Greta didn’t believe in curses. She believed in bits, bytes, and the quiet hum of a hacked Nintendo Switch. That’s why, at 2:00 AM, she was knee-deep in the underbelly of a warez forum, chasing a file named Moonscars_[Update]_[v1.2.0]_[eShop].nsp .

The screen split into nine panels. Each panel showed a different memory: Greta at six, crying over a dead hamster. Greta at fourteen, humiliated in gym class. Greta last week, shouting at her mother on the phone. The worst moments. The raw ones.

“The update patch rewrites the host,” Irma said calmly. “In the base game, I die and return. In version 1.2.0, you die and become me. Don’t worry. Your body will still move. You’ll eat, sleep, go to work. But you won’t be there. I will be. I’ve been trapped in this cartridge for three hundred cycles. You’ll take my place. And I will finally walk under the real moon.”