The ink bled as Klein's quill slashed across the empty throne, erasing it before it could ever be claimed.
For a moment, reality hesitated.
The void trembled, as if recognizing a contradiction. Something meant to be was now something that never was.
And then the screaming began.
It wasn't a sound. It wasn't something Klein could hear.
It was something he felt.
A pressure in his skull, a rupture in thought itself, a thousand voices that had never spoken, wailing in a language that had never existed.
The throne had been part of the unwritten foundation of this place.
By erasing it, Klein had severed something fundamental.
And the void was retaliating.
—
A Realm Unraveling
The ink around him convulsed, rippling like a wounded beast. The unfinished words in the space writhed, reforming, trying to mend the gap Klein had created.
But he could feel it—
This place was cracking.
The more it struggled to fix itself, the more unstable it became.
It was a paradox.
A throne that had always been there—had never been there.
A story that had been left unfinished—had been erased before it could begin.
The quill in Klein's hand pulsed with an eerie warmth, sensing the warping laws of this place.
If he stayed, he risked being dragged into the collapse.
But he had no exit.
No door.
No pathway back.
The ink surged again, this time in the form of hands.
Thousands of them.
Fingers stretching from the shadows, clawing toward him. Some were skeletal, some were elegant, some were gnarled and aged—hands that had once held the pen.
Hands of past authors.
Hands of those who had tried to write before him.
Klein's heart pounded.
They were reaching for him not to kill—
But to replace.
The moment they touched him, they would make him the next writer.
The next architect of reality.
The next prisoner of the empty throne.
Klein clenched his jaw.
No.
He had spent too long being written.
He refused to become the one forced to write.
—
The Pen Against the Page
The hands lunged.
Klein moved.
He didn't fight them—he wrote around them.
His quill slashed through the ink, twisting the structure of this place. He wove words in the air, bending the nature of the void.
"The hands miss."
They faltered, stopping just before reaching him.
"The throne never existed."
The pressure in the world doubled, as if some unseen law was trying to force itself back into place—only to find there was nothing left to fix.
The hands shuddered.
The world trembled.
And then—
The void collapsed.
—
The Fall Between Pages
Klein didn't feel himself falling.
It was different from before.
This time, he wasn't being dragged through an empty space.
This time, he was moving through something already written.
Pages.
He caught glimpses—
A city drowned in twilight.
A table with tarot cards scattered across its surface.
A woman in silver robes, her gaze locked onto something unseen.
A shattered mask, resting atop a throne of mirrors.
The visions flickered—scenes, stories, moments—but none of them held him.
He wasn't part of these words.
Not yet.
Not anymore.
And then—
One caught him.
Klein hit the ground.
For the first time in what felt like eternity, there was weight beneath his feet.
The air was thick, filled with the scent of parchment and candle wax. Shadows stretched unnaturally long, flickering with something half-real, half-imagined.
A vast chamber stretched before him.
And at its center—
A desk.
Not grand. Not ornate.
Just a simple wooden desk, ink-stained and used.
There was another quill resting atop it.
Klein's stomach twisted.
Not again.
But something was different.
This wasn't the throne.
This wasn't the space of the unwritten.
This was a place where stories had already been written.
A library.
A record.
And as Klein turned, he saw—
Shelves.
Towering, endless shelves, each filled with books that had never been opened.
Or rather—
Books that should never be read.
The Archive of the Unwritten.
Again.
He was back.
But something was wrong.
Because the books—
They were open.
—
The Ink That Never Dries
The air shifted.
Klein turned sharply—
And there, standing before the desk, flipping through one of the forbidden books, was a familiar presence.
Not Yeaia.
Not the one who had tried to rewrite everything.
But someone else.
Someone who had been waiting.
Their voice was soft, almost amused.
"Do you know what happens when you read something that was never meant to be written?"
They looked up.
And Klein's breath caught.
Because their eyes were—
His own.
---
End of Chapter 72.
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