My name is Eric Dolsen.

  I am a Protagonist.

  And I just saved the human race.

  For the second time in my life, the terminal sparked and died. The villain was dead and wouldn't hurt anyone else.

  Fighting the Iron Hord in its infancy hadn’t been easy. Traveling back in time hadn't fixed any of my injuries. The machine had been far more vulnerable than before. So had I.

  I had been sent the day before the AI gained access to the world's nukes. It was a surprise to both of us. The machine hadn't expected anyone to teleport in. I had hoped the Protagonist System wouldn't drop me directly in front of the Villain.

  Then again, Protagonist Corp. had never really been nice. Its quests meant to help me always put my life at risk. It constantly gave me impossible tasks, even when I was a child. I was only ever lucky to survive half the ordeals.

  If it wasn't a matter of survival I probably wouldn't have listened to it. But when you’re staring down the barrel of a robot gun, you take hold of whatever opportunity you’re given. At least it let me buy items and advantages.

  I pulled up my character sheet. It had changed much since the first time I saw it. At least the EXP I got from those quests had been good for something. I remember when all I had was weakness.

  I didn't know what the other Protagonist's character sheet looked like. But I was pretty sure mine had been the worst off. No strengths, all weaknesses, and zero clue what these floating screens were about. I only ever got a simple message and a Quest.

  Being a kid when I first unlocked the Protagonist System, I thought it was just my imagination. Lots of people had gone crazy already. I just thought this was new. Until I started listening to it.

  I’m getting ahead of myself.

  Let's start at the beginning.

  Before I was even born.

  The year was 2351. The world was a utopia, the way old talked about it. Planes, cities, and more food than people knew what to do with. There were still problems of course. People fought and argued over things big or small. But it was easy compared to now.

  Then the bombs fell. Nukes and other missiles. The good times ended that day on New Year's Eve. No one was sure who started it. Maybe it was politics. Maybe it was an accident. Either way, billions died. More died later.

  People survive. I wouldn't have been born otherwise. Bunkers, the outskirts of civilization, or just pure luck. Life was hard but people managed. Humanity went back to the basics. Food, water, and shelter.

  A few decades passed and people thought things were going to be better. The ecology of the planet didn't entirely collapse. The nuclear winter that came was manageable instead of completely lethal. Enough technology and information survived to slowly rebuild.

  There was hope. It would take centuries, maybe even a millennium, but we would manage. 2371, two decades the day later, is when the first of the violet robots showed up. And people were dying in mass. Again. It felt like some sick joke.

  People had some protection. Resources were scarce and people were scared. Guns, melee weapons, and whatever old technology were still available. They had never been used as much as they were from that day forward.

  The first robots were manageable. Lethal if you weren't ready, and no one was at first. Never let it be said humans don't know how to fight. We almost killed a world doing it. But it didn't stay that easy. Because the robots were learning.

  Stick to high ground? A robot that could fly came by. Made a gun that could penetrate the armor plating? Thicker metal made for a tank. Hacked one of the drones? The next one would fry your computer.

  Any advantage we had, the robots would learn to counter it. It just wasn't fast about it. It would take months, maybe years before better robots were employed. And that was its real strength. It made people complacent.

  See, people got used to it. The constant attacks became part of casual conversation. When people learned to adapt, they stopped being scared. Hunting grounds were made, forts built, and better guns rediscovered.

  It became modern-day pest control. We treated it like daily chores when we should have treated it exactly as it was. A slow purge of the human race. And it was the sort of world I had been born into. A hard life people didn't know was going to get harder.

  I was born in 2379. I had siblings but I was the only one to survive childhood. A normal pair of blacksmiths were my parents. We lived in a city at the edge of civilization, near where robots would do their attacks. So close to danger, most were employed to supply the metals needed to fight the machines off.

  It was a simple life. I was ignorant of the world and did things every kid my age did. Slack off in class, play with friends, and go places I wasn't supposed to. One memorable event was being saved from a scout robot that snuck into the village.

  My parents were angry of course, and I got a permanent scar for my troubles. But I didn't care about that. All I could focus on was the woman with a metal arm who just risked her life to save me. I Idolize those brave few fighting the machines every day.

  From that day forward all I wanted to be was a fighter. An Iron Breaker as they were called. Maybe that was why I became a Protagonist. I wasn't going to live an uninteresting life after that day.

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  I was 12 when I first got the Protagonist Messages. My parents thought I was crazy when I told them. Seeing how no one would believe it, I decided to ignore it. I tried to anyway. When the world sees you as the main character, you’ll get a reward for just existing.

  Years went by and I would passively earn EXP. Sometimes I went out of my way, doing something the system would call praiseworthy. Usually, I did it when things got difficult and the village needed more food, materials, or medicine.

  People questioned me of course. Some were even scared of the little witch boy who could summon things out of thin air. But eventually, people just learned to accept it. I was more useful to keep around than to throw out I guess.

  The only person who ever even tried to understand was Sara. We were the same age and grew up together. Her parents were miners and old friends of mine. She favored a bow, a natural-born hunter, instead of digging metal out of the ground.

  Maybe she liked the sense of adventure I gave. A Protagonist? Sounds like the kind of guy who would go on adventures. Or maybe she just wanted to learn to summon things from thin air like I did. I don't know. I never got around to asking.

  I guess I wouldn't know anymore.

  We stuck together like glue. It was the only reason she survived. When I turned 16, the number of attacks from the robots had increased. Fighting them became more dangerous. People were getting worried as the Iron Breaker died. It went from a rare occurrence to a common result.

  One day, I got a quest. I tried to ignore it but the system wouldn't let me. It insisted without end, popping into my vision no matter what I did. Eventually, I decided to get it over with just so it would leave me alone. Sara came along since the quest involved hunting.

  That was the day my village and everyone I knew in it died. A hoard of robots had invaded while we were gone. When we came back from our hunt, all we found was ashes and death. I was devastated. Sara was in tears.

  From that day forward, I vowed to kill every robot I could find. I was going to do exactly what the Protagonist System wanted me to do. It was the easiest way to power. It saves my life. I just wish it could have saved everyone else.

  I only learned later why that was.

  It built character.

  It made for a good story.

  Years passed and things went as expected from there. I tried everything to get stronger. Completing quests, upgrading my equipment, and delving into old ruins from before the bombs fell. I did everything I could to get just one degree stronger.

  One of the biggest changes was changing my race. The Protagonist Store had always been available to me, but I had never saved enough EXP to unlock the higher tiers. Going out on adventures made that much easier.

  There had been two options beyond being a basic human. Become a Psionic Human or a Cybernetic Human. I went with psionics of course. The world didn't feel like it had enough resources to support cybernetics.

  It had been the best choice I had ever made.

  After months of training, I finally managed to access my telekinetic abilities. The robots folded like tissue paper. Machines that could take an entire army's worth of ballistic fire crumpled under my psionics. Psionics had been their weakness.

  I had finally found the tool to turn things around. While I had been powering up, the war with the machines had taken a turn for the worse. Refugees from across the sea had come over the years, citing hordes of robots killing people indiscriminately.

  The Iron Hord had been slowly eradicating the human race on a global scale. No one had noticed from where I lived. Because we had been the last continent to meet their eier. It was a battle we had all been losing.

  But things had changed. I had the power to put an end to it all. I just needed more time. More EXP. More experience fighting them. If I got the Advantages, we would win. I just knew it. The human race just needed to hold on for a little longer.

  When I was finally ready, it was too late. The last couple of strongholds were under constant siege and every day we gave ground to the endless horde of robots. But I had done it. A gun to kill every drone with a single shot and enough psionics to keep me alive long enough to kill the AI.

  To kill the Villain of my story.

  I had made allies on the way. They had gained strength as well. A giant of a man who could bend steel with his metal hands. A thief that had a rare invisibility cloak to sneak past the drones. A master hacker who could bypass every firewall the robots had.

  Sarah had been with me the entire way. There had been great cost. To us. Our bodies. Even our relationship. But we were ready. It was do or die and it wasn't going to be easy. We had to cross the planet since the AI had conquered everything between it and us.

  We got there in the end. It had felt impossible some days. Doubts filling our hearts. Crossing canyons carved into the earth. Floating atop oceans boiling in water. Killing numerous drones as quickly and quietly as possible. And when we were right at the heart of the Iron Hord, we faltered a bit.

  Sara comforted me. We spoke of our hopes. Our dreams. What life we would live once we came back home. It was all wishful thinking. But I did have hope. I wouldn't have made it this far if I hadn't. Rage could only get you so far. As long as I had Sarah with me, nothing could stop us.

  She died in the end. Took a hit meant for me. But we succeed. There was nothing between me and the AI controlling the Iron Hord. I talked to it. I wanted answers. I wanted reasons beyond the images I created in my head.

  I was this world's protagonist. The AI was the world's Villain. It couldn't be that simple. There had to be more. We had to be more than puppets playing for some sick gods that gave me this system.

  It didn't give me that satisfaction. Instead, it decided to twist the knife. Everything I had fought for. Everyone that had been sacrificed to get here. All of it was gone in a flash. One last sick gift from a cruel unfeeling machine.

  I killed it. It died laughing at me. Watching the machine sputter and shut down was satisfying. Satisfaction that only lasted a second. It had been a phyric victory. I won and I had nothing to show for it.

  I only got this far because of help. I only got this far because I had something worth fighting for. And it had all been for nothing. Because I was the last living human on this god-forsaken planet. I won and my reward was living the rest of my life alone.

  My emotions got the better of me at that thought.

  It was over.

  I cried.

  But the world wouldn't even give me time to grieve.

  The system was the true sadist all along.

  Because it diluted all the pain and suffering I experienced into numbers. But then it did something far crueler. It gave me hope. I little bit of hope that crushed me in the end.

  I was shocked. Was it possible? Could it be done? Was there still a chance? I turned to look at Sara. At her body. She was still beautiful. She looked like she would wake up any moment. I knew she wouldn't.

  I had an opportunity to save her. There was nothing left for me here. So I took the chance. I turned back to the screen. My heart filled with determination.

  “I accept.”

  And that was how I ended up here. Surrounded by the corpse of a more simplistic machine. I didn't know when it had returned to me. It could have been right after it was created. Or it could have been some time after the bombs fell.

  It didn’t matter in the end. The world was safe. Sara would live. Even if I would never get to see her. I don't know how time travel works. But even if I don't disappear, I’m not the one who she’ll spend her life with. That's up to another Eric to figure out.

  I hope she has a happy life at least.