The air snapped like breaking parchment.
I froze mid-step as the ground beneath my feet quivered. A tremor ran through the City of Manuscripts, rippling the cobblestone streets into jagged lines of text.
The Scribe's parchment-face twisted sharply. "No… not yet. It is too soon!"
"What's happening?" I asked, though my gut already churned with dread.
The sky answered.
A deep tearing sound echoed above, and a rift of blinding white split across the clouds. Letters rained down like ash, disintegrating before they hit the ground.
The System chimed coldly.
[Collapse Event detected.]
District: Lower Archives destabilizing.
Correction in progress: Deletion.
"Deletion…?" My voice cracked.
The Scribe's hollow gaze fixed on me. "The Editors have begun erasing entire drafts of the City. Unstable zones will collapse until nothing remains."
I spun toward the Lower Archives district—rows of crooked shelves and broken towers, stacked with unfinished tomes. Even from here, I saw it unravel. Pages flew upward like a storm of feathers, sucked into the widening void above. Buildings bent inward, their sentences un-writing themselves.
And the screams—gods, the screams.
Half-finished citizens clutched at walls that turned to white. Their voices merged in a desperate chorus:
"Don't delete us!"
"Write me!"
"Candidate, please—!"
The System pulsed with another prompt.
[Collapse Countermeasure Options:]
Stabilize District manually (Grant Roles).
Paradox Cost: 10+ (scales by population).
Sacrifice District (Abandon Draft).
Cost: -20% City Stability.
Ten paradox, minimum. My current total was eleven.
Stabilizing even one district could kill me.
But abandoning it…
I stared at the screaming figures, whole families clawing at each other to avoid being pulled into the blank void. Their eyes met mine.
"Write us!"
"Please!"
"Don't let us vanish!"
My throat closed. "I can't—"
The Scribe's voice cut through, harsh. "You cannot save them all. Choose, Candidate."
The word slammed into me like a weight.
Choose.
Life or erasure.
The boy I had stabilized earlier stumbled forward. His shadow was whole now, his eyes burning with desperate hope.
"You can do it, can't you? You gave me a name… you made me real. You can save them too!"
His tiny hands clutched my sleeve, trembling.
Behind him, the void spread wider. Whole towers of knowledge collapsed inward. A wave of faceless citizens stampeded toward me, hands outstretched, begging for salvation.
My System windows flickered violently.
[Warning: Collapse spreading.]
[Time until full deletion: 3 minutes.]
Three minutes.
If I stabilized the district, my paradox would spike dangerously. Maybe past the limit. I could end up like the corpse in the tutorial—gone in an instant.
If I abandoned it… the City's stability would drop. I might lose my only safe zone.
My chest burned as if the paradox inside me already knew which choice was heavier.
I clenched my fists.
"Stabilize!"
The System screamed warnings as light surged from my hands.
[Draft Granting Engaged.]
[Assigning Mass Roles…]
Windows exploded across my vision, faster than I could read.
Baker. Guard. Scholar. Messenger. Mother. Child. Old man.
Each role consumed a point of paradox. Each role tethered another soul to existence. My veins felt like they were burning from the inside out.
The screams began to shift—fear into awe.
"I'm real… I'm real!"
"He wrote me!"
"He chose me!"
The void shrieked as the district resisted. Buildings reformed, shelves stood upright again, words stitching back into stone.
But my System flashed red.
[Paradox +12.]
[Total Paradox: 23.]
[Warning: Overload imminent.]
My knees buckled. The world tilted. My vision fractured into shards of text. The ground pulsed like a heartbeat, reality itself rebelling against me.
I felt it—something clawing at the edges of my mind, the paradox trying to rewrite me.
The Scribe's voice roared over the chaos. "Hold on, Candidate! Anchor yourself! Anchor with intent!"
Anchor? My thoughts scattered like loose pages in a storm.
Then I saw him.
The boy.
The one I had saved first. He was still clinging to me, eyes wide with terror—but his grip was solid. Real.
I seized that thread.
I saved him. He is proof I exist.
I clenched my teeth and forced the words into the collapsing storm.
"I… am… real!"
The paradox screamed. My body convulsed. For an instant, I thought I was gone—erased like the woman earlier.
Then the world snapped back.
The void sealed shut.
The Lower Archives stood whole once more, shelves stretching tall, citizens weeping in relief.
And I collapsed to my knees, gasping.
[Collapse Event Countered.]
[District Stabilized: Lower Archives.]
[City Stability: 42%.]
[Paradox Level Critical: 23.]
The Scribe knelt beside me, his parchment-face shifting rapidly. "Foolish… reckless… but successful. You bought them time."
I spat blood, my whole body trembling. "How… many more districts?"
The Scribe's silence was answer enough.
I laughed bitterly, the sound broken. "So this is how it is. I'm supposed to save them… and kill myself doing it."
The boy hugged me tighter, whispering. "But you did save us."
And for the first time, I wondered if the Editors weren't testing me at all.
Maybe they were waiting to watch me break.
To be continued…