Extraction incomplete, the text read. Insufficient mass. To uncompress 'Ringworld,' external architecture is required.

The file was small, completing in a matter of seconds. Silas navigated to his downloads folder and double-clicked the icon. His extraction software whirred to life, but instead of spitting out a clean EPUB or PDF file, the progress bar froze at 99 percent.

Silas was standing on a transparent walkway suspended over an abyss so vast his brain refused to calculate its depth. Above him, arching up into an infinite blue sky, was a band of land. It didn't curve down toward a horizon like Earth; it curved upward , stretching into the heavens until it was lost in the glare of a central, eternal sun.

A prompt box flickered onto his screen. It was not a standard Windows error. The font was sharp, geometric, and glowing with an eerie, soft blue hue that didn't seem to match his monitor's color profile.

With no other choice and the infinite sun warming his face, Silas took his first step forward. The world beneath him scrolled.

The glowing link on the forum read simply: .

Welcome to the unzipped directory, the interface pulsed. File initialized: Ringworld. Estimated read time: 3,412 years. Please begin walking to scroll.