Light.
Blinding, endless, formless.
Klein fell through it, weightless, suspended in a void that wasn't quite a void. The sensation was neither pain nor comfort—just being, stretching infinitely and collapsing at the same time.
His thoughts were scattered, half-formed, slipping through his fingers like grains of sand.
"I am Klein Moretti."
That name anchored him. It bound him, even as the reality he had known shattered around him.
"I am Zhou Mingrui."
A truth, but also a lie. A remnant of another life, a shadow cast by a self he wasn't sure had ever truly existed.
"I am The Fool."
That name trembled, the weight of divinity pressing upon it.
Names were powerful.
Names were chains.
And yet…
If he could rewrite himself, what did he want to be?
The thought sent a ripple through the light, warping it, pulling it apart. The formless whiteness cracked, revealing glimpses of something else—a vast library with no end, an ocean of ink, a throne of mist and stars.
And standing amidst it all—
The figure.
No longer a smear.
No longer an indistinct shape.
It had taken a form.
It looked like him.
No—
It was him.
"You thought you could erase me?" the other Klein asked, stepping forward. His voice was steady, his mismatched eyes reflecting something Klein couldn't quite decipher.
"You are the contradiction," Klein hissed.
"No," his mirror said, tilting his head. "I am the proof that you exist."
Klein's breath hitched.
The Archive had tried to erase him. The ink had refused to settle. And yet, here he was—facing himself.
"What are you?" he asked, fists clenching.
His reflection gave him a small, knowing smile.
"I am the part of you that never made sense," it said. "The piece that doesn't belong. The thing that has been rewritten, erased, reformed, again and again.
"I am what remains."
A shiver crawled down Klein's spine.
"That doesn't explain what you are."
The reflection didn't answer. Instead, it stepped closer—so close that Klein could see the details of its face.
It was him, down to the smallest scar, the faintest shadow of exhaustion beneath his eyes.
And yet…
Something about it was wrong.
"If I am you," the reflection murmured, "then who is standing here?"
Klein exhaled sharply.
"You are the past," he said, voice firm. "A remnant. A mistake that should have faded."
The reflection laughed softly.
"Maybe."
Then, without warning, it lunged.
Klein barely had time to react before he was pulled forward—no, not forward—into it.
His mind spun, the weight of something crashing into him all at once.
Memories flooded him.
A thousand loops, a thousand rewritten realities, fragments of himself lost in ink and words.
The vision of a courtroom, a book that rewrote itself endlessly, a god that never was.
And then—
Nothing.
Silence.
Darkness.
And then—
A single voice.
"Choose."
Klein's eyes snapped open.
He was back in the Archive.
The books had stopped moving. The ink had settled. The air was still.
Yeaia stood a few steps away, watching him carefully. Their mismatched eyes held an understanding that Klein wasn't sure he wanted to acknowledge.
"What happened?" he asked, his throat dry.
"You tell me," Yeaia replied.
Klein took a deep breath, steadying himself. He could still feel it—that other version of himself, the weight of the contradiction that had almost swallowed him whole.
But it was gone.
No.
Not gone.
It was part of him now.
"We should leave," Yeaia said, stretching. Their robes shifted, the fabric moving as if responding to unseen tides. "This place won't hold us much longer."
Klein hesitated.
"And if it does?"
Yeaia's lips curved into a smirk.
"Then we make it let go."
Klein exhaled.
"Fine. Let's go."
The Archive trembled one last time as they stepped forward—toward whatever came next.
And behind them, in the empty silence of unwritten words, the books whispered his name.
But which name they spoke…
Was left unwritten.
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End of Chapter 84
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