The world had quieted too suddenly.
Thirty minutes gone. The scenario's clock had hit zero. No blinding light. No sudden disappearance. No announcement from the system. Just... silence.
Hyun-woo and Ji-ah stood in a narrow alley between two shattered convenience stores, their breath visible in the cold air. Distant screams had dwindled into nothing, leaving an almost sacred stillness behind.
"...So what now?" Ji-ah muttered, glancing around, her knuckles white around her sword's hilt.
Hyun-woo didn't answer right away. His eyes were locked on the floating text still hovering in his vision.
[Time Remaining: 00:00]
[First Scenario: Concluded]
Results will now be recorded. Your path begins.
Then something different happened.
A new message unfurled beneath the scenario window. Not like the system's usual blocky prompts. This one looked handwritten—its digital text curling like it had been scrawled in ink across parchment.
📖 "You've always known more than the others."
"You've read these pages before."
"Now, the story remembers you too."
[EXCLUSIVE SKILL AWAKENED: Narrative Sense – The Reader's Script]
Hyun-woo's heart dropped. The world blurred around the edges as his vision zoomed inward, like someone was pulling him into the page of a book. Lines of text spiraled in the air, framing the people and places around him like footnotes in a novel.
And then—
It clicked.
He looked at Ji-ah.
For a brief moment, her outline shimmered—like the world had sketched her in pencil before filling her in with pain.
📘 "She wore her fury like armor, but inside her was a girl who never stopped bleeding." – Page Glimpse: Han Ji-ah
Hyun-woo staggered, overwhelmed. It wasn't just seeing a profile. This was... feeling the story of others, in pieces—fragments of lives he hadn't earned the right to know.
"You okay?" Ji-ah's voice snapped him back.
"I—yeah," he lied, eyes wide.
But inside, a new voice—colder, detached, and ink-stained—was whispering.
The scenario is only the beginning. The narrative bends now... because the Reader has been written in.
[You have unlocked Page Glimpse – Lv. 1]
[You may now glimpse the story of the world around you, one line at a time.]
Hyun-woo turned away quickly, clutching his rusted dagger tighter. He knew what this meant. He had just become more than a survivor.
He had become a part of the story's core mechanics.
The narrative had acknowledged him.
And now... the world would too.
Ji-ah stalked ahead, her boots crunching over broken glass and asphalt. She hadn't pressed for answers—Hyun-woo was grateful for that. Whatever expression he'd worn after unlocking the skill must've warned her off.
But inside him, the world was anything but quiet.
Page Glimpse – Lv. 1 activated.
Nearby individuals may reveal fragments of their narrative. Glimpses are subject to emotional resonance, proximity, and narrative impact.
It wasn't a skill like swinging a sword or firing a gun.
It was knowing.
A curse and a privilege all in one.
"Hyun-woo," Ji-ah called back without turning. "Don't fall behind."
"I'm not," he muttered, even as his feet stumbled a bit.
He wasn't just walking forward now—he was reading the world, one sentence at a time.
As they turned a corner, passing an abandoned bus shelter, Hyun-woo's vision flickered. A man slumped against the wall, unmoving. His body was bloodied. Probably already dead.
But the system didn't mark him as an entity or objective. No highlight. No hostility.
Then the world shifted again.
📘 "He died thinking of his daughter's last drawing, tucked into his coat pocket." – Page Glimpse: [Deceased Civilian]
Hyun-woo choked on a breath, hand shooting to his mouth. Ji-ah noticed the sound and turned—saw the look on his face, but didn't say anything. Maybe she thought he was just shaken. Maybe that was easier to believe.
They kept walking.
More fragments came, fast and fractured.
A broken phone ringing in an empty apartment.
📘 "He tried to call her one last time before the network failed."
A child's shoe, lying in the middle of the road.
📘 "She was running, but the sirens were louder than her mother's voice."
The story of the world wasn't told in words—it bled through the streets, soaked into the pavement.
Hyun-woo could feel it now.
And he was the only one who could.
Eventually, Ji-ah stopped near a burned-out café. She didn't look at him.
"What the hell happened back there?" she asked, voice low.
Hyun-woo hesitated. Do I tell her?
No. Not yet. The truth would sound like madness.
"I just... felt something," he said vaguely. "Like the world shifted."
"That makes two of us," Ji-ah muttered, leaning on her sword. "You're acting strange though. Weirder than usual."
"Guess I'm just a weird guy," he replied.
She glanced at him, then looked away again. "Tch. Fucking idiot."
But there was no real bite in her voice this time. If anything, it almost sounded like concern.
As night began to fall, the sky shimmered again—another glitch in the clouds, a reminder that the world was still under someone's thumb. The system hadn't announced the next scenario yet, but it was coming.
Hyun-woo sat with his back against a car, eyes fixed on the darkness. His thoughts were louder now, echoing in his mind.
The narrative has begun.
The Reader has been written in.
And with that came one final message:
📖 Narrative Sense – The Reader's Script (Lv. 1)
Passive: Perceive emotional and narrative fragments from nearby individuals.
Active (Locked): ???
Next Upgrade: Complete a scenario without using direct combat.
He read it three times.
No direct combat?
The system wasn't just measuring survival—it was testing his role in the story.
Not just a fighter. Not a hero.
A witness.
A reader.
And readers, he knew better than anyone, saw everything... even the endings