When Kai finally emerged from the hidden room — hours later, though it felt like days — the school was empty.
Lights flickered. Hallways stretched too long.
He walked in a daze, barely registering the sound of his own footsteps.
But halfway down the second floor, he froze.
The convex security mirror at the end of the hallway had blinked.
Not reflected light. Not a trick of his mind.
It blinked. Like an eyelid of glass.
And in that instant, he knew.
He was being watched.
Over the next few days, it escalated.
He would glance at a window and see someone standing behind him — but when he turned, no one was there.
Reflections lingered too long.Shadows moved even when the lights didn't.People spoke in strange rhythms — too perfect, too rehearsed.
In class, his textbooks changed when he wasn't looking. Pages rearranged themselves. Words rewritten.
He opened one and found a new chapter title:
"You Are the Story."
When he looked again, it was gone.
On Wednesday, a new student arrived.
Or maybe she'd always been there.
Her name was Yui, and she wore a silver locket in the shape of a mirror.
She sat in the back and never spoke unless called on.
When she passed Kai in the hallway, she whispered:
"You're already inside it, you know."
He turned — but she was gone.
Not just vanished — replaced. A different student was walking there now, with a different face and backpack, humming the same tune Yui had just been whispering.
Kai began compiling a list of people who didn't make sense. People who only existed for a day, a week. Students no one else seemed to remember. Teachers who taught classes without subjects.
One in particular stood out.
Mr. Suda.
He had no desk in the faculty room.He never wrote on the board.And yet he always watched Kai.
Always.
One day, Kai followed him after class — through the courtyard, past the science lab, into the boiler room.
Only…
The boiler room didn't exist anymore. It had been destroyed in a fire years ago.
Kai blinked, and the door was gone.
Friday morning, there was a folded note on Kai's desk.
Not in his handwriting.
It read:
"You're being shaped, Kai.
Every fear you resist makes you more like them.
You're not just being watched.
You're being written."
He flipped it over.
On the back: a simple drawing of an eye — black ink, bleeding at the edges.
It was open.
Until he blinked.
Then it was closed.
On his way home, Kai noticed it: a small, black lens affixed to the streetlight outside his apartment.
Not like the city's usual cameras. This one was older. Rusted, silent.
He stared at it.
And it moved — tilted down, ever so slightly.
When he got home, his laptop camera light blinked.
Once.
Even though the laptop was off.