There was no horizon.
The world stretched into nothing, a loop of half-formed buildings and broken plots stitched together like a patchwork of abandoned genres. Sometimes the city felt medieval. Then it flickered — towers turned into skyscrapers, and the cobbled streets became digital grids.
He and Page ran through this shifting dreamscape, breathless and silent. The air grew thicker the farther they went. Not with fog, not with heat — but with words. Tangible. Hanging in the air like cobwebs, invisible until they brushed against your skin.
They passed them anyway.
"Chapter 7: Betrayal."
"Chapter 12: The Forgotten Twin."
"Chapter 3: Death of a Hero."
He tried not to look too closely.
The words weren't from his story.
But they still tried to attach to him.
"Where are we going?" he asked.
Page didn't answer right away. Her face was tense. Alert.
Finally, she said, "Away from visibility. They're already looking."
"Who's they?"
"The Story Hunters," she said. "They enforce narrative law. Kill off contradictions. Clean up broken tales."
"You mean like Xu?"
"No," she said, glancing behind them. "Xu was a Protagonist. An idiot who thought this was a cultivation trial. The Story Hunters are… worse."
"They're written to end stories."
They turned into a narrow alley that bent sharply to the left — and then again upward, like a staircase made of book spines. As they climbed, Page touched her finger to the stone, and her touch smeared the wall into blotted ink, closing the path behind them.
"Cloaked for a few minutes," she whispered. "Not enough to hide. Just enough to breathe."
The unnamed man sat against the wall, chest rising and falling in sharp, shallow gasps. Sweat slicked his brow.
"I killed him," he muttered. "Xu. I ended a Protagonist with one sentence."
"You rewrote him," Page corrected. "And you didn't kill him. The Quill did."
He looked at it.
Still in his hand.
Still warm.
Still alive.
It wasn't just a tool. It was a character in this story. A silent, invisible narrator in his palm — one that only listened when it wanted to.
Page sat across from him.
"You're still bleeding memory," she said softly.
He looked up.
"What do you mean?"
She nodded at him. "Name three things you felt before you woke up."
He opened his mouth.
Closed it.
Nothing.
She reached into her coat and pulled out a small glass shard. Held it up to his face.
No reflection.
He wasn't just missing memories — he was missing definition. He wasn't a character anymore.
He was a loose idea.
"You're unstable," Page said. "And dangerous. Not just to them — to everything. Even yourself."
He looked away.
"Then maybe I shouldn't exist."
"No," she said, with sudden force. "You're the only one who can change this."
He blinked. "Change what?"
Page stood, stepped to the edge of the roof, and gestured toward the horizon. "This world used to be full of infinite stories. Full of wild genres, rebellious characters, endings no one could predict."
"What happened?"
"They started writing rules," she said bitterly. "Readers wanted tropes. Predictability. Comfort."
She turned back to him.
"They killed originality. Strangled it with formulas. Built entire factions to enforce narrative order. Genre Lords. Plot Council. Story Hunters. And the worst of them…"
She pointed upward.
"The Narrator."
The name made his chest tighten.
"You said he decides how stories end."
"He does more than that," she said. "He rewrites timelines. Imprisons characters in their own tropes. Strips free-thinkers of their arcs."
"Then why hasn't he erased me yet?"
Page's voice dropped.
"Because you're not written. You're a forgotten draft. Something too early or too late. Something he missed."
He looked down at his hands. "I feel like… I'm missing something. Like a hole in my head that goes deeper than memory."
"You are," she said. "And when you find what it is — the story will try to kill you."
Suddenly, the sky darkened.
Not like night.
Like a curtain being pulled over stage lights.
Page stiffened.
"No… not yet."
A massive bell sounded in the air. One, deep, echoing chime that rattled the buildings and made the air ripple with distorted narration.
He stood, panicked. "What is that?"
She turned slowly toward the sound.
Her face had gone pale.
"They found us."
From the sky descended three cloaked figures — black robes, no faces, only quill-masks that curved into hooked beaks. Ink trailed behind them like smoke. Each held a scroll in one hand and a giant pen-blade in the other.
"Violation Detected."
"Subject 0001: Unwritten Entity."
"Sentence: Erasure."
The Story Hunters.
"Run?" he asked.
Page shook her head.
"They'll follow. Rewrite the path behind us."
"Fight?"
"They're protected by Genre Law. We can't kill them."
He looked at the pen.
It pulsed.
"I rewrote Xu."
She nodded. "And you lost something doing it. If you want to rewrite again, you better decide what you're willing to sacrifice."
The Story Hunters raised their blades.
One of them read from its scroll:
"Character has no backstory. No identity. No arc."
"Anomaly confirmed."
He stepped forward.
"I may not have an arc," he said, voice steady, "but I have a pen."
The blade-wielders moved.
He raised the Quill.
And this time, he didn't hesitate.
"Story Hunters may not execute characters lacking definition."
The air cracked.
Time folded.
The Story Hunters stopped — mid-step, mid-sentence, mid-blade.
Their bodies flickered.
And for a moment…
They looked confused.
They looked… human.
One of them removed its mask. Underneath: a boy. No older than him. Eyes wide with terror.
"I… I used to be…" he gasped, before his body crumpled into dust and ink.
The other two collapsed moments later — not killed, but unwritten.
The rewrite took effect.
And once again… the man fell to his knees.
Gasping.
Something inside him was gone.
This time, it wasn't a memory.
It was an emotion.
Hope.
He couldn't remember what hope felt like anymore.
Page knelt beside him.
"You keep winning. But every victory empties you."
He looked up.
"Then how do I win without losing myself?"
She looked at the horizon. Toward a dark tower rising in the far distance, tall enough to pierce the torn sky.
"We have to reach the Core Archive. The center of the plot web. The only place where you can rewrite your own story."
"And if I don't?"
"The Narrator will erase you. And this time… it'll be permanent."
He nodded.
Then rose.
The pen pulsed again in his hand.
Alive.
Waiting.