Continuing form where we left.
There was no sound.
No air.
No ground.
Only a slow pulse of silver light that expanded and folded in on itself, breathing like a creature dreaming in its sleep.
Seo Jin hung suspended in that endless expanse, his body weightless, his heartbeat the only sound that still felt human. Around him, rivers of color drifted in fractal curves—blue for logic, red for memory, white for emotion. The streams met and separated, twisting together like veins inside an invisible body.
> [Warning: System merge exceeding safe threshold.]
The voice wasn't the fox's.
It wasn't Mira's.
It was his own, fragmented, echoing through the light.
He opened his mouth. "Where… am I?"
> [Within the Core. You sought synchronization. You found reflection.]
The light rippled at the word reflection. The brilliance condensed, forming hundreds of tiny motes that swirled into faces—his faces.
Smiling. Crying. Bleeding. Empty.
