The Author's POV

Splash—! Splash—!

Splashing water onto my face I stared at my haggard figure in the mirror. Glaring dark circles bagged beneath my eyes as my mind felt numb.

Glink—!

Turning off the tap, I turned around.

My eyes paused on a certain book in the middle of the table.

My heart remained calm as I stared at the book...or rather, my head was too numb to process what was happening around me. Nothing excited nor stimulated my emotions.

Closing my eyes, I sat down on my bed and leaned forward.

"...Just what happened?"

Ever since waking up, I've been trying to make heads or tails of what had just occurred to me.

My head really hurt.

'For starters, the world I was in not too long ago was definitely not my own world...or did that world even exist in the first place?'

From the fact that I had no recollection of my parent's faces, my own name, and the fact that the prestigious university I wanted to go to was called 'Unversity A,' a name which itself seemed far too generic to make sense.

Putting everything together everything that I previously thought that I knew no longer started to make sense inside of my head.

"Aghhh."

'My head hurts.'

Grasping my head with my hands I ruffled my hair into a mess.

Everything was a mess. A mess I couldn't quite figure the answer to.

"There's also him..."

The previous Ren.

Just thinking about him spread uneasiness throughout my whole body.

There was definitely something odd about that guy. How did he know about the fact that the world was a novel? I never gave him the password of my laptop so it shouldn't have been possible for him to figure out that the world I was in was that of a novel I wrote.

Furthermore, how did he know to ask the right questions?

Like what my name was, whether I recalled my parent's faces and the name of the university I wanted to go to.

The order of the questions didn't really make sense...it was as though he already knew about my answers beforehand.

"Haaa..."

I suddenly stood up.

My head throbbed even more fiercely.

Pacing around the room, I started to think back to my first interaction with the previous Ren in search of an answer.

This wasn't hard, I had only interacted with him once throughout my whole life so I could still vividly remember what had happened.

It was the time he was showing me his past experiences with Matthew and what was going on with his parents...my parents.

I remember that time clearly.

I could see just how sad he was.

Was that a facade or was that really him? At this point, I no longer knew.

"Ugh."

I groaned.

Massaging my head, I thought even further.

'Ever since meeting him, did something strange ever happen to me?'

My brows knit tightly.

Placing my hand on my chin, I fell into deep thought.

"Something strange happening after meeting him..."

My brows which were knit together suddenly jumped up in shock.

"Wait...hold on..."

the incidents that had occurred right after meeting the previous Ren, a thought suddenly occurred to

My head snapped upwards.

'There was one...'

fidgeted

process...it definitely changed after meeting

never occurred to me before, but, didn't my personality change moments after meeting

look back at myself, right after meeting the previous Ren, I started to get this weird idea that everything around

did that

at my previous behavior, the moment prior to meeting the previous Ren, everything I did was

had such thoughts about treating everyone as a chess piece and having everything under my

change...but now that I was looking back at them, from this new perspective, it really did seem as though something

was as though someone was forcing traits and different ideologies inside

and crazy theory suddenly

My breathing evened out.

"....It can't be, right?"

that. I shook my head repeatedly. It couldn't be. Yeah,

My toes curled inwardly.

TRIIIING—! TRIIIING—!

snapping me out of my thoughts. Lowering my

tomorrow, are you ready? Should I come to

"Haaa...haaa...."

suppressed all the anxiety inside of me. Taking my communication

[Yeah, that would do.]

the message, I shut off the communication

"huuuu..."

a deep breath, I took my jacket and put on my face mask. Then, I

air to

thoughts were eating away at

Ci Clank—!

door behind me, I

***

Ding—!

head as he slowly opened his eyes. The first thing

[Synchronization complete]

Synchronisation : 34%

"Haaa..."

deeply. Covering his forehead with his hand,

world did I just

he saw

he saw in the vision, and it was because he remembered that at the moment he couldn't quite grasp what was

was

me

that he was desperately searching for Emma, and that the name of the black figure was 'Kevin', he didn't believe for one second that the

was not something

have been a vision of

his head back, Kevin stared at the white ceiling of

the vision made his

the future, what else could

more certain he was about his analysis. Whatever he

"...Fuck."

Kevin's fists clenched tightly.

thought of Emma dying on him hurt his very

"Haaa..haaa...who was that man?"

were obscured and so

his hands already gave him an idea of what had happened. The

Kevin was sure.

tightly as anger rose within

'...He needs to die.'

scene. But there was only one problem, Kevin did not know who the

slightly familiar

the same time, he didn't.

Ren? ...No,

head, trying to discard such thoughts from his

slight resemblances, Kevin knew Ren.

"It couldn't be, right?"

trying to deny what he saw, the confidence he had within him

creep into his

"Haaa...What do I do."

hands. He really did

***

footsteps stopped

the time I woke up from the 'dream' it was early in the morning. I thought about going around the city to

mind off of things, but having walked a couple of steps out of my residence, I subconsciously made my way

"This is good too..."

the moment was