by Azira573
Ethan, Derek, Nora, and Robin are four thirteen-year-olds who've never actually met in person — just four friends who share the same login times and the same terrible taste in music. Then a mysterious CD shows up on each of their doorsteps, with no return address and no explanation. The moment they play it together, they're pulled out of their bedrooms and dropped into Renderverse: a game world of locked classes, archetypes shaped by zodiac and alignment, and monsters that scale the deeper you go. It should be the best summer of their lives. It doesn't stay theirs alone for long. Watching from the edges of the same shared session is a rival party of demon-blooded players from Earth 619 — a future where humanity was wiped out generations ago, and where the memory of that war still shapes how every young demon looks at a human. Some of them join out of curiosity. Some join to make sure they're not the ones left behind if the game ends without them. One or two might just be waiting for the right moment to turn on everyone else. And somewhere underneath all of it, an ancient, glitching horror called the Darklord is already awake — and losing this game isn't the only way to lose everything.
