The chamber did not reset gently this time.
There was no hum, no flicker, no soft pulse of lights.Instead, the world lurched—like someone grabbed the loop by its edgesand snapped it backward.
Ha-rin clutched Jae-hyun's coat as her vision blurred.
"Something—something's wrong!"
Jae-hyun wrapped his arms around her.
"I know. Hold on."
Echo's voice cracked overhead—
"ERROR—LOOP SEQUENCE CORRUPTED—UNAUTHORIZED MEMORY LOAD—"
Mira's voice burst through the static.
"Ha-rin, Jae-hyun! The system is pulling a memory neither of you logged. It's—"
Her voice cut.
The Watchmaker stepped into the feed, face grim.
"Echo has uncovered something… buried."
Ha-rin's skin prickled.
"What does that mean—?"
But the loop swallowed her before she could finish.
The New Loop
The world settled into place like sand falling after an earthquake.
Ha-rin opened her eyes slowly.
And froze.
She was standing in a garden.
Not the village.Not the city.Not any place she recognized.
A private garden surrounded by high walls, ivy crawling up stone, white flowers blooming in spirals.
A place she'd never seen.
Or—
Her breath caught.
A place she should have seen.
Because the breeze carried a scent she couldn't mistake—lavender mixed with winter air.The exact scent her mother used when brushing Ha-rin's hair as a child.
Her heart clenched.
"Am I… home?"
But no.Her childhood home never had a garden like this.
Jae-hyun appeared beside her, blinking hard.
"What is this place? It feels… familiar."
Ha-rin turned to him slowly.
"Have you… seen this before?"
Jae-hyun shook his head.
"No. But…"He cupped his forehead."I feel like I should have."
Echo materialized weakly.
"Warning… this memory does not belong to either of your active logs.""Origin… unknown."
Ha-rin's breath turned cold.
"If it's not mine…and it's not his…then who—?"
The Watchmaker's voice cut through sharply:
"It's yours. Both of yours."
Jae-hyun stiffened.
"Explain."
The Watchmaker sighed—a sound heavy with secrets.
"This is a buried loop.A memory Echo hid.A timeline that was erased."
Ha-rin's knees weakened.
"A timeline where… what?"
The Watchmaker hesitated.
Then said quietly:
"A timeline where you two met long before you believe you did."
Ha-rin's heart jumped.
"What?We met at the village, when we were little. That's the earliest memory—"
The Watchmaker's voice deepened.
"Earlier."
Her breath hitched.
Jae-hyun grabbed her hand.
"Explain," he demanded.
The Watchmaker's eyes softened—almost painfully.
"The village wasn't the first connection," he said."You met once before that."
Ha-rin gasped.
"Where?"
The Watchmaker gestured around them.
"Here.In this garden."
Ha-rin's chest tightened.
"Why don't we remember this?"
Echo answered this time—voice small, cracking:
"I hid it."
Ha-rin and Jae-hyun froze.
"You what?" Jae-hyun snapped.
Echo flickered, its form trembling.
"It hurt her.So I buried it.And you."
Ha-rin's heart dropped.
"Buried… him?"
Jae-hyun stiffened. "Echo—what did you hide?"
Echo's glow dimmed.
"The first loop.When you both were three years old.When she met you."
Ha-rin felt her breath shatter.
The Watchmaker spoke gently.
"You two weren't just childhood sweethearts. You were—"he paused, choosing a word carefully,"—constants from the very beginning."
Jae-hyun's voice turned thin.
"We… met before the village?"
"Yes," said the Watchmaker."In a place your parents knew.A place they hid from you."
Ha-rin's heart pounded painfully.
"But why—?"
"Because," the Watchmaker said softly,"that loop ended in trauma severe enough to fracture Echo's stability."
Ha-rin whispered, eyes wide:
"What happened here?"
The Watchmaker looked at her with a kind of regret that made the garden feel colder.
"You need to see it yourself."
The Echo of the Buried Loop
The flowers trembled—and from behind the hedge,two toddlers toddled into view.
A tiny girl with jasmine clips in her hair.
And a tiny boy with a wooden airplane in his hand.
Ha-rin's knees buckled.
"That's… me…"
Jae-hyun stared, stunned.
"And that's—"
The toddler boy held the wooden airplane out shyly.
"Ha-win," he struggled with her name,"you pway?"
Ha-rin clapped a hand over her mouth.
Jae-hyun's voice cracked:
"So this is… the first time we met."
They watched their toddler selves giggle, chase butterflies, share fruit, hold hands like little soulmates.
Ha-rin's eyes filled with tears.
"I knew you," she whispered."At three years old… I knew you."
Jae-hyun looked like the ground had been pulled out from under him.
"So why did we forget this?"
The answer came not from the Watchmakerbut from Echo—voice trembling like a confession.
"Because you lost him."
Ha-rin turned pale.
Shadows began spreading through the garden—black threads creeping along the flowers,distorting the memory.
Little Ha-rin cried.Little Jae-hyun tried to shield her—just like he does now.
Ha-rin gasped."That—That really happened?"
The Watchmaker nodded.
"This garden burned down before the village fire.Another accident.Another trauma."
Jae-hyun's grip on her tightened.
"I lost you," he whispered."And I didn't even know."
Ha-rin looked at him, tears spilling.
"And I lost you too."
Echo's voice cracked again.
"You were both hurt.Your memories fractured.So I buried the loopto protect you."
The garden trembled violently.
The buried loop was coming undone.
Ha-rin whispered,
"Jae-hyun… we loved each other twice as children…"
He whispered back, voice breaking:
"And the world erased us both times."
She pressed her forehead to his.
"But we found each other anyway."
The garden cracked—flowers wilting—sky splitting—
Echo screamed:
"LOOP COLLAPSE.BURIAL LAYER UNSTABLE.RUN—"
The world shattered—
and everything went white.