The river was silent.
But Jiheon's reflection wasn't.
It stared back at him — alive, burning with gold, whispering in a language older than creation itself.
> "Knight of the Axis. Protector of the Cycle. The vow remains unfulfilled."
The words echoed not in sound, but inside his skull — a vibration of memory.
He clutched his head, breathing hard. His skin glowed faintly beneath the veins, as if molten light was trying to break free.
Eunha ran to him, rainwater soaking her skirt. "Jiheon! Listen to me—"
He looked up. His eyes weren't brown anymore. They shimmered like liquid sunlight.
> "Eunha?" His voice trembled. "What's happening to me?"
---
⚜️
The ground beneath them shivered. The river rippled upward instead of outward — droplets suspended midair, defying gravity.
A pulse of energy radiated from Jiheon, twisting reality like silk in water.
Eunha's mark responded — glowing through her sleeve in rhythm with his heartbeat.
She felt it — that same connection they'd once forged when they'd bound the Axis together in their first life.
Two souls. One cycle.
Now reigniting.
---
"Jiheon, you have to fight it."
His voice broke. "I am fighting it! But it's— it's inside my head— it knows things I shouldn't remember!"
"What things?"
He blinked, eyes flickering between gold and black. "You… dying. Again. And again."
She froze.
He took a step closer, trembling. "Every life, every mistake — it's all still in me. The blade I raised against you. The promise I made when you forgave me. I thought I forgot, but…"
He gripped his chest. "It never left."
---
The Axis sigil appeared in the air between them — faint, translucent, spinning slowly.
Eunha reached toward it, but the light burned her skin.
> "Don't touch it," Jiheon gasped. "It reacts to you. To us."
The sigil pulsed once, then split into two — one fragment embedding itself in his chest, the other hovering over her heart.
The world stilled.
And then—
> Boom.
An invisible shockwave rippled across the city. Lights flickered. Windows shattered.
The dormant echoes awoke.
---
⚜️
By dawn, the first incident was reported.
A woman claimed to see her dead husband in the mirror, whispering her name.
A child spoke in a tongue no one recognized, calling it "the language of before."
And in every reflection across the city, faint golden ripples danced beneath the surface.
Eunha sat in the darkened bookshop, radio murmuring reports. The world was slipping — again.
Jiheon sat across from her, silent, his hand wrapped in bandages that faintly glowed.
He looked exhausted. Not from battle — from remembering.
---
"You should've let me die that night," he said quietly.
Eunha looked up sharply. "Don't you dare."
He smiled weakly. "I mean it. Every time we try to fight fate, it rewrites the rules. Maybe the Axis isn't a curse — maybe we are."
She crossed her arms. "And you think dying fixes that?"
He leaned forward. "It ends it."
Her voice cracked. "No. It repeats it. You die, I break, the world resets. That's the pattern."
He stared at her for a long moment. "Then what do we do?"
She exhaled slowly. "We do something we've never done before."
He raised a brow. "Which is?"
"Win."
---
⚜️
Night fell.
The two of them returned to the river — the site of every rebirth, every end.
Jiheon's veins pulsed brighter now. The Axis inside him had grown restless, craving release.
He dropped to one knee, gripping the earth. "I can feel it— the voices, the memories — they're trying to merge with me."
Eunha knelt beside him, pressing her glowing hand over his heart. "Then let them. But let me in too."
He opened his mouth to argue, but she was already chanting — ancient syllables written in the language of the First Cycle.
Their lights intertwined, golden threads wrapping around them both.
He gasped, body convulsing. "Eunha— stop! You'll—"
She met his gaze, eyes fierce. "If we share the burden, the Axis can't control either of us. We anchor it together."
"Or we die."
"Then we die our way this time."
---
The river erupted in light.
Visions crashed into them both — lives flashing by in shards of memory.
A battlefield drenched in blood.
A palace burning under a crimson moon.
A quiet cottage by the sea.
Each vision came with emotion — pain, joy, fear, longing — until neither knew which life was the real one.
In the chaos, Eunha heard a voice — not Myung's this time, but something older, softer.
> "Love was never your curse, Countess. It was your anchor."
And just like that — the flood stopped.
---
⚜️
When she opened her eyes, dawn was breaking.
The city was silent again — but the air was different. Clean. Still.
Jiheon lay beside her, unconscious but breathing. The golden glow had vanished from his veins.
Eunha brushed his hair back, tears streaking her cheeks.
"Welcome back, my reluctant knight."
He stirred, eyes fluttering open — brown again, clear and human.
"…Did we win?"
She smiled through her tears. "For now."
He groaned softly. "You always say that."
"And you always wake up to hear it."
---
⚜️
Later that morning, as sunlight poured over the quiet river, something shimmered faintly beneath the surface.
Not gold.
Not the Axis.
Just a single fragment of light, pulsing like a heartbeat — before fading completely.
For the first time in centuries, the world held its breath… and exhaled in peace.