2025-12-14 19:02:42The duplicate’s hand descends toward Frank’s forehead, slowly, precisely, like the final stroke of an executioner’s blade. Frank can feel the world thinning behind him.
His thoughts are blurring. His name slipping at the edges. The void tightens in anticipation. Then, he moves. Not fast. Not skillfully. Not with power. But with refusal.
Frank grabs the duplicate’s wrist, and for the first time, his hand doesn’t pass through. The void shivers. The duplicate’s expression fractures,
a microscopic crack in its perfect stillness. “Impossible.”
Frank’s voice is low, shaking, but steady in its core: “You can talk about purpose. About roles. About design. But you don’t get to tell me who I am.”
His grip tightens. Fire sputters along his arms, weak, flickering, but real. “I decide that.”
The duplicate pulls back, twisting its wrist like its skin is made of polished glass. Frank holds on. “You said
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CHAPTER 103: THE HOUR OF FRACTURES
The first blow came without warning. “You'll tire,”the double said, almost conversational, as if they were arguing over a chair in a quiet room. “You always do.”Frank answered by throwing his weight into a punch. “Not today.”The double moved like a thought,clean, impossible,and caught Frank's fist in one mirrored hand. The impact sang up both arms. “Feel that?”the double murmured. “That’s what you were supposed to feel. No jag, no guilt. Just effectiveness.”“You're not me,” Frank said. He shoved. The double let him. It smiled.“You’ll learn to like it.”“Elara,!” Frank barked.“Stay with me,” she called, wind and light shaking off her.“Don’t,don’t listen.”“You sound like two different people,” the double observed, calm as a judge.
CHAPTER 102: THE MOMENT THE WORLD LEANS IN
The pulse stops. Not fades,stops, like a blade pressed against the city’s throat. Frank feels the world tilt toward him. Every flicker of fire under his skin sharpens.Every nerve waits. Every instinct screams. The entity,the shifting, towering thing of shadow and half-light,stands perfectly still. Its eyes lock onto him. White. Depthless. Knowing.Elara whispers behind him, barely a breath: “it’s choosing a target.”“No,” Frank mutters.“It’s already chosen.”The streets around them tremble. Dust rises in slow spirals. A broken streetlamp flickers once before snapping in half as if acknowledging the creature’s presence.Frank steps forward. Elara grips his arm. “Don’t,”“I’m not attacking it.”He exhales slowly. “I’m testing something.”He raises his hand,palm open, flames flickering softly. The entity
CHAPTER 101: THE AFTERSHOCK
The world settles slowly. Not perfectly. Not completely. But it moves. Gravity returns. Air flows. Raindrops finally fall in chaotic arcs, striking broken concrete and steel.Frank lies on his back, chest heaving, fire sputtering weakly along his arms. The courtyard is a ruin,half-collapsed buildings, shattered debris, puddles reflecting the fragmented sky.He tastes blood in his mouth. Elara is beside him, solid, breathing, flickers of light still trailing off her form like the afterglow of a star. He sits up slowly, scanning the ruins.The duplicate is gone. Or at least… no trace remains. No shadow, no echo, no whisper of perfection. “Elara ”His voice is hoarse. She meets his gaze, eyes wide and shining, exhaustion and relief tangled together.
CHAPTER 100: THE WOMAN WHO IS ALMOST HERE
The first sound Frank hears is nothing. No wind. No hum of static. No distant crumbling of frozen towers. Just the emptiness of a world held in suspension,an entire city mid-breath, mid-collapse, mid-fear. He moves through it like someone walking inside a photograph. Water hangs in perfect globes around him.A cracked billboard is frozen mid-fall. The clouds are split open but refuse to drift. His footsteps echo, even though nothing here should echo. Something’s bending itself around him.He knows why. He knows who. He follows the pull, a gravitational instinct, a thread tugging at the base of his sternum, warm and steady and certain in a world gone cold and silent.The closer he gets, the more the city reacts to him. Shards of glass begin to tremble in the air.Streetlights flicker even though electricity isn’t moving.Edges of buildings groan like they’re trying to finish collapsin
CHAPTER 99: THE SELF THAT REFUSES
The duplicate’s hand descends toward Frank’s forehead, slowly, precisely, like the final stroke of an executioner’s blade. Frank can feel the world thinning behind him.His thoughts are blurring. His name slipping at the edges. The void tightens in anticipation. Then, he moves. Not fast. Not skillfully. Not with power. But with refusal.Frank grabs the duplicate’s wrist, and for the first time, his hand doesn’t pass through. The void shivers. The duplicate’s expression fractures,a microscopic crack in its perfect stillness. “Impossible.”Frank’s voice is low, shaking, but steady in its core: “You can talk about purpose. About roles. About design. But you don’t get to tell me who I am.”His grip tightens. Fire sputters along his arms, weak, flickering, but real. “I decide that.”The duplicate pulls back, twisting its wrist like its skin is made of polished glass. Frank holds on. “You said
CHAPTER 98: THE OVERWRITE
The snap is silent. No flash. No quake. No explosion. Just a sudden, absolute shift. Frank feels it first,like gravity turning inside out. The floor isn’t beneath his feet anymore. The ceiling isn’t above him. Every direction bleeds into every other, folding space into something that shouldn’t exist. He forces his stance wide anyway, chest heaving, fire sparking violently against a reality that’s losing its shape. The Reviser stands at the center of the collapse, perfectly still perfectly balanced, perfectly wrong. Its voice echoes from everywhere and nowhere: “Begin full overwrite.”Frank shouts over the distortion, “What does that mean?!”The being beside him,Elara/not-Elara,grabs his arm, her voice breaking into two tones that don’t fully sync: “It means it’s rewriting the environment. Everything. Us. Down to thought-level.”Frank curses under his breath. “Not happening.”The Reviser lifts both hands, graceful, deliberate, and the world responds like it’s a puppet on invisib
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