Morning threads slipped through torn curtains, as if the light itself hesitated to enter this place. Dust in the air twisted like secrets parading after a month of hiding.
Arin lay motionless. His eyelids fluttered with effort and then opened—slowly, as if the body needed a guide to relearn how to remain.
A trembling voice, edged with worry, cut the silence: — "Arin… can you hear me? You were unconscious for a whole month."
Her face was neither beautiful nor ugly; it was the face of someone who had carried and cared, features hollowed by nights and tears, yet her eyes still read in him the same child she had once held. Her aged hand brushed his forehead the way a mother wipes burnt bread: cautious, loving, shaking.
To her… he was her son, finally awakened.
But for him… this was not a "waking." It was the beginning of something entirely different.
Memories that were not his stirred inside him: towering skyscrapers, nightly lights, the roar of cars, voices of strange people, names without faces and faces without names. A whole world that did not belong to Thorlan.
Memories of another man… Min-su.
But they were incomplete—like a book with pages torn out on purpose. Even the novel he knew about this world… stopped two volumes short of its end.
Arin smiled, but the smile was cold, laced with sarcasm—the kind bitterness practiced by those who do not accept pity:
"Perfect… I was dumped here inside an incomplete copy of a story whose author didn't even bother to finish it. Better yet… I live inside a novel, and everyone around me is nothing but part of it, unaware."
The banter in his head was a defensive weapon; a method of rearranging the world with cold calculation rather than collapse. Then a tangible, immediate sensation arrived: a sharp hunger, as if his stomach reminded him that waking the mind alone was not enough.
— "…I'm hungry."
His mother laughed in a choked voice, a smile full of relief and half fear. — "Wait, I'll bring you some soup."
No sooner had she left than he tried to use the quiet to recall Min-su's last memories. He whispered without emotion, like someone testing a new device:
— "System… awaken."
Silence. No screen, no window, no digital whisper. The void answered in place of it.
He repeated it, less patient this time, in a louder voice: — "System, awaken."
Silence remained an obstinate friend. One simple, cold thought crossed his mind: It vanished… Could it be tied only to Min-su? Or is some different game being played here?
He remembered the white orb. The strange farewell whispers still clung to his mind—words both kind and suspicious: the memories of this parasite… your gift… live without regret. A line that seemed comforting, or perhaps a trick from some knowing sage.
He decided to set the matter aside for now; he had no power to uncover what had happened, and as long as he alone controlled the body he would consider that enough.
His mother returned shortly, carrying a small dish in both trembling hands. — "Don't strain yourself… take it slowly."
But his hunger knew no patience. He began cautiously, then surrendered, devouring spoonful after spoonful as if his stomach were making up for a month of absence. She watched in silence; each bite confirmed to her that he was still alive.
While he ate, he learned that "Martha," the village healer, had been the one to tend him. To her, it had been a head injury. She might not have been wrong… but the true cause of his fainting was far beyond what she could imagine.
When the soup was finished, his mother sat beside him in a softer voice: — "Today… I will visit your father's grave."
He lifted his head without exaggerated movement: — "I will come with you."
She looked at him with worry, but his reassuring smile was enough. — "I'm fine."
She did not know that this small outing… would be the beginning of a change that would alter her family's fate forever.