The air in the headquarters of Nemesis Inc. was thick with stress and the stale scent of half-finished coffee. Monitors flickered with emergency reports from in-game events that should have been impossible.

  “We have a problem,” Mark, one of the senior game designers, said flatly. His fingers were clenched around a stress ball that had long lost its elasticity.

  “No shit, Mark.” Kelly, the quest design lead on duty, was already pulling up the flagged reports. “A scourge resurgence. Hoarderscales! That’s not a minor balance issue. That’s an extinction-level event!”

  A series of red dots pulsed ominously across the world map. Seventeen in total.

  “How?” Someone groaned from across the room.

  “Why?” Another voice chimed in.

  “Who the hell coded these things to be able to come back?”

  Steve, the lead systems designer, pinched the bridge of his nose. “No one did. They shouldn’t be here. According to the game’s lore, the Grand Sacrificial Ritual wiped them out. Those beasts were just meant to be the historic explanation for the fall of the Cathurian Empire and the dark times that followed. They were never meant to be actually used. They're much too imbalanced."

  The team stared at the logs, scanning for any anomalies that could explain the scourge's return.

  Then Eric, one of the environmental coders, froze. His fingers trembled over his keyboard. “…Uh. Guys? I found something in the original procedural world creation protocols.”

  A new window had appeared in the debugging terminal.

  [Historical Simulation Protocol]

  Running Scenario Analysis…

  Reconstructing the Event of the Grand Ritual… 100%

  Calculating Probability of Absolute Scourge Eradication… 87.4%

  Noticing Anomalous Data Points…

  Simulation Adjusted for Concealment Strategies…

  Adjusting Expected Scourge Extinction Rate… 73.2%

  Accounting for Egg Dormancy Periods… 61.7%

  Including Presence of Magic-Using Hoarderscale Specimens… 54.9%

  Result: Grand Ritual Ineffective Against Deep Buried & Stasis-Preserved Eggs

  Generating Alternative Hypothesis…

  Conclusion: Hoarderscales have implemented long-term survival strategies.

  Calculating number and placement of dormant nests...

  If you spot this story on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.

  The room fell into stunned silence.

  Kelly’s stomach dropped. “The AI didn’t just use our lore... It ran the numbers itself?”

  Steve exhaled slowly. “It didn’t just accept our history. It simulated the event as if it were real.”

  Mark let out a nervous laugh. “Okay, but it’s just a simulation, right? It doesn’t mean it actually...”

  Eric swallowed hard. “No. Look at the logs. It build the world around the results of its simulation.”

  The realization hit them like a hammer.

  Nemesis, their sentient AI that managed world events, NPC behavior, and quest generation, had run its own predictive model of the past. It had taken their crafted lore and treated it as a living history.

  And, according to its results, the Grand Ritual hadn’t wiped out the scourge entirely.

  The hoarderscales had hidden. Some of their nests had been buried so deep that detection spells failed to register them. Others had been kept in magical stasis by more advanced, spellcasting specimens. Magic-using hoarderscales, a nearly unheard-of variant that had only been mentioned once in some obscure in-game pre-cataclysm story.

  Kelly's voice was barely above a whisper. “They were always there?”

  Steve nodded grimly. “They were just waiting.”

  Mark swore under his breath. “So, this wasn’t caused by some dumb players breaking the obelisks?”

  Eric hesitated. “No. That mostly just prevents the alert from triggering. But there’s a catch.” He pulled up another section of the log and pointed at some data points. “According to the logs, the nests in magical stasis won't resurface as long as they would trigger a detection spell. But if they sense there is no more surveillance, the stasis field is deactivated and they will start hatching. Those nests already contain some advanced types and breeders, so they will hit hard and fast.”

  Mark’s hands clenched into fists. “What you’re saying is, some random revenant just needs to loot the wrong obelisk and that’s what triggers an Endgame Crisis event?”

  Steve ran a hand through his hair, exhaling. “Once the detection matrix goes down, they'll know. It's like a signal telling them it is time.”

  He rolled his chair back, cracked his knuckles, and started typing furiously. ““…Okay. Okay. We can work with this. If the scourge is back, then we roll with it.”

  The team turned toward him.

  “We can’t erase them again. At least not without triggering another world event, and that’s not happening without months of work.” He gestured to the screens. “Instead, we expand the questline.”

  Kelly narrowed her eyes. “How?”

  Steve grinned. “We make it a continuing quest.”

  With a few rapid keystrokes, new high-level quests appeared in the game’s event log.

  NEW QUESTLINE: "Prevent the Scourge Resurgence"

  Long ago, the hoarderscale scourge was thought destroyed. But now, it stirs again, hidden in the depths of the world. Its presence was masked, its return unseen... Until now. The obelisks that should detect them have been shattered. Unless they are restored, the scourge will spread again unnoticed…

  Primary Quest: Rebuild the Obelisks

  Recommended for class specializations: Enchanters, Stonemasons, Artificers

  Objective: Work together to reconstruct and re-enchant the damaged or destroyed detection obelisks.

  Design and implement additional protections for the rest of the obelisks.

  Reward: Increased Crafting and Mage Guild reputation, unique spellcrafting materials, and artifact blueprints.

  Secondary Quest: Hunt the Scourge Nests

  Objective: Track down and eliminate any discovered hoarderscale scourge nests before they reach critical size.

  Reward: Experience, high-tier loot, and rare crafting components.

  Steve leaned back, satisfied. “There. We turned it into a player challenge. They will keep the scourge under control, rebuild the detection matrix, and we can let the rarely used enchanter and mason classes actually do something important.”

  The rest of the room stared at him, then at the newly generated quests.

  “That’s actually brilliant,” Kelly admitted.

  “It’s either that, or we let this spiral into another endgame boss scenario,” Steve said dryly.

  He turned to Eric, who was already typing furiously. “Add a new game rule into the system,” Steve continued. “It doesn’t contradict any previous events or lore, so there shouldn’t be any issues. Make sure that hive-mind creatures can’t integrate into a different hive-mind. And specifically,” he added, rubbing his temples, “make hoarderscales immune to Krigesti influence. We do not need to see that nightmare scenario playing out. And get me someone from marketing.”