In the center of the Seoul Memorial Park, the rain falls in a steady, rhythmic needle-press.
Two protagonists stand before fresh graves, their bodies a map of white bandages and dried blood.
Kim Suho and Yoo Joonghyuk do not speak; their eyes are hollow, reflecting a void that no coins or stories can fill.
Yoo Joonghyuk stares at the name etched into the stone before him.
It is a name that feels like a glitch in the Star Stream, a reality he refuses to accept.
He grips the hand of Shin Yoosung.
The girl's eyes are dry and bloodshot, her small frame trembling as she stares at the earth.
Han Sooyoung stands beside them, her leather coat slick with rain.
Without a word, she places an open box on the mound.
Inside, hundreds of ants begin to scatter into the grass—a final tribute to the King of the Insects.
"A kind boy. Friend. Comrade who only ever wanted to walk beside one man. The insects are still waiting for your command, Gilyoung-ah. Please... find your Hyungs in the next story."
This is Lee Gilyoung's grave.
A few yards away, Kim Suho stands paralyzed before a grave that holds the shattered remains of his future.
"Leader of the Creator's Sacred Grace. Beloved Fiancee. Mother of a miracle we never got to meet. You chose the world over our home, and now the world is whole, but my arms are empty. Sleep well with our little one, Seung-Ah."
The name carved there is Yun Seung-Ah.
Just one week ago, in the quiet before the Apocalypse, he had proposed to her.
He had begged her to stay behind, to let the other heroes handle the front lines. But as the leader of the Creator's Sacred Grace, she had looked him in the eye and spoken of duty.
The cruelty of the world had saved its sharpest blade for the morgue: the medical reports confirmed she was pregnant.
"Seung-Ah... why?"
Suho's mana begins to go on a rampage, golden sparks of cutting energy shredding the rain around him.
He is a second away from a total mental collapse until a hand clad in a black suit sleeve grips his shoulder.
Kim Hajin stands there, his expression unreadable behind his dark suit.
Using his own resonance, he suppresses the jagged mana flowing from Suho.
Clarity flickers back into Suho's eyes; he turns, collapses into Hajin's arms, and finally lets out a sob that drowns out the storm.
"..."
Hajin looks past Suho toward Yoo Yeonha.
"The Shield that never cracked. Master-rank Hero. Father. You gave us the future at the cost of your own, leaving a debt of silence that no wealth can ever pay. Rest now, Father; the Guild—and your daughter—will hold the line."
The iron-willed Guildmaster is bent double over the grave of her father, Yoo Jinwoong.
The Master-rank hero had fallen defending the final evacuation corridor in Japan, leaving his daughter with a debt of grief that no Won-signs could ever balance.
The service begins as the Pope of the Evernight Goddess steps forward.
He raises a scepter of dark wood, and a wave of tranquility—the divine essence of Concealment—washes over the mourners.
It doesn't take away the pain, but it wraps it in a soft, heavy velvet, allowing their minds a momentary respite from the horror.
In this half-dreaming state, Yoo Joonghyuk sees a flash of an island filled with the scent of vanilla.
On the shore, Lee Gilyoung is standing, looking back at the sea with a bright, innocent smile.
He isn't a king or a soldier; he is just a boy.
"Say hi to Dokja-hyung!"
A single tear tracks through the grime on Joonghyuk's cheek.
His lips move, dropping a sentence that feels like the death of a story.
"Dokja... Gilyoung he... I'm sorry..."
***
In England, the air around Buckingham Palace is heavy with the scent of millions of white roses. The sea of flowers blankets the gates, stretching down the Mall in a silent, colorful testament to a nation's grief.
It was only now, as the cosmic dust settled, that the Royal Family revealed the truth: Princess Rachel had died.
Evandel stands near the palace steps, her small hand tightly gripping the hand of her teacher, Ah Hae-In.
Beside them stands Cattleya, the colleague and best friend Rachel had made during their desperate climb to the 8th Floor. Cattleya's eyes are fixed on the closed casket, her usual pirate-like bravado replaced by a hollow, mourning silence.
One after another, the members of the English Royal Court guild enter the courtyard to pay their respects.
Standing in the distance are Shin Jonghak and Jung Heewon.
Both are bandaged and weary, their faces etched with a guilt that traces back to the Fourth Epoch in Trier, where the seeds of this tragedy were first sown.
They watch from afar, two soldiers who survived while their princess did not.
Across the ocean, in Backlund D.C. (South America), a massive memorial square has been established. Thousands of names are carved into granite stones that catch the gray, afternoon light.
Deep within the city, inside the Main Church of the Evernight Goddess, the darkness is not terrifying, but comforting.
Fors Wall stands in the center of a silent crowd, her shoulders shaking. Chae Nayun stands beside her, arms wrapped tightly around in a protective embrace. Having lost her own brother, Nayun knows the weight of this silence better than anyone.
"Miss Judgment. The Arbiter of the Tarot Club. You spent your life judging the darkness so others could live in the light. Your book is still open on the table, Xio. We are just waiting for you to come home and finish the final chapter."
"Xio... you haven't even finished reading my new book," Fors whispers, her voice breaking against the stone walls. "You were supposed to tell me if the ending was too dramatic".
Little Sun placed a single Tarot card near the flowers.
That was Judgment card.
He prayed to the Fool, wishing her soft clouds up there.
In a nearby row, Audrey Hall stands with Alger Wilson.
Instead of her usual posh, vibrant attire, she wears a classical black dress that hangs loosely over the space where her right arm used to be.
In front of her are four separate graves: Earl Hall, Caitlyn Hall, Hibbert Hall, and Alfred Hall.
Her entire lineage has been extinguished.
Her shoulders tremble with the force of her grief, yet she refuses to use Placating on herself.
She chooses to live through every agonizing second of this reality.
To mourn.
To remember them.
Inside the cathedral, Leonard Mitchell stands by a high, stained-glass window, looking out at the mourners in the square.
He looks at The Moon Tarot card in his hand.
The service at the Church of Earth Mother will begin shortly.
He clasps his hands.
"The Fool that doesn't belong to this era;
The Mysterious Ruler above the Gray Fog;
The King of Yellow and Black who wields good luck"
He feels a presence behind him.
He turns to see the familiar face of Klein Moretti.
Leonard cannot believe his own eyes.
He lunges forward and pulls his old friend into a desperate hug.
High above the city, standing on the edge of a skyscraper overlooking the memorial, is the true Lord of Mysteries. The Fool stands in his dark trench coat, the stars within his abyss flickering in time with the city's lights.
Beside him stands Roselle Gustav, wearing two crowns upon his head and clutching the Trunsoest Brass Book.
Inside the Fool's mind, faces flash by in a strobe-light of memory: Daly Simone, Dunn Smith, and a hundred others who paved the way for him to get this far.
He sighs, a sound that carries the weight of eons.
He repeats the phrase his Captain once told him in Tingen:
"We are guardians, but also a bunch of miserable wretches that are constantly fighting against threats and madness".
***
Kim Hajin carried the unconscious Kim Suho through the thinning crowd and handed him over to Park Soohyuk, the head manager of the SH Agency.
"Take care of him," Hajin said, his voice low.
Hajin let out a long, weary sigh.
He didn't like this atmosphere—the cloying scent of lilies and the sharp, jagged edges of collective grief.
He moved toward Yoo Yeonha, who was sobbing into her mother's shoulder. Her uncle stood nearby, a silent sentinel of the Yoo family's loss.
"Yeonha," her mother whispered, "your friend is here".
Yeonha looked up, her face tear-stained and red.
Hajin was holding a simple plastic bag.
Inside was Korean street food—spicy ddeokbokki and fried snacks—that he had prepared specifically for her.
"W-What? I don't need this..." Yeonha stammered, her voice cracking.
"Don't forget to eat," Hajin replied simply. Yeonha looked at the bag, then at him, and gave a small, jerky nod.
As Hajin walked away, he spotted a figure leaning against a lone ginkgo tree at the edge of the memorial park. It was Jang Hayoung. His eyes were wet, and he looked entirely out of place in the formal setting.
"Why weren't you in the official part?" Hajin asked as he approached.
Jang Hayoung looked at him with confusion.
"Who are you?"
"I'm Dokja's companion," Hajin answered.
Jang Hayoung tensed as a shadow fell over them.
Yoo Joonghyuk passed by without a word, his black coat fluttering in the wind, his presence a cold reminder of the war that wasn't yet over.
He didn't even look at Hajin.
Once the regressor was gone, Hayoung let out a shaky sigh.
"I need your powers to contact Dokja," Hajin said, getting straight to the point.
"I've already tried," Jang Hayoung retorted, his frustration bubbling over.
"Have you tried Impossible Longing?" Hajin asked, referring to the skill that allowed Hayoung to form temporary sponsor contracts.
"I can't use it," Hayoung muttered, looking away. "It's on cooldown".
Hajin clicked his tongue in disappointment and vanished in a flicker of Spartan's wings.
Hajin reappeared in a fold of the Spirit World, standing before the towering presence of Klein-Amon.
The Lord of Mysteries stood perfectly still, his dark trench coat absorbing the dim light of the spectral realm.
"How is your state?" Hajin asked.
"I have finished stabilizing," Klein-Amon replied, his voice a perfect, haunting blend of two identities. "Call me Amon or Klein; at this stage, it no longer matters".
The illusory monocle glinted on the blank mask as he looked toward the horizon of the Star Stream.
"Is everything ready?"
Hajin nodded, his face hardening as he prepared for the final gamble.
"We shall begin".
Klein's hand cut through Spirit World, leaving Roselle Gustav behind.
They appeared in the broadcasting room within the Essence of the Strait.
Kim Hajin sat before the main console, he looked at his smartwatch as he activated [Setting Intervention].
He targeted the camera.
He added two sentences.
[Planetary Broadcast Frequency]
[Overwriting 'Star Will' translation protocols...]
Across the globe—from the ruins of Seoul to the bunkers in Backlund—every screen, every smartwatch, and every subconscious 'System' window flickered to life.
Hajin leaned toward the microphone.
His voice was steady.
"To the protectors of Earth," Hajin began, his voice echoing in every language simultaneously. "To those who stood in the rifts of the Canada range, the streets of Seoul, and the cathedrals of Britain. You were told you were extras in a story written by stars. You were told your lives were just 'probability' for a larger scenario".
He paused, his eyes thinking of the fresh graves of Yun Seung-Ah, Lee Gilyoung, and Rachel.
"But today, the story changed. You aren't 'extras' anymore. You are the heroes who fought not because you were destined to win, but because you refused to let the world end. For every father lost, for every child who won't wake up—we remember. And we will make it mean something".
In the shelters, people began to weep, the "tranquility" of the Evernight Goddess finally giving way to a shared, defiant pride.
Klein-Amon took the seat beside him. The dark trench coat seemed to swallow the studio's artificial light, and the gold-rimmed monocle glinted with a cold, divine predatory light.
"The final challenge is at the threshold," Klein-Amon spoke, his voice layered with a thousand echoes. "The Outer Deities and the Nebulas have looked upon this world as a banquet. They have traded our history like coins".
He looked directly into the camera lens, and for a moment, every Constellation watching the Star Stream felt a chill of absolute Error.
"Consider this our formal announcement," Klein-Amon continued. "To the Nebulas who hid behind scenarios, and to the Great Old Ones who sought our decay: you are no longer the authors. We are the guardians of this reality, and every transgression against it will be met with weight. We do not negotiate with the stars. We will extinguish them".
Hajin stood up, a blue system window manifesting before him.
[You have accessed the 'Nebula Creation' protocol!]
[Cost: 100,000 Coins]
Hajin didn't hesitate; he paid the price, and the air in the room vibrated with the birth of a new narrative force.
"We need support," Hajin whispered to the Star Will.
The response was instantaneous. A flood of messages began to scroll across the global feed:
[The
[Constellations 'Most Ancient Liberator' and 'Mandala's Guardian' offer their names!]
[The
[True Gods of Planetary System 8612 recognize your status!]
['Star Will' is stunned by the collective weight of your supporters!]
[Numerous Constellations of the Final Scenario are paying attention to you!]
A final notification chimed—a soft, singular sound.
[■■ 'The Last Witness of the Unwritten End' has donated 1 Coin!]
Hajin looked at the single coin.
[Congratulations!]
[You have successfully created a brand new Nebulae!]
['Star Will' is waiting for the name of the Nebula.]
Hajin looked at Klein-Amon, who nodded slowly, the abyss within his coat swirling in agreement. Hajin turned back to the screen and spoke the name that bridged their three worlds.
"Viewpoint of Mysterious Extra".