the tower, it stopped expanding and we no longer needed to maintain a large presence there.  That was when Dragon, Fae, Ship, Heal, and Pirate-Ulacrum all got the opportunity to leave the Tower whenever they wanted, so long as one of us stayed there. Mainly because we are all very bad with directions and it is a lot easier for us to get to a place where one of us is already located. That way, I was able to use myself and six other Simluacrums  to terraform the world at any one time. That and the fact that my new Demi-God status allowed for the elongation of one of our auras at any time, and the process became exponentially easier, allowing us to finish a job that would have taken eight months, as originally predicted, in just under two months. Honestly, we could have probably done it with just the increased aura range, but not nearly as quickly as doubling our forces allowed us to go.

Seeing that I finally answered, I could see a myriad of emotions flow across Mallory’s face, everything from an are you serious, to fear that I might have not done this one task, to finally relief at the fact that I had done the task so long ago that it slipped my mind.

“Well then, I will say that we are all officially on leave for the next twenty-four hours and are expected to party like it is the end of the world,” Mallory offers.

“Oh, so kind of you giving us the final five hours, before the end of the world is set to begin,” I add.

Mallory and Gwen both just give me a side eye stare at that comment. “Well, since you are so ready for this vacation to start, why don’t you do the honors?”

Hearing the cue, I pull out another one of Penelope’s beacons, this is one of her originals that I readjusted so that it can be reused multiple times, so long as we just input new energy into the battery portion of the beacon.

One click, and less than a second later, a portal opens right where I am pointing, as if it is a temporal garage door opener, that can create a garage door out of thin air. Which of course can’t be done, at least not by this design, as the door is actually Rune-Ulacrum just working with Penelope who was in charge of setting up the tables and refreshment stands at the top of the Aranarus Tower. Why the top? Well apparently everyone agreed that it had the best view possible, and that if they were all to watch the end of the world from anywhere, it made sense to be there.

With the Arcane Geomancy Teleportation Tunnel stabilized, I anchor the end in Mallory’s office and walk through finding that even this time away from Penelope is almost too much.

As soon as I come over, I see her face smile brighter. The smile that is normally a constant on her beautiful face tilts up three degrees higher on both sides, and she looks slightly flushed as I get closer, as if she is suddenly embarrassed to see me. Or rather, not embarrassed of me, but embarrassed that I might see just how flustered and how fast her heart rate is accelerating. Thanks to my heightened abilities as a healer, I can see these changes in her, the way her body temperature on her cheeks are rising one degree from just smiling. I might not know what love is, not truly, but seeing her smile like that at me, I know for a fact that she loves me.

And as for me, I am still trying to understand the various emotions that are running through me. My avatar is now officially 18 years old, I turned during the middle of the planetary competitions. There was a party, but in the end it was just Penelope and I who celebrated, as everyone else broke off to continue practicing and training for their individual events.

“You ready for the end of the world?” Penelope asks, grabbing a glass of lemonade and handing it to me. I reach out and hold glass, trying to remember when the last time I actually consumed real liquids was, and can’t remember, maybe when I almost got drowned by the flooding waters in Yggdraspirit, when Mallory and I first made our way up Arcanarus Tower?

“Thank you,” I say while taking the glass, and then answer her question, “and yes. As long as I’m with you, I’m ready to ride this until the end.”

“Until the end?” Penelope repeats, and that’s when I find myself once again saying one of my dad’s favorite lines.

“Yep, you and me until the wheels fall off, we gain speed, and fly on to eternity screaming with excitement at the ride, and the inevitable fear that it will all crash and burn horribly.”

“That’s a pleasant image,” Penelope jokes.

“Imagining your smile next to mine, yes, you are right. It is a pleasant image,” I begin, then turning to her, I again try to take more of my dad’s advise to heart. Trying to treat Penelope with the same level of commitment that she has shown me. I know I have a lot to make up for, but for her, I know she is worth it, that is why I continue. “One that will make every step from here on out worth every ounce of sweat that it took to get here, and one that I will gladly enjoy to the last drop.”

I am terrible with relationships and knowing if I actually hit the mark. Especially when it comes to overly sappy comments, but the blush on Penelope’s face lets me know I was close. At least, I was close enough to let her know that I cared, and that I wanted this, I really really wanted this.

“Oh, holding hands now are we?” Raygunnr calls out, somehow wearing a pair of oversized beach shorts on his mechanical frame that only seems to work. Hearing his words being projected for all to hear, I can feel everyone’s gazes all turn to find the source of the noise and then look to see that we are in fact holding hands. I don’t know how it happened, maybe a switch after I grabbed the glass? But it feels oddly natural. Eventually everyone else turns away, and goes about their own activities or conversations, leaving Penelope and I to be alone and enjoy the quiet comfort that we both offer so easily to each other.

***

(One Hour and Change Later)

“All right everyone, it is time,” Mallory calls out her voice echoing and booming across the cloudy platform in the way only a person in a commanding role can provide. “We have just over three hours until the end of the world. Are there any last minute messages you’d like to say to anyone on the outside? If so, do them now.”

With that, everyone began to turn to face outwards, speaking out loud. Some spoke words of advise, others spoke of inheritances, or wills. Many apparently came to this meeting prepared to make personalized speeches that all seemed to echo out and roll over and through each other. It was chaos, especially as Gwen began reading off her list of things for her children and grandchildren to do while was gone.

Realizing this was my time, I turned to Penelope and saw that she was oddly quiet, despite still holding onto my hand the entire time.

“You don’t have anything to say?” I ask.

“No, I only had my parents before I passed, and they never joined. So I’m all alone,” Penelope replied.

“No you’re not,” I replied.

“What?” Penelope asked.

“You are not alone, for as long as someone truly loves you, you will never be alone. And, I—” I begin but feel the last part get caught in my throat, but I am going to push through my nerves and tell her honestly, at least that was the plan.

Ting, ting, ting. Mallory again using some form of noise amplification ability clinks a spoon against a crystal glass and produces a chime that is loud enough to stop everyone from talking.

“Look, we all knew this was coming, so you should have already said your goodbyes multiple times by now, this was just your last time to tell your family how you felt,” Mallory spoke, her words cutting through everyone and letting us all realize that it was finally time. Then turning to me, she spoke, “now Dr. Spiritlight, if you will do us the honors?”

Hearing her words, all eyes turned towards me, as I realized this was my big moment. I could feel the weight and attention of everyone’s gazes on me, all wanting me to use my Confidentiality right now, with the final three hours of the server up. That way we could all do final tasks that we had secretly wanted to do, but in secret. This was perfect, and the first time that I would be able to maximize the full three hours of my Confidentiality for normally the logs would only be scrambled for three hours, but then reviewable later. This time, however all the logs would be lost after midnight, meaning this would be three hours for us to do anything and everything we had been conspiring to do with the other servers. Knowing I needed to work fast, I focused myself and was about to use my Confidentiality, but I stopped as I realized that Penelope was still there, staring up at me with her wide eyed expectant face. A face that knew the answer I wanted to say, but still wanted me to say it, to speak it into being.

That’s when I took a moment, centered myself and declared loudly before Penelope and all my friends and family assembled, “I love you!”

Then turning quickly, I looked away instantly activating my Confidentiality, only realizing a moment later that everyone’s face was now stuck looking at me, while I looked away embarrassedly, after finally confessing my true feelings. But it was all worth it!