When Eunha opened her eyes, she saw two worlds layered on top of each other.
One was real — the manor's ritual chamber, smoke curling from broken sigils, Jiheon's voice calling her name.
The other floated above it like a reflection in water — pale, luminous, and wrong.
In that mirrored space stood the other her.
Same face. Same voice.
Different soul.
> "Welcome back," the echo said, smiling faintly. "We're finally whole again."
Eunha pushed herself up weakly, clutching her head. "Whole? You call this whole? You're a distortion."
> "And you're a wound pretending to heal."
The words hit like static in her skull. Jiheon reached for her, but his hand passed through her for a second — the two realities flickering in and out of sync.
"Eunha, talk to me!"
> "I'm here," she whispered, forcing her focus back. "Don't let go."
The echo tilted its head. "He can't touch you if you belong to me."
---
⚜️
The stabilizers hummed violently. Rin swore, her wings flickering in and out. "The resonance field's collapsing! The system can't handle two identical quantum signatures."
Jiheon barked, "Then isolate one!"
> "Which one?"
> "The one that's her!"
Rin glared. "That's the problem — the system can't tell them apart."
As they argued, Eunha stared at her echo — really looked.
And she realized something chilling.
The echo wasn't tethered to the Crown anymore.
It was tethered… to her own heart.
Every heartbeat pulled them closer together, like gravity made of memory.
> "You're feeding off me," Eunha whispered.
The echo smiled. "Feeding? No. Reclaiming."
> "You're stealing my existence."
> "No. I'm taking back what you discarded when you chose to be mortal."
---
⚜️
Eunha's memories began to blur.
She saw flashes — moments that didn't belong to this life.
The battlefield under the red moon.
The first cycle's end.
Her final prayer before dissolution.
Each fragment shimmered — but instead of fading, it flew toward the echo, absorbed into its form.
Jiheon saw it and froze. "It's taking her memories!"
> "Not taking," the echo said, voice coldly calm. "Restoring. She wanted to forget. I refuse to."
Eunha staggered forward, hand glowing with golden light. "Then I'll erase you."
The echo smiled softly. "You'd be erasing yourself."
---
⚜️
The chamber couldn't contain the energy anymore. The two Euhas' presence created a paradox — a temporal rift spreading outward, bending walls like glass.
Rin pulled Jiheon out of the main circle. "We can't fight them both. If their frequencies sync, it'll collapse everything."
Jiheon shook his head, eyes locked on Eunha. "No. There has to be a link — something that can separate them without killing her."
Rin's eyes flicked toward the golden shard embedded in Jiheon's wrist — the Knight's Seal.
> "You still carry her mark," she said. "It was made to anchor her to you across lives. Maybe it can distinguish the real one."
> "Or burn through her soul," he muttered.
> "You wanted a choice. Here it is."
---
⚜️
Inside the collapsing chamber, the two Euhas faced each other like reflections on breaking water.
> "You think love will save you," the echo murmured.
> "It already did."
> "No. It trapped you in mortality."
> "Then let me stay trapped."
The echo reached forward, touching her chest — and for a moment, they both froze. Their hearts beat in perfect sync.
Outside, Jiheon's Seal flared to life, reacting to the resonance.
He could feel her heartbeat inside his pulse — two rhythms at war, one human, one divine.
> "Eunha…" he whispered, raising his hand. "Forgive me."
He slammed the Seal to the ground.
---
⚜️
Light exploded — not bright, but deep, like gold burning in silence.
The Seal linked to Eunha's core essence, reaching past space and dream.
Both Euhas screamed — their bodies flickering as the energy divided their souls.
The echo lunged at her, furious. "You'd let him define us again?!"
> "No," Eunha gasped. "I define me."
She drove her hand forward — directly into her echo's chest. Golden light surged outward, ripping through the mirrored dimension.
The echo's form began to splinter, fragments of light scattering like glass shards across the air.
> "You can't erase me," it hissed, even as it dissolved. "I'm every thought you refused to feel. Every power you denied. I am you."
> "Then live in me," Eunha whispered, voice breaking. "Not against me."
The echo froze — then smiled.
A genuine, sorrowful smile.
> "You've finally learned to love the part that terrifies you."
And with that, she stepped forward — into Eunha.
Not vanishing. Merging.
The light faded.
---
⚜️
When Jiheon reached her, she was lying in the center of the shattered sigil, breathing slowly.
Her pulse was steady. But her eyes — when they opened — gleamed faintly silver beneath the brown.
> "Eunha?"
She smiled weakly. "Still me. Just… more."
He touched her face gently. "You scared the life out of me."
> "That makes two of us."
Rin crouched nearby, wings dim but steady. "Congratulations. You just became a walking paradox."
Eunha sat up, rubbing her temples. "She's not gone. She's… asleep. Inside me."
> "And the Crown?" Jiheon asked.
Eunha looked at the fragments scattered around them — dull, lifeless glass now. "Empty. Like it served its purpose."
Rin frowned. "Then why is the city still humming?"
They froze.
Because she was right.
Somewhere far below the manor, a deep resonance pulsed — slow and steady, like a heartbeat the world itself had learned to mimic.
Eunha's gaze turned toward the window, where the horizon shimmered faintly.
> "The dream didn't die," she whispered. "It just… moved."
---
⚜️
That night, as Jiheon sat beside her in silence, she stared out into the dark, feeling the faint pull in her soul — the lingering echo of her other self.
> "She's quiet now," she said softly.
> "You think she'll stay that way?"
> "No. But maybe we'll learn to coexist."
> "And if not?"
She leaned her head on his shoulder. "Then I'll fight her again. With you."
He smiled faintly, eyes half-closing. "Reluctantly, of course."
> "Naturally," she said, smiling back. "You're my reluctant knight, after all."
Outside, the stars flickered — not randomly, but in rhythm.
A pulse.
A message.
The world was no longer ending.
It was listening.