There was no floor beneath him.
No ceiling. No walls. Only shards of light drifting, each one carrying a reflection of him—or someone who looked like him—drifting through a dark black void.
The ground formed beneath his feet a moment later, a smooth shiny surface stretching infinitely in every direction.
Helia was gone.
The Time Master stood behind him, unmoving. His silhouette was a shadow pulled out of ink, blurred features except for the eyes—two points of electric teal burning with an unimaginable patience.
A soft chime rang out in the distance.
Then another.
Nero turned toward the sound—and froze.
A door hovered in the empty space, suspended in midair. Old, wooden, and out of place.
"Go on," the Time Master murmured behind him. "You wanted answers."
Nero felt his jaw tighten. "I didn't ask for this."
"You did," the Time Master said. "Just not in this life."
The void rippled.
The wooden door opened on its own.
Beyond it laid a narrow hallway, lined with dimmed lights and cracked floor. Nero squinted—he knew this place. It was family.
"This is…" His voice caught. "My childhood home?"
"Not yours," the Time Master corrected. "His."
Before Nero could ask who, the Time Master gently drifted him forward—and the world pulled him through the doorway.
The hallway smelled faintly of dust and old paper. A soft buzzing hum ran under the floorboards, like something mechanical breathing beneath the house.
Nero walked slowly, each step getting heavier. He reached a living room lit by a dim lamp.
A boy sat on the couch.
Twelve years old. Dark hair. Pale skin. Familiar eyes.
Nero's eyes.
But the boy did not look up. He stared at a blank television, unmoving, as if someone had pressed pause on his entire existence.
Nero's breath hitched. "That's me."
"That's him," the Time Master corrected softly. "Your Unlived."
Nero stepped closer, unable to stop himself. The boy's hands were folded neatly on his lap, his posture was straight, his face was calm in a way that seemed unnatural.
"Why does he look…" Nero swallowed, "…empty?"
"He was designed to be," the Time Master replied.
Nero snapped around. "Designed?! By who?"
The Time Master did not answer. Instead, he motioned forward.
The boy suddenly blinked—slowly—before standing up. His expression didn't change. He wasn't breathing normally; he inhaled only when the room flickered, as if synced to the lights.
Nero felt something cold settle in his chest.
"Was he… real?"
"As real as you," the Time Master said.
The implication slammed into Nero like a punch.
I wasn't born naturally.Neither was he.
The boy walked toward a small desk. Papers lay scattered across it—drawings, equations, symbols.
Nero's voice shook. "I used to draw these. How does he know them?"
"He doesn't," the Time Master said. "He copied you."
The boy suddenly stopped, head tilting slightly, as if listening to someone whisper in his ear.
His irises glowed.
Nero staggered back. "That's—! That's the same glow I have."
"Of course," the Time Master said. "You inherited his echo. His failed resonance became your potential."
The boy opened his mouth.
A whisper slipped out—dry, cracked, as if unused for years.
"Veyra…"
Nero felt his ribs tighten painfully. "He… he knew the word too."
"He was meant to use it. He never did."
The boy's body froze mid-motion.
Time around him stuttered.
Then cracked.
Lines of light split across his form like cracks in glass. His eyes widened, not in fear but in permission—like he had been waiting, for this moment.
The boy shattered.
Not into blood or bone—but into hundreds of glowing data fragments that drifted upward like fireflies.
Nero gasped. "No—wait—!"
He reached out, but the fragments passed through his fingers like cold mist. The pieces swirled together, forming a growing storm of blue light that sucked the room inward.
Shelves collapsed. Walls folded. The entire house dissolved into code.
"Nero Vale," the Time Master said quietly, "you were never chosen."
The last fragment blinked out.
"You were born out of his collapse."
The world vanished.
Nero hit the ground hard—another landscape, another memory.
This one wasn't a house.
It was a lab.
Grey walls, machineries, a massive containment chamber in the center of the room. Scientists wearing Archive insignias[1] moved around the chamber frantically, shadows trembling under the harsh white lights.
Inside the chamber stood a figure.
A person—wreathed in swirling segments of frozen time. One moment his body blurred, the next it sharpened, flickering between states like a corrupted file.
Nero recognized him instantly.
The boy. Only older—maybe fifteen. The same face Nero saw in mirrors.
Alarm sirens blared.
"Resonance spike!" someone shouted. "Containment is breaking!"
The chamber trembled. A blast of teal energy exploded outward, knocking people and equipments across the room. Nero stumbled back, even though the memory couldn't physically harm him.
The boy in the chamber screamed—not in pain, but in some primal, fractured howl that bent the air itself.
The glass cracked.
The scientists scattered.
One of them yelled, "Shut it down! Shut it down!"
But they were too late.
The chamber erupted.
A shockwave tore through the lab.
Nero covered his face instinctively as the world got consumed. When the flash faded, everything was reduced to static dust.
Even the boy.
Nero collapsed to his knees. "Stop," he whispered. "Please… stop showing me this."
The Time Master stepped beside him. "You needed to see it."
"Why?!" Nero's voice cracked. "Why show me his suffering? His death?"
"Because it wasn't a death," the Time Master said. "It was a transfer."
Nero lifted his head slowly.
"What… are you saying?"
The Time Master crouched in front of him, glowing eyes inches from Nero's.
"That his existence didn't end.It became yours."
The memory dissolved into darkness.
The Time Master stood and extended a hand to Nero.
"You are not living his life," he said softly. "You are living because of him."
Nero stared at the offered hand, eyes shaking.
"You mean I'm…a continuation,"
The Time Master finished. "A second attempt."
The void trembled.
Somewhere far away, Nero heard Helia shouting his name.
The Time Master leaned closer, his voice dropping to a whisper that curled around Nero's spine.
"And now he wants his life back."
The world splintered.
Everything went white.
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