The light swallowed him whole. A soundless roar echoed through his skull as the floor vanished and the fractured basement gave way to the impossible.
He fell.
But before the descent could take him, before gravity could finish its claim—
Something shifted.
The moment before the fall completed, reality bent.
A loud snap—like a vinyl record tearing off its groove.
And then he was somewhere else.
Jin hit solid ground hard, the impact jarring his teeth. Asphalt. His side throbbed, his breath knocked clean out. The sky above loomed heavy and pale, clouds like dead things suspended in glass.
He pushed himself up, groaning. His mind spun, disoriented. The street was familiar.
His street.
But… wrong.
No wind. No noise. No people. The trees were still. Leaves frozen mid-sway like they'd been paused in a frame.
Even the puddles on the sidewalk—perfect mirrors, unmoving.
He turned in a slow circle.
Something about this place reeked of stillness, of simulation running in idle.
And then, he heard it.
Tap.
Tap.
Shoes. Hard leather against frozen asphalt.
From the corner of the street, a figure emerged.
Tall. Human-shaped. Dressed in a sharp black tuxedo, pristine despite the unreal atmosphere.
But the face—
A mask. White. Smooth.
No eyes. No mouth.
Just a single black question mark painted across its surface.
Jin's pulse kicked. His body recognized the threat before his mind did.
"Overseer," he whispered. But this one… it was different.
It walked like a person. It moved with weight.
Not like the faceless ghosts he'd seen in flashes. This one was real. Heavy. Present.
"SUBJECT #003," the Overseer intoned, its voice somehow both distant and inside his skull. "YOU HAVE BREACHED RC-1 CONTAINMENT. DELETION IS REQUIRED."
Jin backed away instinctively, but the Overseer didn't rush. It simply… tilted its head.
Then the street glitched.
The houses behind Jin jumped back three seconds. The cracked sidewalk reversed its break. His own last footstep undid itself.
And then he was standing where he had been five seconds ago.
"What the—?"
The Overseer took a step forward.
Again—rewind.
He was shoved back again. A five-second rewind.
His breath caught. "It's looping me… but just a few seconds."
The Overseer watched. Studied. It was testing him.
Tap. Tap. Closer.
Jin bolted. He didn't wait to learn the range of that thing's ability.
The street was long, looping. He sprinted past familiar mailboxes and frozen cars.
He had no destination. No plan. Just a gut instinct that screamed: run.
But then—he saw it.
The end of the street. The empty lot.
Where Ark's house used to be.
His heart hammered.
That's it.
He didn't know why, but he knew that place mattered. Even if the house was gone.
He charged toward it, legs burning. The Overseer's footsteps echoed behind him.
Then—
Snap.
He was yanked back.
Back five seconds. The rewind.
But this time—he was ready.
He didn't stop. He shifted his angle, curved left, anticipating the rewind. Using it to slingshot forward.
A memory surfaced.
Chapter 2. The USB drive.
The program Ark left.
Glitch.exe.
Jin didn't install it.
But he ran it.
He activated it.
It was still running.
A variable still open in his mind—written across the memory plane.
Not a weapon. Not a tool.
A corruption.
Jin gritted his teeth. "You're not the only one messing with the rules."
Another rewind.
But this time—Jin remembered. The exact moment. The exact vector. His feet adjusted before the rewind even finished.
He doubled his speed the second he returned.
The Overseer tilted its head again.
"GLITCH.EXE ACTIVE. TEMPORAL TRACE RESISTANCE DETECTED."
Jin grinned. "Yeah, I'm glitching too, asshole."
The empty lot drew closer. Static rippled across its surface. The absence of Ark's house was louder than anything else. It called to him.
Another rewind.
But Jin was faster.
The Overseer stepped forward—
And a glitch pulse erupted from Jin's chest.
His vision fractured for a split-second—dozens of angles of himself overlapping.
The Overseer paused.
"UNSTABLE VARIABLE. NULL NODE INTERFERENCE DETECTED."
Jin staggered to the edge of the lot.
He didn't know what he'd triggered. The glitch, the memory fragment, the location—maybe all of it.
But the Overseer hesitated.
That was all he needed.
He stepped into the lot.
And the world twitched.
The static in the air thickened. The clouds above flickered. The frozen puddles on the sidewalk rippled for the first time.
The Overseer reached for him.
But just as its fingers stretched out—
The ground beneath Jin collapsed.
Not into a hole.
Into code.
Black-and-green grids pulsed under his feet, scrolling with unreadable language.
He fell again.
This time—willingly.
But the Overseer followed.
Its mask peered down over the edge, unblinking.
"DELTA CLASS INITIATING PURSUIT."
Jin twisted mid-air.
Wind roared around him, but there was no wind. Only data. Only crashing memory.
And then—he saw something below.
Another prompt.
Floating. Waiting.
NULL_GATE_002
Would it be safe?
No.
Would it change everything?
Probably.
He reached for it.
Above, the Overseer dropped too.
The question mark mask tilted in midair.
Time bent.
The world stuttered—
And then: