The city groaned as if it were alive.
Buildings leaned against one another like corpses frozen mid-collapse, their windows flickering with static instead of light. The system's glow pulsed faintly over the streets — a heartbeat too slow to feel human.
[Scenario 2: Final Phase — Protect your Promise until dawn.]
Dawn.That meant six hours.
I knew what was supposed to happen.In Heaven Falls Twice, the testers would regroup, evolve, and attack the bonded pairs one last time — forcing them to prove their promises held under absolute pressure.
If they broke, one partner vanished.If they survived, they advanced.
It was all so familiar. But this time, the city wasn't following the script.The skyline was different. The layout had shifted.And the countdown timer in the corner of my vision… was wrong.
[Time remaining: 4 hours, 56 minutes.]
The world was moving faster than the story I remembered.
Do-hyun walked ahead of me, silent.He never asked for direction, but somehow he always chose the same path the novel's protagonist would've taken — calculated, cautious, precise.
I trailed behind, reading the system messages flickering on the cracked glass walls of a nearby building. Each one shimmered faintly before fading.
[Promise Integrity: 98%][Observer activity detected.][Story divergence: 0.39% → 0.52%]
The number kept climbing.
"Stop," I said.
Do-hyun froze instantly — not because he trusted me, but because he trusted patterns.He scanned the ground. "Why?"
"There's a trap here," I said.
He didn't move. He looked at the cracked asphalt, the faint shimmer of light beneath it. Then he stepped forward anyway.
"Wait—!"
The ground exploded. Dust and light scattered outward, but Do-hyun moved faster than I'd ever seen a human move — diving through the blast, landing hard, rolling once.
He rose slowly, brushing off the ash. "You were right," he said. His voice was calm, unshaken. Then he looked up at me, eyes cold as stone. "But you hesitated."
"I—what?"
"If you knew there was a trap, you should've stopped me sooner."
He wasn't angry.He was studying me. Testing me.
I forced a thin smile. "Maybe I didn't want to sound paranoid."
His gaze didn't soften. "Paranoia keeps people alive."
We found shelter in an underground parking garage — dark, half-flooded, echoing with faint metallic dripping.
Do-hyun sat against a concrete pillar, pipe resting across his knees again. I watched him from a distance, the glow of a broken exit sign flickering over his face.
He hadn't said a word since the explosion.Every now and then, his eyes would flick toward me — quiet, calculating.
He was trying to see what I'd do next.
The silence broke when the system spoke again.
[Testers — Phase 2 Mutation Detected.][Warning: Unknown parameters active.]
My stomach turned cold.That wasn't in the story.
"They're changing form," I murmured.
Do-hyun didn't react. "You expected this?"
"Not like this."
From the shadows at the far end of the garage, something began to crawl out — fast, stuttering like a bad signal. It was human-shaped, but its body flickered with static between movements.
Then it spoke — in Do-hyun's voice.
"We will stay alive."
He stood immediately.So did I.
[Integrity Check — Commencing.]
The world blurred. Two versions of Do-hyun stood before me now — one with a faint system glow, one without. The fake was perfect.
The system's cruel trick: force you to doubt your partner.If your bond cracked — if you hesitated — it erased both.
I already knew what to do.This had happened before.
The fake always struck first.
When it lunged, I didn't think. I reached into my jacket, pulled a broken pipe, and drove it straight through its chest before it could move an inch.
The system blinked.
[Target neutralized.][Promise Integrity: 100%.]
Do-hyun stared at the twitching corpse on the floor — then at me.
"You didn't even wait to check," he said quietly.
"I didn't have to."
He tilted his head slightly, his expression unreadable. "You knew it wasn't me."
"Of course."
A beat of silence.
Then, coldly:"Or you just didn't care if it was."
His words cut deeper than the system alerts.
I didn't answer. I couldn't.
Because for a moment, when both versions of him had stood before me…I hadn't been sure either.
Outside, the city shifted again — buildings rearranging themselves in the distance like the world was being rewritten mid-chapter.
[Story divergence: 0.92%.][Observer activity increasing.]
Do-hyun turned toward the horizon, his profile lit by the burning sky. "You always know what's coming," he said softly. "Even when you shouldn't."
He looked back at me then, and for the first time, I felt something colder than suspicion in his gaze.
Recognition.
[Scenario 2 Progress: 98%.][New parameter detected: Reader Interference.]
The words pulsed faintly, visible only to me.
And in that moment, I understood what was happening.The world wasn't following the story anymore.It was following me.