GLOBAL AWAKENING: My 10,000x Exp Multiplier-Chapter 32: []Faltering Code, The Vanguard’s Watch

Currently, Vahn Ryker was losing a war against his own body.

He sat slumped against the far wall of the bunker, his eyes closed, his chest heaving with slow, labored breaths. The [Calamity Curse] pulsed with a sickly, rhythmic black light beneath his shirt, fighting aggressively against the residual golden healing magic Aria had layered over his skin.

He opened his internal interface, his mind feeling thick and sluggish, like trying to run a high-end physics simulation on an outdated processor. The numbers were terrifying. What had started as a one percent stat drain per hour had violently accelerated after his confrontation with the Golden Dragon guild. He was currently bleeding out five percent of his latent attributes every sixty minutes. His Agility, which had allowed him to walk on thin air and dodge light-speed projectiles, was severely compromised. His processing speed—the core of his Architect class—was staggering.

For the first time since he had awakened his memories of the future, Vahn felt genuinely, physically weak.

"Your core temperature is dropping," a soft, fiercely controlled voice echoed in the small room.

Vahn slowly cracked his eyes open. Sia Vance was sitting cross-legged on the cold metal floor exactly three feet away from him. She had unequipped her massive obsidian shield, setting it aside, but she was still draped in her combat gear. She had a small, digital whetstone in her hand, aggressively polishing a secondary short-sword. She hadn’t slept. She had been sitting there, watching his chest rise and fall, for the past six hours.

"I am functioning within acceptable parameters, Sia," Vahn murmured, though his voice lacked its usual crisp authority. It sounded distinctly human, tired and worn thin. "You need to log out and rest. Sleep deprivation will significantly lower your reaction times."

"My reaction times are irrelevant if the Commander’s system fails," Sia replied instantly, her silver-grey eyes flashing up to meet his. She gripped the hilt of the short-sword tightly. "You saved me from the Labyrinth. You forged me a weapon of Mythic caliber. My duty is to hold the line while you recover. I am not leaving this bunker."

Vahn let out a soft sigh, resting his head back against the cold steel wall. He didn’t have the energy to argue with the Vanguard’s absolute devotion. "It’s not a wound that can be guarded against, Sia. It’s a systemic drain. You can’t block an error code."

"Then I will stand here and wait until I can," she stated stubbornly.

A quiet shifting of fabric drew their attention. From the makeshift cot on the other side of the room, Aria slowly sat up. The Priestess had taken off her ornate Crimson-Lotus hat, her pink-gold hair falling in chaotic, messy waves over her shoulders. She rubbed the sleep from her emerald eyes, taking in the sight of the heavily armored tank fiercely guarding the exhausted Architect.

Aria didn’t say a word. She simply stood up, the soft rustle of her silk vestments breaking the silence of the bunker, and walked over to them. She sat down on the floor directly next to Sia, crossing her legs and resting her wooden staff across her lap.

For a long moment, the two women just sat there, shoulder to shoulder, looking at Vahn.

Normally, the dynamic between them was a tense, unspoken rivalry. Aria viewed Sia as a terrifying, over-protective guard dog who enabled Vahn’s reckless behavior. Sia viewed Aria as a chaotic, overly emotional variable that distracted the Commander from optimal efficiency.

But tonight, looking at the black curse slowly eating away at the man who had single-handedly carried them through hell, the rivalry evaporated.

"His mana pathways are fraying," Aria whispered softly, not looking at Sia, but her tone was meant for the knight. "I can stitch the outer layer of the code, but the curse is rooted in his foundational data. It’s like trying to bail out a sinking ship with a teacup."

"He doesn’t show it," Sia replied quietly, her polishing motions slowing down. "When he fights, he moves like a god. He speaks with absolute certainty. He makes the entire world feel... small. Manageable."

"It’s a front," Aria sighed, her voice laced with a profound, aching fondness. She leaned forward, resting her chin on her hands. "He calculates everything because he thinks if he controls the math, he can control the outcome. He acts like a machine so he doesn’t have to feel the terror of what’s actually coming. But he’s not a machine, Sia. Look at him. He’s just a guy trying to keep his little sister alive."

Sia finally turned her head, looking at the Priestess. The silver-grey eyes met the emerald ones, and an unspoken understanding passed between them. They were both in love with an idiot who thought he had to carry the weight of the universe on his own shoulders.

"We need to get stronger," Sia stated, her voice hardening with absolute resolve. "If his physical infrastructure is failing, we must become his shield and his sword. He cannot expend this much energy on basic clearing operations anymore."

"Agreed," Aria nodded, a fierce determination replacing her usual anxiety. "I will overhaul my healing algorithms. I’ll find a way to generate a continuous, localized buffer around him so his stats don’t drop during combat."

Vahn listened to the exchange through the haze of his exhaustion. The old Vahn—the pure, calculating System Administrator—would have viewed this as a highly efficient bonding moment that optimized party synergy. But the man sitting against the wall just felt an overwhelming, crushing wave of warmth in his chest that had nothing to do with magic.

He didn’t view them as data points. He viewed them as his team. His people.

"Your whispers are highly audible," Vahn finally spoke up, a faint, genuine smile touching his lips.

Both women jumped slightly, their faces instantly flushing varying shades of crimson as they realized he had heard the entire conversation. Aria quickly grabbed her staff, pretending to inspect the runic carvings, while Sia aggressively returned to polishing her already flawless sword.

"We were simply discussing tactical redistributions, Commander," Sia stammered, maintaining her rigid posture.

"I was running a vocal diagnostic on my vocal cords," Aria added quickly, refusing to meet his gaze.

Vahn chuckled, the sound vibrating painfully but pleasantly in his chest. He slowly pushed himself off the floor, using the wall for leverage. His limbs felt heavy, like they were wrapped in lead, but his mind was sharp. The brief rest had rebooted his localized systems.

"The tactical redistributions are appreciated," Vahn said softly, looking between the two of them. "But we don’t have time to grind for levels. The timeline is broken."

He walked over to the small, grimy window of the bunker that looked out over the massive, churning abyss of the fifteenth floor. The glowing blue data-streams of the Spire were flickering violently, turning a harsh, corrupted red at the edges.

"Sovereign City is no longer an optional side-quest," Vahn stated, the cold, absolute authority returning to his voice, though it was now tempered with a deeply human urgency. "The Convergence is bleeding into the real world. The stat drain from this curse is a symptom of a larger systemic collapse. We are logging out. We need to secure the physical perimeter before the Vanguard from the stars arrives on our doorstep."

The transition from the VR interface of Aetheria back into the physical reality of Earth was usually a jarring, disorienting experience. For Vahn Ryker, it felt like being slammed into a brick wall at terminal velocity. 𝑓𝑟𝑒𝘦𝓌𝑒𝑏𝑛𝑜𝘷𝑒𝘭.𝒸𝘰𝑚

His eyes snapped open inside the sleek, metallic confines of the VR pod in his cramped Sovereign City apartment. He gasped, his back arching as a violent spasm wracked his physical body. The [Calamity Curse] didn’t just exist in the game’s code anymore. The Dataization process—the terrifying merging of the digital world with biological reality—was actively pulling the effects of the curse across the boundary.

Vahn pushed the canopy open, his arms trembling as he dragged himself out of the pod. He hit the cold, synthetic hardwood floor on his hands and knees, sweat dripping from his forehead. He coughed, a ragged, ugly sound, waiting for his lungs to remember how to process real oxygen instead of simulated air.

Slowly, the pain subsided, replaced by a strange, coiled heat humming beneath his skin.

He pulled himself up, leaning against the kitchen counter. The apartment was completely silent. The digital clock on the microwave read 2:00 AM. He flexed his hands, staring at his palms. He had zero base stats in the game, but the residual data from the millions of experience points he had processed was bleeding into his biology. He felt incredibly light. He felt dangerous.

"Vahn?"

He turned. Hana was standing in the doorway of her bedroom, rubbing her eyes. She wasn’t leaning on her cane. She was standing perfectly straight, her posture flawless, the sickly pallor of her skin entirely gone. The Elixir of Primal Vitality had permanently rewritten her biological framework.

"Go back to sleep, Hana," Vahn said softly, forcing a reassuring smile. "I just had to reboot the system. Everything is optimal."

Hana frowned, stepping fully into the living room. "You look terrible. You’re sweating, and you’re clutching your chest. The curse followed you out, didn’t it?"

"It’s manageable," Vahn lied smoothly. He walked over to the sink, pouring himself a glass of water.