Pretty unhelpful responses so far. Enter

exit

to exit the current screen and return to a selection of installed OS/Kernels. You should be able to boot normally from there on. Once logged in, try

update-grub 

which should repair your bootloader config.

I raise you "what happened to my bus ?"

You broke grub

Your system is fucked, that's what happened.

More specifically, it cannot find the config file (/boot/grub/grub.cfg) it uses to load the menu & stuff to boot.

Usually it means one (or more) of:

• the grub.cfg got moved/deleted
• grub directory got moved/deleted
• /boot directory got moved/deleted
• boot partition failed to load

Welcome, this is the Linux user equivalent of popping your cherry.

You have a few options, but the easiest is to just use a rescue thing like Rescatux on a USB drive that automates most of the process. If you haven't the means of flashing a USB drive (like another computer) but still have your linux installation USB drive, most distros offer a "rescue existing install" option somewhere in their installer/liveUSB. But you'll have to search around.

You’ve got some schmutz on your screen.

ACHIEVEMENT UNLOCKED

Solar eclipse clearly.

What were you doing before you got this? If the systems intact you can just boot your machine manually with grub commands.

Here's a guide I found: https://www.unix-ninja.com/p/Manually_booting_the_Linux_kernel_from_GRUB

Dont forget to play around with grub while its like this. Tab completion works great, try '(' the press tab to maybe see your disks as grub sees them. I think help lists commands and most of them are harmless.

It isn't booting a kernel, you're in the bootloader.

I think I remember that a non geek friend of mine had good luck with this for fixing their Grub : https://www.supergrubdisk.org

Another option : https://www.system-rescue.org/disk-partitioning/Repairing-a-damaged-Grub/

Can you give a little more background info? What distro are you using, are you dual booting, is it a new install, did you make changes to your kernel, your partitions or grub before that?

While it's clear that grub couldn't find a kernel to boot, we need these Infos to help you find a solution.

Burn a live Linux system onto a USB (can be one with just a terminal, like Arch Linux). If you don't have another computer to plug the USB into, this can be done on an Android phone using EtchDroid.

Then, boot from that USB and mount your main filesystem. Inside of the Live system, chroot into the mounted filesystem and run sudo grub-mkconfig -o /boot/grub/grub.cfg which should fix the bootloader.

After that, you can just exit the USB system and return back to your OS which should boot now.

(If you don't know how to mount a filesystem or chroot, I would explain but I forgot how to do it. If someone else could explain that would be neat)

@joel_feila Super Grub2 Disk
https://www.supergrubdisk.org/super-grub2-disk/
Rescatux
https://www.supergrubdisk.org/rescatux/
build a rescue stick
https://pendrivelinux.com/yumi-multiboot-usb-creator/

Some good tips on this thread, saved for later.