—Echoes from a Burned Past
The leather-bound journal lay between them, unremarkable at first glance—yet it seemed to carry a weight neither of them could name.
Shawn hesitated before reaching out, his fingers grazing the worn cover.
Elias spoke in a low voice. "I never opened it."
Shawn looked up. "You never even read it?"
His grandfather shook his head, something unspoken flickering across his face.
"It arrived three days after she vanished. No return address. Just… two pieces of parchment, and this."He tapped the journal. The sound landed with a dull thud in the heavy air.
"I was afraid, Shawn. Afraid of what might be inside. Or worse—afraid there'd be nothing at all."
The atmosphere thickened, pressing in like a storm yet to break.
Shawn slowly opened the cover.
The first page was blank.
So was the second.
And the third.
His brow furrowed as he flipped through more pages—nothing but yellowed paper, untouched.
"Is this a joke?"he muttered, tension edging into his voice.
Elias frowned. "Keep going."
Shawn turned a few more pages.
Then—
In the middle of the book, one page held writing.
The ink was faded but legible.
It was Lucy's handwriting.
If you're reading this, it means the century-long loop will begin again.
Shawn stared.
The journal slipped from his hands and landed softly on the floor.
Elias said nothing. Both of them stared at the page, the silence now deafening.
"If you're reading this…"
Before either could speak, Shawn's phone buzzed violently on the table.
The screen lit up—not with a notification, but with stark crimson text replacing the clock:
2031.07.01 | T–60D | 06:29:59
2031.07.01 | T–60D | 06:29:58
2031.07.01 | T–60D | 06:29:57
The numbers ticked down.
Shawn blinked, stunned.
It was now 17:30 on April 30, 2031.
The meaning was unmistakable: the countdown had begun.
Elias lurched forward, his voice tight with urgency. "Check everything".
Shawn lunged for his tablet—same countdown, same format.
Even the smart fridge had overwritten its display, now reading:
T–60D | 06:28:46
His Thunder Core trembled—not in warning, but in recognition.
Something ancient stirred in his chest—an instinct, or maybe memory.
Elias staggered toward the bookshelf, pulling out a thick volume of 20th-century history.
The pages fell open to a chapter titled:
THE YEAR THE WORLD FRACTURED:1931
Shawn read over his grandfather's shoulder:
January: Global markets collapsed under the second wave of the Great Depression.
September: Japan invaded Manchuria.
December: Einstein published a controversial 'closed universe' theory—and vanished days later.
A yellowed newspaper clipping slipped from between the pages.
Elias's hands trembled as he unfolded it. The headline read:
LOCAL RESEARCHER CLAIMS 'TIME LOOPS' AFTER LAB EXPLOSION
The photo beneath it showed a younger Lucy standing beside a charred ruin, her face smudged with ash, her eyes disturbingly calm.
Shawn's throat went dry. "She knew."
Elias pointed to a line near the article's edge:
"Dr. Lucy insists the event was not an accident but a 'temporal correction,' though authorities dismissed her claims as shock-induced delirium."
Outside the window, something had shifted.
Across the street, neighbors stood frozen in place.
Their devices displayed the same countdown.
A child pointed upward—clouds were looping, their movements repeating unnaturally, like broken animation.
Then the ground gave a low, steady hum.
As if the world had slipped into a strange rhythm.
Shawn's Thunder Core vibrated again—not in alarm, but affirmation.
The journal on the floor fluttered open. Pages turned on their own, stopping at a new entry.
Lucy's handwriting was jagged, the ink blotched in places:
The countdown isn't to the end. It's the beginning.
The ink beneath pulsed, as if the journal itself was alive.
Elias paled, his voice a whisper: "Last time she wrote those words... was the day before the lab burned."
Shawn flipped through the journal. Words were appearing on once-blank pages, line by line.
The Loop corrects via catastrophe.
1731: Fire.
1831: Plague.
1931: War.
2031: ?
The ink beneath seemed to hesitate—blurring, as if unsure what to write next.
A hush fell over the room.
Shawn leaned forward, his breath shallow, heart thudding.
At the bottom margin of the page, one final line appeared, smaller than the rest:
Find the lost pages.
He sat back, stunned. "Lost pages? From this journal?"
Elias shook his head. "I don't know. But if Lucy wrote this... she left something. Somewhere."
Somewhere?
Why?
A chime broke the silence.
Shawn turned. His laptop screen lit up.
One new message.
The sender's address flickered—characters blinking in and out like corrupted code. No recognizable domain. No metadata.
Encrypted. Self-deleting.
Shawn hesitated. Then clicked.
The screen went black for a beat. Then, lines of text emerged—pulsing faintly in deep red:
A new Loop is coming.
Time is shorter than expected.
Quinn's faction is growing stronger by the day.
Trust no network.
The Monolithic Palace in the Earth is still clean—for now.
Come alone. Tomorrow, 12:00.
We finish what we started.
The message disintegrated line by line, dissolving into static. Within seconds, the screen returned to its home display.
Shawn stared, unmoving.
The Monolithic Palace—a place buried deep in the Meta Origin Mountains.
Remote. All but forgotten. Once dismissed as myth—now summoned as necessity.
And yet—"Come alone."
"Finish what we started."
His fingers curled into a fist. The phrasing rang like Kyng's—familiar, clipped, exact. But without warmth. Only urgency.
Kyng.
It had to be. But after all this time... could he still be trusted?
He looked up.
Elias was watching him, eyes steady and unreadable.
"Mr.Kyng?" Shawn asked quietly.
Elias didn't reply. He only nodded once—not in confirmation, but understanding.
Shawn's thoughts spiraled.
If Quinn had truly turned—and his shadow network was as vast as the rumors suggested—then nothing outside that rendezvous could be trusted.
Or worse—what if it was, and Kyng had changed?
He swallowed, the stillness in the room growing dense. Everything was converging:
—Lucy's journal, the countdown, the broken memories.
—The Monolithic Palace. Tomorrow. Alone.
He turned to the journal on the floor. The last line still lingered at the bottom margin:
"Find the lost pages."
He didn't know what Lucy had hidden. Or what
Kyng was about to unleash.
But the clock wasn't waiting.
He glanced at the tablet:
2031.07.01 | T–59D | 23:57:58
T–59D | 23:57:57
T–59D | 23:57:56
The countdown continued.