The plasma shot didn't sound like an explosion.
It sounded like something tearing apart.
An electromagnetic shriek split the rain-heavy air above the alley, as if a piece of the sky itself had been ripped open. The shot wasn't aimed at my chest—or at Kaian's heart.
It targeted the light between us.
The thread.
The bond.
The moment the glowing blue mass struck the dragon mark on my wrist and the golden cross at Kaian's throat, something deeper than flesh was torn away.
Not pain.
Disassembly.
[Warning: External breach — deletion code active]
[Biological synchronization: 40%]
[Risk: Existential separation]
I collapsed to my knees inside the metal container. The world dissolved into static, like a radio trapped between frequencies. My hands shook as layers of myself began to slide apart—Layla, Evelyn, spirit, body, data—splitting into separate versions that no longer aligned.
"Layla!"
His voice wasn't entirely human.
It carried mechanical echoes, layered frequencies overlapping each other. His hands gripped me tightly, as if he were holding me back from falling into a void only he could sense.
He didn't tremble.
He ignited.
Kaian drew his sword.
Violet lightning burst from the blade, pulling charge from the surrounding towers. Neon lights dimmed. Hover vehicles stuttered midair. The atmosphere thickened with energy until a storm of sparks spiraled around us.
Sujin—or what remained of her—staggered backward.
Her face fractured into pixels. Red error messages flooded her eyes.
[User: Isabella — Host instability detected]
"You're a fool, Layla!" the voice came doubled, distorted. "You fused this monster's core with the city's infrastructure! He isn't a lover—he's a virus feeding on the system itself!"
I forced myself upright, summoning the admin interface through the haze. The data streams flickered, unstable.
"Zone isolation… mutual protection protocol…"
[Executed]
[Cost: 200 days]
[Remaining balance: 631 days]
A violet shockwave erupted between us, hurling drones and Sujin dozens of meters away. Kaian didn't hesitate. He lifted me into his arms and leapt from the container, running along the alley wall as if gravity were optional.
The city began to fail around us.
Screens flickered. Power grids stuttered. Every step he took left behind electromagnetic interference.
"To the tunnels!" I shouted.
We dropped into a smart drainage shaft seconds before the drones recalibrated.
---
The tunnels were cold—sterile in an unsettling way. Dim white lights reflected off shallow water moving slowly along the floor. The air smelled of industrial disinfectant.
Kaian set me down gently but didn't step away. His hands remained on my shoulders.
"Am I the disease?"
There was no anger in his voice.
Only honesty.
I looked up at him. Faint lines of data shimmered beneath his skin, appearing and disappearing with each heartbeat.
"You're the exception," I said quietly. "Isabella fears you because she can't rewrite you."
He pulled me into an embrace—not gentle this time, but certain.
A promise.
"If I am a virus," he murmured, "then I'll be the one that burns anything that tries to touch you."
[Obsession level: 95/100]
[Skill unlocked: Arcane Hacking]
Before I could respond, a new notification appeared.
[Mission: Infiltrate Arkan Tower]
[Objective: Recover original body]
[Warning: Host body in coma — brain functioning as central processor]
The air left my lungs.
"I'm… running the server?"
[Yes]
The truth settled into place.
I hadn't escaped the company.
The company had turned me into its core.
I was the processor.
And Kaian was the anomaly they couldn't contain.
If I disconnected, my body would die.
And he would be erased.
I took his hand.
"We're not running anymore. We're going back to the heart."
He smiled—the expression of a prince who finally understood the siege ahead.
"Then lead the way."
We moved deeper into the tunnels until he suddenly stopped, staring at a smooth metal wall. Without hesitation, he punched it.
The metal shattered as if it had been waiting to break. Behind it lay a narrow passage absent from any city map.
We entered.
A small room, completely isolated from the network.
Old cathode-ray monitors. Computers from another era. No wireless signal. No broadcast.
And in the center—
An old man.
A long, dust-covered coat. A paper book in his hands.
He didn't look up immediately.
"You're late."
I froze.
His voice wasn't digital.
It was… alive.
He raised his eyes.
Sharp, despite his age.
"Layla. Kaian."
Kaian's sword appeared in a flash, its edge at the man's throat.
"Who are you?"
The old man smiled calmly and lifted the book.
On the cover, written in faded handwriting:
The Cursed Grace System — Original Blueprint
My heart stopped.
"That's impossible…"
He gestured toward a nearby screen. One of the old monitors flickered to life.
A faded image appeared.
A young girl with black hair standing beside a blond boy in an unfamiliar garden.
I stared.
The girl…
was me.
Not as I am now.
And the boy—
his face wasn't identical to Kaian's, but the resemblance hurt.
"What is this?" Kaian whispered.
The old man removed his glasses, wiping them slowly.
"I'm not the creator. The creator died years ago."
He paused.
"I was the first failed experiment."
Silence pressed against my ears.
"Before Server 01, there was a prototype. A small world. Two children bound by an experimental link. We wanted to test emotional synchronization between two consciousnesses."
He turned to me.
"You weren't pulled from Seoul, Layla. You were reloaded."
Cold spread through my veins.
"No… I remember my life."
"Those memories were implanted."
Another screen lit up. Files. Recordings. An old laboratory.
A child lying on a medical bed.
A boy's voice echoed through the speakers:
> "We'll always meet again… even if we forget our names."
A violent headache split through me. Memories surfaced that weren't Layla the analyst—or Evelyn the villainess.
A white room.
A massive machine.
A small hand holding mine.
"Ka—"
"My name doesn't matter," the boy in the memory laughed. "We'll choose new ones every time."
I staggered back.
"No…"
The old man continued, mercilessly calm.
"The experiment collapsed. The boy died physically. The girl—you—fell into a long coma. Later, the company reused your brain as the foundation for the server."
He looked at Kaian.
"He's not just a character from a story. He's an unstable reconstruction of that boy. Every time the server resets, he's generated again in a different form."
Kaian's grip tightened on his sword.
"You're saying I'm a dead copy?"
The old man met his gaze without flinching.
"I'm saying you're the only part that was never erased."
The room felt smaller.
Memories flooded in—old machines humming, a child's laughter, a promise without context.
I looked at Kaian.
Not a prince.
Not a virus.
Something I had known long before this world existed.
A small hand in a garden.
We'll always meet again.
The air suddenly trembled.
The old monitors flickered—not through the network, but from within.
The old man paled.
"They found you."
A new symbol appeared on the screen.
Not the company's logo.
Not Isabella's signature.
A simple white mark:
An eye within a circle.
Beneath it, a single line:
Origin restoration in progress
The walls shook. Above us, the city lights began shutting down district by district.
Kaian looked at me—not as a protector, not as a weapon, but as someone realizing he had never existed by accident.
"Layla…"
For the first time, his voice carried real fear.
The ground split open with a thin white fracture. Colorless light poured through it.
A non-human voice filled the room:
"Models unstable. Forced merge initiated."
Threads of light reached toward us.
The old man shouted, "Run! If they merge you, you'll disappear as separate beings!"
The light closed in.
Kaian's hand tightened around mine. The twin bond ignited again—not as an attack.
As a choice.
He looked at me, golden eyes steady now, filled with something beyond obsession.
"If we were the beginning of the experiment… then let's be its end."
The light reached us.
And above New Seoul, the sky went dark.