The sky above the world had no boundary now.
Where once code flickered and simulations hummed, there was only open air and the sound of breath — the kind that belonged to people who had lived something real.
Rin stood on a quiet hill, the threads that had once wrapped around her feet now resting calmly beneath the earth. Her hand brushed the petals of a flower — ordinary, imperfect, alive.
Aro stepped up beside her. "So… it's done?"
She nodded. "Not fixed. Just... no longer falling apart."
Behind them, Jun laughed somewhere in the distance, chasing after a runaway scarf that Mei had reluctantly let go. Mei sat cross-legged in the grass, sketching something into a notebook — not a memory, not a plan. Just something that made her smile.
Elu was reading aloud to Kaen under a tree, though Kaen kept interrupting with questions. No one minded.
And then, just briefly, the air shimmered.
Threadwriter appeared.
Not descending, not looming — just there, as if he always had been.
The group turned toward him, but he raised a hand.
"No speeches," he said, almost embarrassed. "I just came to collect something."
A small rustle in the grass, followed by a dramatic meow.
The striped cat, the one who'd appeared and disappeared through the oddest chapters, leapt into Threadwriter's arms — and then immediately began clawing at his coat sleeve.
"You again," the cat muttered. "If I have to be in another one of your sad stories—"
"You won't," Threadwriter said, gently prying the feline off his shoulder. "The next one will be much worse. You'll be a star."
The group laughed. Rin raised an eyebrow. "Are you... leaving?"
Threadwriter looked at each of them.
"No. I already left," he said. "But this world — this one you made real — it doesn't need us watching anymore. Not even me."
"But what if it falls apart again?" Aro asked.
Threadwriter smiled faintly.
"Then you'll write it back together."
He placed the cat down and turned to go. Veyne appeared beside him, nodding once to the others — a quiet salute.
As they vanished into the soft horizon, the threads beneath the world didn't tremble. They didn't tighten or weave.
They simply rested.
As if exhaling.