The silence didn't end.
It tightened.
Je could hear his own pulse, slow and uneven, like a drumbeat muffled under soil. Shadows in the treeline thickened until they bent the light away, and the bruised moon above bled into a sickly red.
Something moved between the trees—its footsteps made no sound, but each step made the air heavier.
Then it spoke.
Not in words.
Not in a voice.
But in meaning.
> "You've been seen."
Je's breath hitched. "Who—?"
A figure emerged, shrouded in a cloak of darkness so deep it swallowed even the moonlight. No face. No hands. Just a void in human shape.
The System flickered back online, sputtering symbols Je didn't understand.
[Unverified Contract Detected…]
[Warning: Entity Classification — ???]
[Proceeding may result in irreversible reality breach.]
The cloaked figure tilted its head.
> "Power. A place beyond the reach of gods. Immortality. All this… for your name in my ledger."
A thin scroll of silver light unrolled in the air between them. Strange runes bled across it, shifting like something alive.
The system voice returned, strained, as though something was choking it.
[Reject immediately.]
[Reject immediately.]
[Reject immediately.]
Je swallowed. "And if I sign?"
The cloaked void leaned closer. Je felt the edges of his soul scrape against something vast.
> "Then you become more than the first. You become the only."
The silver scroll pulsed—once, twice—and the moment his finger brushed it, the System screamed.
[System Panic Initiated!]
[You have been recorded in the Akashic Records.]
[Status: Irreversible.]
In a realm far beyond his sight, an eye the size of a sun opened in the dark and turned toward him.