The silence of the steel door was harsher than the dragon's roar.
I pressed my palms against the reinforced glass, my face nearly touching the cold surface. Beyond the phosphorescent fog filling the hall, I saw him. Kaian. Standing as a barrier between the beast and the world, his white sword cutting through the darkness like a final promise.
"Kaian! Open the door!"
My voice didn't penetrate the metal—but it reached him through the Twin Pact. I felt a shiver in his chest, his pulse quickening—not fear… but decision.
"That's why I closed it, Leila."
His voice was eerily calm.
"If one of us must become the heart for this thing… let it be me."
[Red Alert:]
[Vital Synchronization: 70%… 65%]
[Distance: 9.2 meters]
[Simultaneous death triggers at 10 meters]
His body began to flicker.
Once flesh and blood.
Once fractured golden lines.
Once a featureless shadow.
The Erased Dragon no longer roared—it recalculated the world. Each flap of its geometric wing erased a portion of the floor. No debris. No trace. Only nothingness.
A chill crept into my limbs.
Not fear.
Deletion.
"No…" I whispered, then screamed internally:
"I'm a data analyst! If this world is code—I can read it!"
[Activated: Software Control]
[Admin Mode — Experimental]
[Mission: Rewrite Dragon Heart before partner deletion]
The world flipped.
Walls became arrays.
The door became a simple logical lock.
The distance between him and me… a numeric variable.
9.2 meters = a number.
And numbers can be rewritten.
I reached for the shattered control panel, but didn't touch it.
My fingers intertwined with mana threads—pulsing light wires.
"Cancel forced lock. Execute."
A faint sound.
Click.
The door slid open.
I rushed to him.
The counter hit zero.
[Vital Synchronization: 100%]
I threw myself behind him, hugging him tightly.
The dragon loomed above us.
Not a natural creature—but a massive mass of black cubes devouring light. In the center of its chest, a hollow vortex—the deletion engine.
"Why did you come back?!" Kaian whispered, shielding me with his body.
"Because you're not a battery."
I held his hand.
"We are dual code. You are the power. I am the logic."
The dragon opened its mouth.
Deletion dust began to gather.
I opened the final interface.
[Final Mission: One becomes the heart — the other kills]
No.
That's a false binary design.
If the world is built on duality—we can break it with a third option.
"Kaian, hold the sword with me."
He didn't hesitate.
His hand over mine.
His pulse merged with mine.
"But this time, don't strike its body. Strike the center of the equation."
We aimed the blade at the black vortex in the dragon's chest.
I unleashed everything I had.
Friction points.
Days of life.
Memories.
Fear.
Love.
"Convert matter into meaning. Execute."
The light exploded.
Not violet.
Not gold.
But pure white.
The light didn't tear the dragon apart.
It entered it.
I saw its inner code.
A repeating loop.
An ending rewritten every time.
Evelyn's betrayal.
Kaian's death.
Reset.
Again.
The Maker wasn't evil.
He was stuck.
I rewrote the line.
Instead of:
if deviation > threshold → reset world
I added:
allow variance = true
The dragon shuddered.
Its body disassembled.
But not into nothing.
Into particles of light that rebuilt the floor.
The walls.
The air.
We fell together to our knees.
Silence returned.
But this time… it was the silence of birth.
[Executed: Full System Update]
[World Status: Open]
[Forced narrative roles canceled]
[Host: Free Entity]
Kaian stared at me.
As if I were something fragile that could evaporate.
He extended a hand and touched my face.
"So… you weren't a serpent."
I smiled despite the exhaustion crushing my bones.
"And you're not a program."
He chuckled softly, the first laugh without shadow.
He leaned closer.
Forehead against mine.
"Will you stay?"
The question wasn't about the lab.
It was about the world.
"Even if we become just humans?"
I didn't think.
"I will stay."
He kissed me.
A kiss of promise.
No despair.
No sacrifice.
Only a beginning.
---
But the ending wasn't over.
As we exited the lab into the forest, dawn slipped through the trees. The light was natural. The air was natural. No screens. No alerts.
I thought it was over.
Then I felt something on my finger.
I looked.
A strange metal ring.
It hadn't been there before.
Its surface smooth, with a tiny holographic screen at its center blinking.
Blood froze in my veins.
A message appeared.
"Leila, if you see this—you have successfully breached."
The voice… from my world.
"We are in the main lab. The server holding your consciousness is collapsing. We have a short temporal window to extract you."
Extract me.
The word was a knife.
I lifted my head.
The sky above us began to crack.
Not clouds—
But fabric.
Fissures revealing massive wires dangling from the stars. Cables, metal platforms, human shadows moving above them.
Kaian didn't see them.
He was looking at me only.
"Leila?"
I swallowed.
If I leave…
Will this world collapse?
Or will it remain now because it's open?
The ring continued to blink.
"Countdown to withdrawal: 60 seconds."
Sixty.
Fate laughed.
Not death this time.
But choice.
My real body lying in a capsule in the cold reality.
Or this world where my heart beats with a power it never knew.
"What's happening?" Kaian asked, voice dangerously calm.
I couldn't lie.
"My world… is trying to pull me back."
The silence between us wasn't fragile.
It was heavy.
Then he said something I didn't expect:
"If a world needs you… go."
My eyes widened.
"But—"
"Love is not a chain."
He gripped my hand tightly.
"If it's real… it will find its way."
The sky cracked further.
Cables began to descend.
White light surrounded me.
[Withdrawal in 10… 9…]
Kaian pulled me toward him.
One final kiss.
No possession.
No fear.
Only trust.
"Ten meters…" he whispered.
"This time, I'll let you choose the distance."
5…
4…
I looked at the ring.
At the sky.
At the man I chose amidst a war of gods.
3…
2…
I reached out—
And I didn't press the withdrawal.
I broke the ring on the ground instead.
The light vanished.
The sky returned to sky.
The cables disappeared.
The voice from my world cut off.
Silence.
Then…
[New Alert]
[Variable Detected: Refusal to Return]
[Result: Two-Way Portal Opened]
The ground shook.
A luminous rift appeared before us.
Through it… I saw my lab in the real world.
Scientists running.
Red screens.
One screaming: "It's not responding to commands! She's breached us!"
I looked at Kaian.
He smiled slowly.
"So… now your world will learn the meaning of chaos."
I smiled.
Because I realized something dangerous.
I was no longer just a player inside a story.
Nor a prisoner inside a server.
I had become a bridge between two worlds.
And Part Two wouldn't be about survival…
It would be about invasion.
And before the portal fully formed, a hand reached from the other side—human, wearing a tech glove, wielding a weapon pulsing with familiar blue energy… the same as the Code Guardians. And a voice echoed through the crack:
"Source identified. We will reclaim the original… or erase the copy."
In that moment, I realized the coming war would not be for a throne… but for reality itself.