I turned to leave.
To finish manifesting my human shape.
To explore the world I had written.
That was the plan.
Then—
"Hey."
One of the humans glanced back.
Not with a skill.
Not with magic.
Just… with his eyes.
He squinted.
"…Did you see that?"
The others stopped walking.
"What?"
"There—by the river."
"Are you messing with us?"
They turned.
All three of them.
And looked directly at me.
Not at my human form.
At what I really was.
Their pupils widened.
Their mouths opened as if to scream, but no sound came out.
Blood poured from their eyes like ink from cracked pens.
One clutched his head and fell to his knees.
Another laughed once—too loudly, too sharply—and then his skull struck the ground.
The third never even twitched.
Their minds collapsed before their bodies did.
Then…
Nothing.
They lay still.
Dead.
I stood there, unmoving.
My chest felt tight.
Not fear.
Not guilt.
Something unfamiliar.
"…So this is what a corpse looks like," I whispered.
It was the first time I had ever seen death up close.
The first time something had ended because of me.
Or rather—
Because they had seen me.
"I didn't even touch them," I muttered.
They looked at me.
And their stories ended.
My mind spun.
Sadness crept in slowly, awkwardly, like a delayed emotion patch.
I turned away from the bodies.
"I didn't mean to," I said softly. "I just wanted to walk."
Curiosity replaced the sadness almost immediately.
Why?
How?
The moment the thought formed—
DING
The sound was familiar.
The same sound I had given Asura.
A floating interface appeared before my eyes.
Not blue.
Not white.
Black ink.
Translucent.
Flowing like liquid calligraphy.
An author-designed UI.
It hovered inches from my face, glowing faintly, as if written in living paragraphs.
"…A system," I murmured.
I had never used one before.
Yet somehow, I understood it instinctively.
I navigated it with thought alone.
First tab:
[INFO]
Name: The Author
Age: Ageless
Race: Evolving Narrative Anomaly
Rank: —
I stared at the name.
"The Author…?"
A strange irritation surfaced.
"That's the best I could come up with?" I sighed. "That's lazy."
I thought for a moment.
Something subtle.
Something only certain fans would recognize.
A name that meant frog.
A name that meant rebirth.
A name that meant to change.
"…Kaeru."
The moment I chose it, the word engraved itself into me.
Not just as a label.
But as a second consciousness.
Like my name existed alongside my other self in the real world.
Name updated: Kaeru
"…Yeah," I said quietly. "That feels better."
Next:
Age: Ageless
Same as Asura's.
But when I felt its meaning…
It was different.
His meant eternity.
Mine meant something colder.
I was not written.
I was the hand.
And I would not die — even if every story ended.
That realization disturbed me.
So I stopped thinking about it.
Some truths were better left unedited.
Next:
Race: Evolving Narrative Anomaly
I opened the description.
It read like a definition of myself:
A being whose existence is composed of story logic rather than biological form.
Appearance, abilities, and identity are shaped by perception, narrative pressure, and authorial will.
Can redefine itself through description.
"…So I can become whatever I describe," I said slowly.
That was interesting.
Very interesting.
Rank:
—
Nothing.
No letters.
No numbers.
I was unmeasurable.
"…Figures," I muttered. "Systems need limits. I don't have one."
I moved on.
[STATS]
HP: Conceptual (Cannot be measured)
MP: Infinite Ink-Mana
STR: Narrative Dependent
AGI: Undefined
VIT: Paradox
INT: ∞∞ (Meta-verse Consciousness)
LUK: Story Probability
I blinked.
"…That's excessive."
Yet somehow, it felt honest.
My strength depended on how the story wanted me to be strong.
My intelligence wasn't knowledge.
It was awareness.
Of worlds.
Of readers.
Of authors.
Of myself writing myself.
Next tab:
[SKILLS / ABILITIES / TITLES / CLASSES / RESISTANCES]
There were too many.
Pages and pages.
Scrolling endlessly downward.
Narrative Rewrite.
Ink Manifestation.
Form Authorship.
Observer's Paradox.
Conceptual Immunity.
Unfinished Sentence.
Fourth Wall Drift.
I could say more.
So many more.
But before I could explore further—
A familiar text box appeared in front of me.
Just like when the System or the Aetherborn spoke to Asura.
Black ink letters formed slowly.
Waiting.
Watching me.
And for the first time since arriving in my own world…
Something addressed me directly.