One day three years ago, all mankind heard a whisper at the same time.
The voice had no source and no language, but everyone understood the same sentence: "The rules have awakened."
The world has changed since then.
The taboos you once thought were just superstitions - "You can't look in the mirror in the middle of the night", "You can't forward this message or something will happen", "You can't sit in the last row of the movie theater" - all came to life. They are no longer passively waiting for warnings to be violated, but are rule-based life forms that actively expand, prey, and evolve.
All the mirrors in an apartment building become "channels" and those who break the rules are replaced by their own reflections.
A chain message sweeps the world, and those who don't forward it will watch their loved ones being erased from their memories.
An abandoned cinema "shows" every midnight, and the audience is a human being invited by the rules. There will always be one less person when the show ends.
These are called "Rule Monster Areas." They grow, devour, mate, and reproduce like living organs. They have their own hierarchy, territory, ecological niche, and even begin to appear "awareness".
The only people who can fight against them are a group of desperadoes called "Rule Hunters".
