What awaits beyond

Login failed.

What the –

Login failed.

No, why is this happening right now? I force the password aggressively down the neuralink again and retry logging in.

Login successful with errors.

Okay, whatever. That’s never happened before.

The familiar path appears between the trees, and I advance quickly to the stone tower. I barely take in the arched trees and empty loot chests anymore, I just need to reach the Rift before the mission starts. Or I’m on my own with the mobs again.

Welcome, weary traveler.

Stupid unskippable NPC. Enter town, enter town, enter town.

You have reached the mighty gates of Turah, where himself the great Dark king –

Ugh, enter town already.

-Lioncell the third resides. Unfortunately, a great Terror has befallen Turah. Would you like to:

Hear the history of Turah

Learn of the great Terror

Enter town

Finally, C, enter town.

Option unavailable. Before entering the town, new players must Hear the history of Turah and learn of the great Terror.

What? I’ve passed this NPC a million times, just enter town!

In the years passing the great Thorn War –

Oh no, not the whole spiel, come on, I have places to be.

Neuralink, message Glen: Stuck at tower, NPC rebooted for me. Must be some bugs in the new patch.

System: Message to user glen356 not sent. Messaging service available exclusively withing the walls of Turah (at Non Playable Character : Flower girl, opt for C. Enter Town)

I’m trying, game!

-the Dark king Lioncell the first united the peoples of the valley and established capital at Turah.

Yes, yes, I know. And proclaimed all Magics and Tampering illegal and killed every last Voidwalker. Move it along!

…and because the old magic makers, or Voidwalkers, refused to renounce their old ways, the king had no choice but to exterminate all of them, but one.

Wait, what?

I’ve played this sequence more times than I can remember. I was a child the first time my avatar entered the walls of Turah, I could barely manage the neuralink connection, bumping into trees, staring at the vivid stars. This is my main, but I have countless secondary characters, but never once has there been a Voidwalker that survived the purging of Dark king Lioncell. Did the last patch change the story?

Neuralink, message Glen: smth weird happened. The flower girl NPC gave me a new intro story. Did u get it too?

System: Message to user glen356 not sent. Messaging service available exclusively within the walls of Turah (at Non Playable Character : Flower girl, opt for C. Enter Town)

Goddamit.

Neuralink, search online “latest patch to Riftwalkers resets story, Flower Girl NPC broken”.

I skim the results showing up as text overlaid on the scenery. Nothing about a change to the story, no major bugs reported.

The rest of the infodump is unchanged. The NPC repeats the sequence of events that led to the Rift as she (it?) always does. One hundred years after all magic had been banished, a portal appeared near the palace square, a swiveling gray cloud consuming itself endlessly. It didn’t pull anything in, and nothing came out of it. But one by one townsfolk approached the vortex, and without saying a word, simply stepped in.

Finally, the option to enter the town becomes available and I access it before the NPC has a chance to change its mind.

The cut scene shows the wooden gates open as always and the town appears beyond them. The shops lining the walls are all there selling wares of every kind. I check my inventory and go to exchange some of the rubbish there for gold.

Neuralink, message Glen: Finally, in, clearing out my inventory and heading for you guys. Is the party still out?

glen356: where you been?

You: had some trouble logging in, then the flower girl NPC glitched and took forever to let me in. You have any problems?

glen356: no. was already logged in when it happened.

You: when what happened?

System: User glen356 has paused messaging service.

Shit, they must have gone in. Maybe if I hurry, I can still slide past the action and catch up to the party alive.

But still, when what happened.

I reach the potions stall and try to sell my stuff. I expect the merchant NPC to say one of his usual lines.

Traveler, do you come from the beyond?

That’s not one of them. Anway, I don’t have time to explore why he’s gained new vocabulary. He accepts my items and I’m on my way to the old mines, chasing down cobblestoned streets. The old mines are through the forest on the other side of Turah.

System: offline message received from glen356 “dude where are you? Are you seeing this?”

System: offline message received from glen356 “I guess you’re offline. So, the weirdest thing happened, I don’t know if it’s the new patch or whatever. Can’t find anything on the internet about it. I was front and center for it too, right near the rift, as I was heading to the mines.”

I check the timestamps and, of course, these messages were sent while I was fighting to login today. Why didn’t I get them sooner? And will someone tell me what happened?

System: offline message received from glen356 “the game started lagging, NPCs froze and even the sky changed from blue to something, I don’t know. Multicolored. I even thought I saw… but get this, then, another portal appeared next to the rift. Like it was doubled or something. Then it came back, normal flow, only one portal was left, but just as I was leaving, townies started walking out of it. Weirdest dialogues too, creeped me out. But here’s the best part: you can engage the portal now.”

I’m completely stunned. Entirely new game play would have been announced months, years in advance. Making the portal playable? That’s huge. I’m sure that’s where Glen went.

I stop running and instead walk to the center square, dominated by the vortex. The visuals are as gorgeous as always, each crenel on the castle walls slightly different than the next. The colors of the fruit and flowers in townies carts. A blue bird randomly flying right before me. I’ve been playing Riftwalkers for years, but still no game has matched its graphics and textures.

I turn a corner and there it is. Vibrations and a low hum invade my senses, and the swirling portal hypnotizes me. I’ve come here countless times to just stare at it mesmerized when I’m tired of playing missions or hacking mobs. It’s a compelling sight, like the endless sea or mountains poking at the sky.

I walk to it slowly and engage. The humming intensifies.

You come to meet your destiny, Voidwalker.

Whatever I was expecting, it wasn’t that. So, the gameplay is to cast the user as the spared Voidwalker?

In the options panel there is only Enter portal, so, naturally, I reach for it.

Option unavailable. Before entering the portal, players must Hear the story of the Beyond (Non Playable Character: Returned townie, hut by the forest gate).

I’m so impatient to enter the portal, my legs actually kick as I hurry down the alley to the forest gates. Instantly I am sure which hut to enter because of its greyish aura and the slight humming coming from it.

Inside, a man sits alone at a table, his face away from the door. He has the same diffuse lighting around him, as if his contours are slightly bleeding into the surrounding environment.

I engage.

Nothing I say will dissuade you from entering the portal, Voidwalker.

Ok, grim.

He slowly turns his head to look at me. I’ve never seen an NPC do that.

I am no ordinary townie. I have seen the beyond. Just like you, one day the portal beckoned, and I was no more powerful than you to resist.

When is he getting to the good part?

Soon, Walker.

What? Neuralink, turn of mental coms.

System: mental communication channels shut off. Use manual commands.

To my horror, a sad smile spreads on the man’s face and his eyes shift to stare right into mine.

You will not hear from me what lies beyond the portal, but you will receive a warning: once the vortex is breached, a life will end. A life of understanding, memories, feeling will be no more. There is truth beyond, more than a mind can hold. Ah, but the mind of a Voidwalker might shift and stretch, perhaps.

This whole interaction is much darker than anything typical for the game. The thought crosses my mind to just log out and forget about it.

That is one path, Voidwalker. But once the call comes from the beyond, can it truly be rejected.

What the heck, my coms are off. And since when do NPCs have such dynamic dialogue.

He… laughs.

What is the link you use to control the world, do you ever wonder? What grants you such power, Walker?

My manual command hovers over the logout option.

If you would heed my warning, leave. Leave now and never return. Let the flower girl tell her histories to others, as she has no choice but to do. But how free are you to choose?

Leave.

Return to Rift portal.

I switch on my Neuralink and reach for option B.

The portal is so close I can see the strands of gray interweaving to form the swirling pattern. The vibration and hum numb all my senses except sight. I walk through.

…

I reel at the sight before me. A simple room, wooden floors and walls painted blue. Big windows overlooking a trim yard. A child’s set of toys forgotten on the high shelves and highschool books lower, within reach. The bed I haven’t made up.

Ne-Neuralink?

System: Mental communication operational. Switch to manual?

As I hear the synthetic voice the words overlay on the scene.

My mother walks in.

“Hi sweetie, are you done with your game?”

“I guess, since our world is nothing but a series of imbricated simulations, layers beneath layers, and I’ve just come through a rift in the fabric of reality.”

“Yea mom, what’s for dinner?”

Neuralink, I choose option B.