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..."

back at any of the incidents that had occurred right

My head snapped upwards.

'There was one...'

fidgeted

definitely

to me before, but, didn't my personality change moments

but now that I look back at myself, right after meeting the previous Ren, I

that come

I looked back at my previous behavior, the moment prior to meeting the previous Ren, everything I did was completely different. My

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

it in the past because I never felt it. I never felt the change...but now that I was looking back at them, from this new perspective, it really did seem as though something

ideologies

theory suddenly

My breathing evened out.

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

believe that. I shook my head repeatedly. It couldn't be. Yeah, there's no way something like

My toes curled inwardly.

TRIIIING—! TRIIIING—!

snapping me out of my thoughts. Lowering my head, I looked at the message. It was

tomorrow, are you ready? Should I come to pick you

"Haaa...haaa...."

all the anxiety inside of me. Taking

[Yeah, that would do.]

message, I

"huuuu..."

I took my jacket and put on my face mask. Then, I proceeded to

needed some fresh air

eating

Ci Clank—!

the door behind me, I

***

Ding—!

of Kevin's head as he slowly opened his eyes. The first thing he saw as soon as he opened his eyes was a system

[Synchronization complete]

Synchronisation : 34%

"Haaa..."

Covering his forehead with his

world

vision he saw was

he remembered that at

up straight, Kevin was able to calm

me wasn't

he was desperately searching for Emma, and that the name of the black figure

was not something he had

that have been a vision of

Kevin stared at the

at the vision made his body

the future, what

more he thought about it, the more certain he was about his analysis. Whatever he just saw, it

"...Fuck."

Kevin's fists clenched tightly.

the thought of Emma dying on him

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

the vision he saw. The features of the figure were obscured and so was his voice, but from what he saw, the

flask in his hands already gave him an idea of

Kevin was sure.

clenched even more tightly as anger

'...He needs to die.'

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

felt slightly familiar

though he had met him before, yet, at the same time, he didn't. There was this chilly air surrounding the man that

Ren? ...No,

trying to discard

resemblances, Kevin knew Ren. He would never

"It couldn't be, right?"

Despite his many attempts at trying to deny what he saw, the confidence he had within him slowly crumbled

to creep into his

"Haaa...What do I do."

his face with both hands. He really did not know what

***

knew it, my footsteps stopped

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

a couple of steps out of my residence, I subconsciously made my way towards

"This is good too..."

needed at the moment was