Maya's POV
The Administrator's power hit me like a tidal wave of golden fire.
But I didn't burn.
My new system—Death's Sovereign—absorbed her attack and converted it into pure energy. I felt it flowing through me, making me stronger, faster, more.
"Impossible!" The Administrator's eyes blazed with fury. "You can't exist! That rank was deleted from the code!"
"Then I guess I'm a glitch." I raised my hand, and her system interface appeared in front of me—not just visible, but editable. "And I'm very good at exploiting glitches."
I reached into her code and started deleting.
She screamed as her administrative privileges began to vanish. One by one, her powers flickered out. The golden glow in her eyes dimmed.
"Stop!" She tried to fight back, but her attacks were weakening. "You don't understand what you're doing! The system needs an Administrator or everything collapses!"
"Then the system is badly designed." I kept deleting. "Any system that requires a dictator to function deserves to break."
Jae-hyun appeared at my side, his void power flowing into mine through our Soul Resonance. Together, we were unstoppable—his ability to erase combined with my ability to control death itself.
The warehouse shattered around us, revealing the truth underneath: we weren't in a warehouse at all. We were inside a massive computer server—the physical manifestation of the system that controlled all awakened powers.
"This is what everything really is," the real Dr. Sarah said, stepping forward. "A simulation. A game. We're all just players in someone else's code."
"Not anymore." I grabbed the Administrator by her throat, lifting her off the ground. "I'm rewriting the rules."
But as I prepared to delete her completely, something unexpected happened.
The Administrator smiled.
"You fell for it," she whispered. "Just like I planned."
Her body exploded into data, streaming directly into my system. Not attacking—merging. Becoming part of me.
[WARNING: ADMINISTRATOR SYSTEM MERGING WITH DEATH'S SOVEREIGN][CANNOT STOP PROCESS][MERGE COMPLETE IN: 5... 4... 3...]
"No!" I tried to pull away, but it was too late. Her consciousness flooded into mine, bringing with it all her memories. All her knowledge.
And the horrible truth.
She wasn't the villain. She'd been trying to stop something far worse.
In the rush of her memories, I saw it all:
Timeline Zero—the original timeline where the apocalypse happened naturally. No Administrator. No system. Just a virus that turned everyone into zombies and ended humanity in six months.
Someone had created the system afterward. Created the Administrator role. Created the ability to reset and try again. All in hopes of finding a timeline where humanity survived.
For fifty cycles, the Administrator had tried. Had reset. Had watched everyone die over and over, searching for the one combination of variables that would save the species.
"I'm not the enemy," her voice echoed in my head as we merged. "I'm the prison guard. And you just opened the cell."
[MERGE COMPLETE][NEW SYSTEM UNLOCKED: OMEGA ADMINISTRATOR][WARNING: THE TRUE ENEMY HAS BEEN RELEASED]
The warehouse—the server—began to crack apart. Something massive was pushing through from the other side. Something that had been locked away by the Administrator's endless resets.
The Original Virus.
Not a biological disease. Something worse. A digital plague that consumed system code itself. And now that the Administrator was gone, nothing was holding it back.
It burst through, manifesting as a massive creature made of corrupted data and screaming faces. Every person who'd died in Timeline Zero, merged into one nightmare entity.
"RUN!" the Administrator's voice screamed in my head. "This is what I was preventing! This is why I kept resetting! Because if this thing reaches the current timeline—"
"Everyone dies," I finished. "Permanently. No resets. No second chances."
The creature roared, and reality itself began to glitch harder. Buildings outside the server room flickered. People's system interfaces started corrupting.
"How do we stop it?" Jae-hyun asked, his void power already forming shields around us.
"We can't." The Administrator's memories showed me the truth. "In Timeline Zero, this thing consumed every awakened system. It grew stronger with each one. By the end, it was unstoppable."
"Then we're dead," Dr. Sarah said flatly.
"No." I looked at the merged system interface in my vision. At the new powers I'd gained. "We're not dead. We're just out of resets."
I felt the weight of the Administrator's fifty timelines settle on my shoulders. Felt the exhaustion of watching the world end again and again.
But I also felt something she never had: hope.
Because I had Jae-hyun. Had Sarah. Had the people I'd saved. Had a second chance that I'd earned through suffering and survival.
"Everyone, listen!" I shouted to the awakened humans filling the room. "The apocalypse is coming. Not in two days—now. That thing—" I pointed at the digital monster "—is what kills us all if we don't stop it."
"How?" someone yelled.
"By doing what the Administrator never did." I turned to Jae-hyun. "By working together instead of trying to control everything."
I accessed my Omega Administrator powers and broadcast a message to every system in Seoul:
[EMERGENCY QUEST: SAVE HUMANITY][The Original Virus has awakened. In 60 minutes, it will consume all systems and kill all awakened.][But together, we can stop it.][Objective: Lend your power to the Death's Sovereign.][Reward: Survival. And the chance to build a better world.]
"You're asking them to trust you," Jae-hyun said. "After everything—the hunting, the betrayals—"
"I'm asking them to choose." I met his eyes. "To choose hope over fear. Life over death."
My system pinged. One person had accepted. Then another. Then ten. Then a hundred.
Power flowed into me from across the city. Not stolen—given freely. Each person lending me their strength because they'd decided to believe.
But it wasn't enough. The Virus was too strong, growing larger with each passing second.
"We need more," Sarah said, checking her calculations. "At least five thousand people. Maybe ten thousand."
"Then we convince them." I opened a video link to every system in Seoul. Let everyone see my face. "My name is Maya Chen. Three days ago, I died. My sister and my fiancé fed me to zombies while laughing. And when I came back to life, all I wanted was revenge."
The power flow slowed. People were listening.
"But revenge isn't going to save us from that thing." I gestured to the Virus. "Anger isn't enough. Fear isn't enough. The only thing that's going to save us is choosing to be better than the worst things that happened to us."
I took Jae-hyun's hand. "I'm not asking you to trust me. I'm asking you to trust each other. To trust that together, we're stronger than alone. That five thousand people working as one can beat any monster."
"Please," Jae-hyun added, his voice carrying across every system. "Help us save the world. One more time."
Silence.
Then my system exploded with notifications:
[USER 732 HAS JOINED][USER 1,451 HAS JOINED][USER 2,890 HAS JOINED]
Thousands of people, all choosing to believe. All lending their power.
I felt it building inside me—not corruption, not control, but connection. Thousands of souls linked together through the system, all working toward one goal.
Survival.
"Now!" I screamed, unleashing all that borrowed power at once.
The blast struck the Virus dead center. Jae-hyun's void power erased chunks of its code. The combined abilities of five thousand awakened humans tore into it from every angle.
For a moment, I thought we'd won.
Then the Virus split apart, multiplying.
One became two. Two became four. Four became eight.
"It's adapting!" Sarah yelled. "Every attack makes it stronger!"
The Virus laughed—actually laughed—with thousands of voices speaking as one:
"Thank you for the meal. Now watch as I consume your timeline just like I consumed Timeline Zero."
One of the Virus copies lunged at the crowd of awakened humans. People screamed, trying to flee—
And Yiren stepped in front of it.
My sister. The girl who'd betrayed me. The one I'd sworn to destroy.
"Maya!" she screamed, her A-rank Siren power blazing. "I'm sorry! For everything! But please—save them! Save everyone!"
The Virus consumed her in seconds, her body dissolving into corrupted code.
"NO!" I tried to reach her, but it was too late.
Ethan ran forward next, flames erupting around him. "I was a coward! I was weak! But maybe—maybe I can be brave one last time!" His S-rank fire power exploded in a suicide attack that barely slowed one of the Virus copies before it ate him too.
One by one, people were dying. Buying me time to find an answer.
My system showed a solution, but the cost made me want to scream:
[ULTIMATE OPTION AVAILABLE][SACRIFICE YOUR DEATH'S SOVEREIGN SYSTEM TO CREATE A PERMANENT FIREWALL][WARNING: You will lose all powers][WARNING: You cannot be resurrected again][WARNING: Timeline will lock—no more resets possible][EFFECT: Virus will be sealed forever, but the apocalypse will proceed as scheduled]
"The apocalypse still happens?" I read aloud, horrified.
"But humanity survives," the Administrator's voice whispered. "They'll awaken. They'll fight. Some will die. But the species continues. Isn't that worth everything?"
I looked at Jae-hyun. At the people fighting. At the world that was about to end no matter what I chose.
"If I do this," I asked, "what happens to our Soul Resonance?"
His face went pale. He'd seen the notification too.
"It breaks," he whispered. "We'll forget each other completely. Like we never met."
Tears streamed down my face. "I don't want to forget you."
"I don't want to forget you either." He pulled me close, pressing his forehead against mine. "But if it saves everyone—"
"It's worth it," I finished.
We kissed. One last time. Pouring five lifetimes of love into a single moment.
Then I activated the sacrifice protocol.
[SACRIFICE ACCEPTED][SEALING VIRUS... 50%... 75%... 100%][TIMELINE LOCKED][APOCALYPSE WILL BEGIN IN 24 HOURS AS ORIGINALLY SCHEDULED][SOUL RESONANCE BREAKING...]
The last thing I saw before everything went white was Jae-hyun's face.
The last thing I felt was his hand slipping from mine.
Then nothing.
I woke up in my bed. Morning sunlight streaming through the window.
My phone showed a date: April 18th, 2025.
The day of the apocalypse.
But my system was gone. My memories of the last three days were... fuzzy. Like a dream I couldn't quite remember.
Had any of it been real?
My phone buzzed. A text from an unknown number:
"Meet me at Gangnam Coffee Shop at noon. We need to talk before the world ends. —Someone who remembers."
My heart raced. Someone who remembers?
I got dressed and headed out, some instinct pulling me toward that coffee shop.
When I arrived, a handsome man with black hair and sad eyes was waiting.
"Do I know you?" I asked.
"I don't know," he said. "But I dreamed about you last night. Dreamed about holding you while the world ended. And when I woke up..." He showed me his phone. "I had your number saved with one word: 'Fated.'"
We stared at each other, two strangers with the strangest sense of déjà vu.
"The apocalypse starts in six hours," he said. "And I don't know why, but I think we're supposed to survive it together."
I sat down across from him, my hand reaching across the table.
When our fingers touched, a system message appeared:
[SOUL RESONANCE DETECTED][RESTORING MEMORIES...]
And suddenly, I remembered everything.