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When I got back to the apartment—if you could call a half-suspended cube floating in fractured gravity an apartment—I had a teenage girl in my arms, and I'd already forgotten her name.
Not that it mattered.
Names are for people with homes, birthdays, and high school drama. Not for someone who'd just watched her entire species get vortexed into the vacuum between realities. I looked down at her. She was light. Not weight-wise—emotionally. Like her soul hadn't caught up to what happened yet.
Good.
Maybe she'd last longer that way.
I let the portal stitch itself shut behind us and dropped her gently onto my couch. She winced at the sharp springs stabbing her back through the cushions.
"You live in this?" she asked, eyes scanning the chaos around her. Floating books with teeth, a fridge that barked if you opened it too fast, an unwashed plate from three parallel Thursdays ago. She squinted at a black puddle moving on the ceiling.
"It's temporary," I said, tossing my coat at the coat rack that ducked. "I haven't committed to a decorating aesthetic since the last big bang."
"What the hell is that thing?" she pointed at a floating mirror, which turned to her and whispered, "You're still not over your dad."
"Don't listen to it," I said. "It's emotionally manipulative."
She pulled her legs up on the couch and hugged her knees. "You killed everyone. Just… just like that."
Ah. The grief finally found her.
I poured myself a glass of liquid amnesia—technically soda, but it forgets its flavor every five seconds—and took a long sip. "Not everyone. You're still here."
"Because you saved me. Why?"
"Felt like it." I shrugged. "The system's been nagging me about getting an assistant."
"An assistant?! I just watched my entire planet die and you're offering me a f—freakin' internship?"
"Unpaid, obviously."
She stood up, pacing, trembling. "What is wrong with you?!"
"Not enough to be interesting, too much to be cured."
That shut her up.
I sighed and snapped my fingers.
The walls of the apartment trembled—then peeled outward. The ceiling expanded, the floor unfolded like a lotus, and suddenly we stood inside a gothic-mansion-meets-cosmic-library combo. Starlight drifted through the windows. The furniture repaired itself. My sentient cactus finally stopped swearing.
She gasped. "What the hell…"
"House mode: 'Guest Who Judges.'"
The mirror gave a slow, sarcastic golf clap.
"Okay," I said, clapping my hands once. "Rules. Rule one: Don't die. Rule two: Don't touch my coat. Rule three: If the toaster asks if you want to play poker, you say no."
She blinked. "What happens if I say yes?"
"The toaster cheats."
She huffed. "I'm not a kid, by the way."
I paused. "You're like… what, seven?"
"I'm eighteen, okay? Eighteen."
That number barely registered to me. Honestly, anything under a hundred felt like a rounding error.
I raised a brow. "Cool. You can vote. Still doesn't mean I trust you not to accidentally release a mindworm into the kitchen dimension."
She rolled her eyes. "Whatever, grandpa."
I was… technically twenty-seven. But cosmically? I stopped counting around the time I disemboweled a timeline for lying to me.
"Alright," I muttered. "Let's fast-track this."
I waved a hand. A heavy book thudded into existence on the coffee table, splintering the wood. The cover read:
> "So You Accidentally Became the Assistant of the Null Reaper: A Practical Guide"
(With Updates You'll Never Understand)
She picked it up with both hands, face twisting. "What is this, a murder manual?"
"Technically, yes. It also includes a crash course on dimensional etiquette, multilingual swearing, and how to make coffee in a collapsing dimension."
"Have you read it?"
"God, no. I live it. You… read it."
She flipped through the pages. "These aren't even written in English. This one's in… binary?"
"It's for my former assistant. He was a toaster."
"The cheating one?"
"His cousin."
She sighed and threw herself onto the now-plush couch. "I hate this."
"Welcome to the club."
For a moment, we both just sat there. The quiet between us wasn't exactly comfortable—it was more like the silence after a scream.
"Are you always this casual about genocide?" she asked.
I tilted my head. "He was going to kill billions. I just… beat him to it."
"That makes you better how?"
I thought about it. About Ikaru's smug face. About the way his power twisted the sky. About how proud he looked when he declared himself a god.
"I don't care about being better," I said softly. "I care about balance. The system gives me names. I give them exits."
"And the little girl you saved? Was that balance too?"
"No. That was boredom."
She gave me a look like she wanted to scream—and maybe cry—but she didn't. That earned her a few respect points.
I raised my hand, fingers curled like I was plucking a grape from space itself. The tiny orb—still humming with the quiet screams of a now-nonexistent civilization—hovered between my fingers.
"Where do you put those?" she asked, arms crossed, barefoot on the floating couch behind me. Her sarcasm dripped more than the tea she hadn't touched.
I turned toward the shelf. Not a shelf, really. More like an endless cathedral of cubes—floating, rotating, infinite in depth and width—each slot holding a dead universe, compressed and humming in perfect symmetry.
With a flick, I slid the orb into an empty slot. It clicked in place like it always had a home there.
She blinked. "How many?"
I didn't even look back. "Guessing? Hundred fifty-six thousand and eight."
Her jaw dropped slightly.
I sipped my coffee. "Could be nine. I lost track when emotions still existed."
"I need a room," she said.
"First door on the left."
She walked toward it, then paused. "You ever forget them?"
"The people I kill?"
"Yeah."
"No."
She didn't say anything to that. Just disappeared into the hallway.
I let my head fall back against the couch. The mirror whispered something, but I ignored it. For once, I was too tired to care.
I don't know how long I sat there. Time didn't tick the same in this place. It shifted with my mood. And right now?
Time was standing still.
The girl was alive. The book would keep her busy. The house would protect her if she didn't break anything.
And me?
I was going to sleep.
I deserved that much.
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