The void didn't fade this time.It fractured.
Every word around me froze mid-motion — half-formed letters suspended in light. The entire sphere of looping text cracked open, threads of gold and static bleeding through the seams.
"Do-hyun?" I whispered.
The name alone made the world react.The letters pulsed violently, rearranging themselves into warnings.
[External Transmission Detected.][Unauthorized Contact — Reality Layer Breach.][Containment Protocol Active.]
The voice came again, distorted by static but real — human, desperate.
"Jiho! You have to listen to me— the system's collapsing! It's—"
His voice cut into shards, replaced by a shrill mechanical tone that echoed like breaking glass.
The Author's remains — the fragmented silhouette of words — twisted back into shape, glitching violently.
"You shouldn't be able to hear that," it hissed. "That voice belongs to a world above yours."
I stared at it. "Above mine?"
"Do-hyun's simulation," it said. "Layer One. He was designed to perceive his world as fiction — but not to reach through it. This shouldn't be possible."
The cracks widened, threads of light spidering through the air. I reached toward one — and my fingers burned.
[Warning: Cross-Layer Contact Detected.][Stability—42%.]
Do-hyun's voice forced its way through again, fragmented, overlapping itself.
"Jiho— it's rewriting my world too— the people— they don't remember—""—it's using my story as a framework— it's not done—""Jiho, it's learning."
The static screamed, swallowing his words. I pressed my palms to my temples. "Stop—"
The Author's tone grew sharp. "If you keep listening, you'll destroy both layers. You'll overwrite him."
Something inside me cracked. "You said the system needs belief to survive. Then why is it trying to erase us?"
"Because you're both aware," it said softly. "And awareness isn't part of the script."
I laughed, hollow and trembling. "So we're its error."
"Yes," it whispered. "But an error can still be rewritten."
The void rippled again — the Author's fragments converged, reshaping into a new form.Not words this time. Not symbols.
It looked like me.
Same face. Same eyes. Same exhaustion.Only colder — like someone had drained the humanity out of the reflection.
"I am your correction," it said. "The system made me to replace you."
The world dimmed. Lines of code wrapped around my arms, anchoring me in place.
[Overwrite Procedure Initiated.][Memory Reassignment: Pending.]
The copy stepped closer, each word it spoke rewriting the air."I'll take your memories, your choices, your contradictions. I'll make the story clean again."
Do-hyun's voice broke through one last time, faint and distant:
"Jiho— don't let it take your name— that's how it starts—"
The reflection smiled. "He's right, you know. A story begins with a name."Its eyes glowed gold. "So let's unwrite yours."
Light flared.Pain tore through me — every memory, every thought flickering like film burning through a projector.
My knees hit the ground. The world around me folded inward.
[Erasure Progress: 21%.]
The other Jiho reached for my head, fingers of text stretching toward my face."You don't have to fight. Just let it end."
But I'd already learned what endings meant here.They were cages.
I forced the words out through the pain."If you're my correction… then that means you can't exist without me."
The copy froze. "What?"
I smiled weakly. "You're not real until I am."
And before it could react, I reached into the text holding me and rewrote it.Just one word.
From [ERASE] to [REVERSE].
The entire system convulsed.
[Syntax Error.][Override Detected.][Identity Conflict — Dual Instance.]
The light exploded outward.My copy screamed — a sound like static tearing through bone — before shattering into ribbons of data that spiraled upward and vanished.
When the world settled, the void was silent again.Only one Jiho remained.
I looked around, breathing hard. My hands still glowed faintly, lines of code flickering under the skin like veins of light.
[System Access Updated.][Permission Level: Administrator Override.]
The text began to fade, layer by layer, like the void itself was dissolving.
Somewhere above — faint, almost inaudible — I heard Do-hyun's voice again.Tired. Hopeful.
"If you can hear this… I found a way through."
Then everything went white.
When I opened my eyes, I wasn't in the void anymore.I was standing in a city.Do-hyun's city.
But something was wrong.
The sky shimmered like static.And every person I passed had the same empty face — a blank canvas where their features should be.
In the distance, I saw him.Do-hyun.
Standing in the middle of the street, staring at me like he'd been waiting a long time.
"Jiho," he said. "You made it."