"He was never meant to be read. That's why he set himself on fire."
Scene: Office – 1:13 AM
Rain hammered the windows. Ishigami placed a single black-and-gold tome on the table.
The First Book. The original manuscript written during the Great Binding War.
But it was damaged—pages scorched, title missing.
"This is what Pageburner tried to destroy," Ishigami said. "But something survived."
Airi narrowed her eyes.
"You think his true name is inside?"
"I know it is," Hiragi muttered.
The Hidden Name
Under ultraviolet light, one name flickered on the burnt first page:
Yurei Orpheon.
A rogue archivist from 200 years ago. Once the guardian of forbidden texts… until he burned the entire section under Tokyo.
The reason? He believed reality was infected by story.
He wanted to erase it all.
"Pageburner... was a man," Hiragi said quietly. "And he tried to unwrite the world."
The Diary Entry – Surviving Text
From the ashes of the First Book, Ishigami had salvaged one diary entry:
"They say stories save us. But mine won't. Mine bleeds. And if no one reads it, maybe the bleeding stops."
"There's a boy who survived the Verse. I failed to erase him. I'll write again. I'll burn again. Until the story ends."
–Yurei O.
Hiragi clenched his fists.
"He remembers me."
Intermission: Suguru's Interruption
Suguru burst in, soaked from the rain.
"Bro you won't believe this—the Dream Scribe vanished."
Airi's eyes widened.
"Vanished? How?"
"All that's left is a pen. Floating. Still writing."
The Final Message – Written in Fire
They rushed back to Tsukimura. Sure enough, the girl was gone.
One sentence hovered in the air, written in flaming ink:
"Pageburner has her now. And she's dreaming louder."
The ground shook. Not physically—but in a narrative way. Like the plot itself was cracking.
Hiragi looked at the pen.
It turned midair and wrote:
"Chapter 0 begins again."
Foreshadowing
Ishigami whispered:
"He's not just rewriting the future. He's rewriting the past."
Hiragi narrowed his gaze. "Then we'll burn him out of history."
To Be Continued…