User Agreement

The rain in Seattle didn’t wash things clean; it just made the grime slicker.

Nora Vance stood outside the brutalist concrete slab that was Archival Solutions Inc., clutching a lukewarm latte and blinking against the headache that had been throbbing behind her eyes for twenty-four hours. She had slipped in the breakroom yesterday—a puddle of spilled toner fluid and cheap linoleum—and cracked her head on the water cooler. HR had called it a "minor incident."

Nora called it the moment the world broke.

She pushed through the revolving doors, and the text appeared. It didn't fade in; it snapped into existence, a translucent blue rectangle hovering in the center of her vision.

**[SYSTEM INITIALIZED. WELCOME, USER.]**

**[CURRENT OBJECTIVE: CLOCK IN BEFORE 8:00 AM.]**

**[REWARD: +5 CURRENCY. AVOIDANCE OF VERBAL REPRIMAND.]**

Nora squeezed her eyes shut, then opened them. The box remained. It anchored itself to her retina, drifting slightly as she turned her head toward the security desk.

"Morning, Nora," Martha, the elderly receptionist, chirped. Martha was a fixture of the building, a sweet woman who smelled of peppermint and dust.

Above Martha’s grey perm, a green bar floated.

**[MARTHA - LVL 2 HUMAN - RECEPTIONIST]**

**[HP: 45/100]**

**[STATUS: FRIENDLY]**

Nora offered a weak smile, her heart hammering a frantic rhythm against her ribs. "Morning, Martha."

**[QUEST COMPLETE: SOCIAL OBLIGATION.]**

**[XP GAINED: +2]**

"I’m going crazy," Nora whispered to herself as she hurried toward the elevators. "I have a brain bleed. That’s it. I’m dying, and my brain is processing it as World of Warcraft."

She stepped into the elevator, pressing herself into the corner. The mirrored walls reflected her own status bar, hovering just above her messy bun.

**[NORA VANCE - LVL 1 HUMAN - DATA CLERK]**

**[TRAIT: PLAIN (PASSIVE). -50% PRESENCE. YOU ARE EASILY OVERLOOKED.]**

It stung, even if it was a hallucination. "Plain" was her life's definition. She was the person people forgot to invite to lunch, the face no one remembered in meetings. She was an NPC in her own life.

The elevator chimed at the 14th floor. The doors slid open to the sprawling, grey maze of cubicles. The fluorescent lights buzzed—a sound Nora usually ignored, but today it sounded like the hum of a server room.

She walked to her desk, keeping her head down. But as she passed the empty cubicle where Jerry from Accounting usually sat, she froze.

Jerry wasn’t there. His desk was cleared. No photos of his dog, no stress ball. Just a single, flickering red tag hovering over the empty ergonomic chair.

**[OBJECT STATUS: DECEASED.]**

Nora gripped the fabric wall of her cubicle. *Deceased?* HR said Jerry had transferred to the Spokane branch.

Before she could process the red text, the air in the room changed. The temperature dropped ten degrees. The hum of conversation died out instantly.

The double doors at the end of the hall opened. A man walked in.

He was tall, wearing a charcoal suit that cost more than Nora’s annual salary. His hair was black, swept back with severe precision. He moved with a grace that was predatory, too fluid for a human being.

This was Adrian Thorne, the new CFO sent from corporate to "restructure."

Nora looked up, and the breath hitched in her throat. The System interface flared, the blue text bleeding into a violent, warning red.

**[ENTITY DETECTED: ADRIAN THORNE]**

**[RACE: VAMPIRE (ELDER CLASS)]**

**[LEVEL: ??]**

**[THREAT: EXTREME. DO NOT ENGAGE.]**

The System flashed a new window, pulsing in the center of her vision.

**[MAIN QUEST UPDATED: SURVIVE THE WEEK.]**

**[REWARD: YOUR SOUL.]**

**[PENALTY FOR FAILURE: PERMANENT DELETION.]**