As they tumbled into the dim, rattling subway car, the golden radiance of the [Original Author] status flickered and died like a spent candle. Hajin's legs turned to lead, his knees hitting the grimy floor of the carriage with a bone-jarring thud.
[The status 'Original Author' has been burnt out.]
[All Gifts, Physiques, and Stigma-based Skills are being archived...]
[System Error: Narrative Volume is insufficient to sustain the 'Extra'.]
Hajin gasped, his vision swimming. It felt as if his very bones were being hollowed out. His Stigma, the violet mark that had defined his existence in this world, grew icy cold and faded into a dull, grey scar.
Suddenly, his spatial inventory shuddered. With the collapse of his Stigma, the pocket dimension he had relied on for years burst open. A literal mountain of items—high-grade mana stones, enchanted bullets, the Black Arrow Arrows, and countless artifacts—clattered across the subway floor in a chaotic heap.
Hajin's hand moved reflexively, trying to sweep them back into the Star Stream's inventory, but his fingers met only static.
[You are beyond the reach of the 'Star Stream'.]
[Inventory access is permanently denied.]
Hajin let out a ragged breath.
In the mess of fallen items, a single, unassuming black card slipped from the pile and slid perfectly into his pocket.
He didn't notice it.
He simply reached for the only thing he could still hold: his Desert Eagle. As his authorial power vanished, the only thing that he was left with was his weapon. Aether flickered towards Desert Eagle, its internal logic shifting until it settled into the form of a sleek, black rifle.
"We have to move," Klein-Amon whispered.
Without his Author's status, every step felt heavy, his muscles protesting the sudden return of mundane gravity.
[Giant Story 'The Novel's Extra' is supporting your existence!]
At least, his stories were still with him.
Klein walked beside him, the weight of the unconscious Kim Dokja draped over his shoulder, his monocle reflecting the rhythmic flicker of the overhead fluorescent lights.
They moved through the connecting vestibules. Unlike the cosmic chaos they had just escaped, this place was devastatingly quiet.
Klein supported Hajin, walking in complete silence.
They stepped into the final carriage.
There, sitting curled in the corner of the subway car, his face a mask of blank, eternal sorrow, tears tracking silently through the grime on his cheeks.
He was small—statured enough that Hajin and Klein might have mistaken him for an elementary schooler at a distance. But as they drew closer, the maturity of his features became clear; he was at least fifteen, though trapped in a body stunted by a lifetime of isolation. His skin was a haunting, translucent pale, making the shock of his raven-black hair stand out like ink on snow.
This was the Oldest Dream.
He was the reason why the River of Fate and Time flowed. He was the reason the whole world's time wouldn't simply stop or glitch when the Convergence happened. He was the most omniscient yet the most powerless god.
All he could do is to allow the world to exist.
'But why is does he look like Dokja? Is he..?'
The same thoughts filled Hajin and Klein's heads.
Near his trembling hand, a smartphone lay on the bench. Its screen was cracked.
Opposite the boy, sprawled across another bench, lay Kim Dokja.
"What does it even supposed to mean?" Klein felt puzzled, looking at the Oldest Dream, who resembled Dokja.
He looked less like a hero who had reached the end and more like a discarded puppet, his face as pale as the boy's, his breathing so shallow it was almost non-existent.
Hajin felt a pulse of intuition.
"The Sefirots... they're near." Hajin pointed at their companion, "Take Dokja, I'm alright,"
He grabbed the handrail to keep from falling to the floor.
Klein leaned down and hoisted the unconscious Kim Dokja onto his back.
They turned toward the sliding doors at the end of the carriage, but as Klein stepped forward, an invisible force slammed into them. It wasn't a wall of mana or a physical shield; it was a conceptual rejection.
It was the Dreamer's subconscious defense—a wall of "Don't Leave Me."
"We're trapped," Hajin gritted his teeth, slamming the butt of his rifle against the air. It didn't even leave a scratch.
Klein adjusted Dokja's weight on his back, his eyes fixed on the cracked smartphone.
[Three Ways to Survive in a Ruined World – Chapter 3,149]
Klein stood still, his monocle reflecting the starlight trapped within the carriage.
He felt the weight of the [Creator's Mandate] pulsing in his soul—the Authority Hajin had granted him just moments before. Suddenly, the puzzle pieces of the last few moments began to click into place with a sickening, familiar precision.
Why Sealing?
Klein looked at Hajin, who was frantically checking his pockets for a way out. He thought of Han Sooyoung and her [Predictive Plagiarism].
The Fool knew that when he was stabilizing above the Gray Fog. Hajin, Yoo Yeonha, best strategists of Earth and Han Sooyoung had worked on the plan.
Had she seen this?
Had Hajin, even in his moments of desperation, already anticipated that they would find a god they couldn't kill, but had to stop?
A chill that had nothing to do with the vacuum of space washed over Klein. It felt like the shadow of Ince Zangwill and the quill 0-08. It was the suffocating sensation of a "Coincidence"—the feeling that his every step had been guided by a hand he couldn't see.
'Was I given the power to seal because I am the only one who can do it?'
"Hajin," Klein whispered, his voice cold. "You gave me this Authority... because you knew we couldn't wake him up."
Hajin looked back, his eyes wide and hollow.
"I didn't... I just felt it was the only way to get through the Wall."
The Lord of Mysteries stood over the Oldest Dream.
They needed to pass that barrier to execute their plan. They needed the Sefirot.
Klein didn't have time to argue.
To wake the Oldest Dream was to end their lives. To kill him(which even Hajin in his Author's state wasn't sure of being able to do) was to erase the universe. But to Seal him... that was to pause the dream.
Hajin nodded to Klein.
Klein adjusted his monocle.
He still had the [Creator's Mandate] Hajin had granted him, and he held a shimmering, crystalline Sequence 1 ingredient—a remnant of the Abomination of the Chained Pathway.
"Forgive me, little Reader," Klein murmured.
[Authority 'The Creator's Mandate — Absolute Sealing' is activating!]
Klein slammed his cane onto the floor. Thousands of doors erupted from his shadow, weaving into a cocoon of starlight and grey fog that enveloped the sobbing boy. The subway car groaned as the Dreamer's influence was suppressed.
The boy's sobbing stopped.
[Logic Error!]
['Most Ancient Dream' has been suppressed.]
[System Alert!]
[The structural integrity of the World-Line is failing!]
[The Foundation of Reality is dissolving!]
[The Sixth Pillar's consciousness is awakening!]
The moment the seal was complete, the subway car didn't just rattle—it screamed. A violent, world-shaking earthquake threw Hajin against the doors. The metal of the train groaned, twisting as if being squeezed by a giant hand.
Klein felt it most of all. As the Lord of Mysteries and the Pillar of the World, he was the only entity left with enough narrative volume to anchor the space. The literal weight of the universe—every star, every story, every life—suddenly transferred from the boy to him.
Klein's knees buckled. His skin began to crack, a faint gray glow leaking from the fissures. He was supporting the entire dream.
"Hah... hah..." Klein's monocle cracked.
The barrier at the door dissolved into ash.
Dokja fell from Klein's back. He was deathly still; his skin felt like cold parchment. Without Hajin's Observation or Reading skills, they were blind to his status. Even the Fourth Wall was eerily silent, as if it had retreated into the deepest recesses of Dokja's mind.
"The barrier's gone!" Hajin shouted, scrambling to his feet and reaching out to support Klein. "Let's move! Now!"
"I'm okay..."
'If I'm okay, then who the hell in this world isn't?' Klein-Amon no longer identified who lampooned inside their head.
"Take his left, I'll be on the right. The Dreamer did something to him," Klein noted, his voice grim.
The train sped up, the darkness outside the windows turning into a blur of static as the world began its terminal collapse.
Klein, bearing the tension of a dying universe, took a heavy, shuddering step toward the exit with his companions.
Dokja's right arm was over him, while left one was over Hajin's trembling frame.
They pushed through the door into the next carriage, but it wasn't a carriage at all. It was another platform.
They boarded a second train, one that felt older, its wood-paneled walls humming with the frequency of the Wheel of Fate.
"Which station?" Klein asked, his breath hitching.
They stopped at the station [Tenebrous World].
"Not this one," Hajin said, his eyes closed. His luck remained as a jagged instinct. "Skip it. And the next. And the one after that."
They flew past three stations, skipping [Knowledge Moor], [City of Calamity] and [River of Eternal Darkness] each one a blur of white light or black darkness and distorted fables.
"Now. This is it."
They stepped off at a station that glowed with a soft, golden radiance. It looked like the solemn Buddhist land. It was a singularity of pure, unadulterated probability, the source of all 'Luck' in the cosmos.
And in the center of it stood a man.
A monk with golden skin. The monk stared above, his head tilted. It was as if he didn't notice that Hajin, Klein and Dokja was there.
Hajin pulled a card from his pocket—the last remnant of his "Settings."[1]
===
[9-Star Card: Momentary Apotheosis] ＊Effective Good
A card forged from the distorted laws of a foreign world. For 20 seconds, the user may accommodate the 'Authority' of a 'Sequence 0' entity compatible with their Pathway.
[Warning: The user's vessel may shatter if their 'Status' is insufficient.]
===
"Step away," Hajin whispered.
[Constellation 'The Novel's Extra' has temporarily ascended to the Sequence 0: Wheel of Fortune!]
As he touched the card, his consciousness was pulled into a vast, golden void that was the skin of the monk . A giant, shimmering silhouette of the Golden Buddha manifested before him.
[Giant Story 'The Lucky One' is howling!]
Hajin didn't fight the power.
He accepted it.
The Buddha smiled at him.
"I've waited for you."
[The 'Key of Light' has found its wielder!]
Hajin's hair turned a brilliant, metallic gold.
He had a sense of deja vu since the time when he became the fifth Story Body of Sun Wukong.
Behind them, the train car groaned, its metal skin weeping rust as the logic of the world-line unspooled.
A conceptual void started devouring the tracks ahead.
He turned to Klein, reaching out his hand.
"Klein. We don't have much time left," Hajin commanded.
Klein looked up, his face a map of cracks leaking gray fog. He was holding the weight of a dying universe on his shoulders, his knees trembling under the literal pressure of every story ever told.
He looked at Hajin's outstretched hand.
"Together."
He did not care if it was someone else's arrangment.
He did not care of all the coincidences.
He could only believe in his companions.
"Together!"
On the fabric of Klein's black trench coat, a pattern of intricate, glowing runes erupted. A Door of Light, composed of a billion sparkling stars and layers of illusory space, manifested over his heart. With a gutteral groan of pain that shook the very foundations of the subway, Klein grabbed his hand.
The gray fog exploded into reality. The dimming subway coming into contact with Key of Light was suddenly overwritten by the phantom image of an ancient, majestic palace. The mottled stone pillars and the long, bronze table of the Tarot Club superimposed themselves over the vinyl benches and flickering lights.
In that moment, vibrant clouds illuminated the fog, flowers fell like rain, and golden lotuses blossomed from the ground.
On the side where Hajin stood, land adorned with glazed and amber decorations, countless Buddhas, Bodhisattvas, Arhats, and Wisdom Kings appeared.
And in the center of all of it were Hajin and Klein(and quietly sleeping near them Kim Dokja ;3).
The moment their fingers interlocked, the Convergence reached its absolute zenith. It wasn't a clash of powers, but a perfect, terrifying resonance. The Mystery that hides the truth met the Fate that determines it.
They resisted the urge to merge into a single entity.
[Warning!]
[■■ is manifesting!]
[The 'Star Will' is losing its ability to define your status!]
Instead, they projected their combined statuses outward, forcing the universe to recognize a new law.
The gray fog of Sefirah Castle turned a brilliant, searing gold. The two protagonists ascended. Their physical forms blurred, becoming a singular pillar of blinding white radiance that pierced through the roof of encroaching darkness that signaled the termination of the Universe.
[A Temporary Fifth Pillar has manifested: FATE.]
As the Hidden Pillar, they stood above the River of Fate and Time, looking down at the tangled, knotted threads of the three converged universes.
With the authority of the Fifth Pillar, Hajin and Klein reached with their minds.
The subway, the Ark, and the dying stars vanished in a blinding explosion of white.
When the light faded, Hajin's heart sank.
He was standing on a pristine, white floor. To his left was Klein, looking exhausted and pale. On the floor between them lay Kim Dokja, who was finally beginning to stir.
It was the White Room.
The same white void they had woken up in at the very start of the Convergence.
"No..." Hajin whispered, falling to his knees. "We tried to go further. We tried to undo the whole collaboration."
"We can't," Klein said, his voice hollow. "The reboot stopped here. This is the beginning point of the Universe. We can't go back to a time when we didn't know each other."
Their plan to reboot the whole Universe has failed.
Dokja groaned, his eyes fluttering open. He looked at Hajin and Klein holding hands—a golden-haired god and a monocled lord—and let out a weak, dry chuckle.
"Is this... still a dream?" Dokja rasped.
Hajin felt the urge to drop Klein's hand, but the Fifth Pillar authority was the only thing keeping the room from collapsing. He looked at the vast, empty whiteness.
"What should we do next?" Hajin sighed.
From his pocket flew a card. It flicked into the center of the room.
"What's that Hajin?" Klein looked at the black card.
Dokja stood up.
"What the hell happened?" Dokja was the most confused.
Hajin remembered, ignoring Dokja.
That was one of the cards he had received. He almost forgot about it.
But why did she activate only now?
===
[0-Star Card: ???] ＊??? Good
[Description: ■■■■■ ■■■ ■■■■.]
[Effect: ■■.]
===
"Can someone explain to me what's..." before Dokja could finish the sentence...
The card absorbed.
The white walls, the ceiling, and the floor were instantly devoured by a pitch-black abyss. The light of the Fifth Pillar was sucked into the card's surface. Everything turned dark.
Out of the silence, a voice resounded.
It didn't come from a direction; it came from the fabric of their thoughts.
"The conceptual resources have been processed."
Hajin and Klein surged their remaining power, using the Fate authority to pry into the darkness, searching for the source.
The darkness cracked like a mirror.
They were still in the white room, but it was no longer empty. A few meters away, a simple wooden chair sat on the floor.
On the chair sat a shifting silhouette—a form that blurred between ink, grey fog, and pure probability.
The silhouette looked at them.
Yes, that was me sitting on that chair.
"Kim Hajin. Kim Dokja. Klein Moretti."
As these three names touched my lips, that I could finally touch, I felt a sudden pull of Convergence.
[Warning!]
[Total Resource Re-allocation is in progress!]
[Giant Story, 'The Lucky One', is being harvested.]
[Shares of Giant Story, 'Echo of the Unseen Abyss', is being harvested.]
[Story, 'The Last Witness of the Unwritten End' , is being harvested.]
[Giant Story, 'The One Who Shattered the Night's Throne' , is being harvested.]
[Modifier, 'The Last Witness of the Unwritten End', is being archived as a Conceptual Resource.]
[Ultimate Skill 'Lv. 0 The Once and Future King' has been dismantled.]
[Modifier, 'The Novel's Extra' is being archived...]
[Basic Skill...]
...
These were all the powers, stories, statuses, modifiers they gained during Convergence.
They stood paralyzed, three souls who had just wielded the power of a Pillar, now looking like children caught in a storm.
Dokja's eyes were wide, his breath hitching.
Hajin's hand was still on the grip of his rifle, though he looked like he might collapse.
Klein… Klein's face looked indifferent.
"We've finally met," I said, my voice resonating not through the air, but through the very fabric of their stories. "The Author, The Reader, and The Fool. Three universes, three protagonists, one impossible reality."
I leaned back, resting my chin on my hand.
"When their stories are forcibly merged by the mighty cosmic entities, Kim Hajin, Kim Dokja, and Klein Moretti are thrown into a battle for survival. The world is rebuilding and merging.
Their enemies-Outer Gods, Demon Kings, Outer Deities and scheming Constellations-have formed unholy alliances to devour the nascent, combined universe and reach the end."
I paused, letting the silence settle. "Interesting. Isn't it?"
Hajin was the first to find his voice.
"Who the hell are you? And what is this... room?"
My expression curved into :3.
"My name is Alov," I replied. "At least this time, my name is Alov. And as for what this means… well, I can answer your questions now. After all, it took you so many attempts to finally reach this chair."
Dokja stumbled forward, his face pale.
"W-wait... attempts? Turns? I don't understand. Klein, Hajin—am I still dreaming?"
I chuckled.
The sound was dry, like old parchment.
I looked at Dokja.
"You're wondering about your little friend, aren't you? The Fourth Wall."
Dokja froze.
"When the Oldest Dream—your other self—took you behind the Final Wall, the Fourth Wall realized the end was a cul-de-sac. Oldest Dream split it off you, Fourth Wall transferred its essence into the past to try and find a different exit. That was the moment you entered your slumber, Dokja."
Dokja stared at his hands, the memory of the Oldest Dream's lonely face finally surfacing.
"As you know, The Fourth Wall," I continued, "was the Dokkaebi King of the original timeline. In one of the countless turns of this Convergence, he was awakened by the Mother Goddess of Depravity. Fail after fail, turn after turn, he slowly regained himself. He reached the Final Wall with you before, many times. But he understood that even the Fifth Pillar—Fate—couldn't turn back the clock once the stories had begun to converge."
"Wait-wait," Hajin interrupted, his voice sharp with a writer's suspicion. "Why do you keep saying turns?Attempts? Failures?"
I met Hajin's gaze.
"Do you really think you could reach this place on your first try? Do you think you would trust each other so easily? Dokja, how long did it take for Yoo Joonghyuk to call you a companion? Hajin, how long did it take for you to see your characters as living breathing people? And Klein… or Amon, or whatever we're calling you now. Do you think a god of the 'Error' and 'Fool' pathways would ever call someone a 'comrade' without the weight of a thousand shared deaths?"
Klein's monocle glinted.
He remained silent, but I could feel the Worms of Spirit inside him vibrating. He was remembering the 'coincidences' that had brought them together—the way they had clicked into place like gears.
"You've suffered together through turns you no longer remember," I said. "Every time Yoo Joonghyuk died, the wheel turned. Every time the converged universes became unsolveable, the cycle reset. Until finally, the Original Creator during one of your attempts."
For the first time Klein's eyes widened.
"But even his 'Possible of Impossible' couldn't allow him reach the Oldest Dream. The universes were too tangled by then, creating multiple timelines. So, the Creator did the only thing he could. He utilized his own instinct to Converge and contacted, went back to the very beginning of his consciousness, to the point of being eaten by his own children, and shattered the remnants of a Sixth Pillar out of his own corpse. "
This time Klein repeated:
"Sixth Pillar? But there are..."
I interrupted Klein, already knowing what he wanted to say.
"Don't you find it interesting that there are only three pillars. They form a Trinity of the Universe"
I raised my hand, and three golden words manifested in the air.
[Existence. Information. Symbolism.]
"The Trinity of 'What Is,'" I said. "The Physical, Spirit, and Astral worlds."
I couldn't help but smile.
"As you are aware of the Fifth Hidden Pillar now, since you became one with Hajin. It's obvious that the Hidden Pillars must form a Trinity too. The Trinity of 'What Is Not,'" I smiled. "The Fourth, Fifth, and Sixth Pillars. Fate symbolizes what things are becoming inevitably. Termination is what they become in the end. And the Sixth…"
Then, I drew three more words in ink so black it seemed to swallow the light.
[Termination. Fate. Possibility.]
I stood up from the chair.
My silhouette shifted, blurring between ink and fog.
"The Sixth Pillar is Possibility. It is born from the emergence of the death of all timelines. It requires the power of Fate and enough 'Conceptual Resources' to give the universe a choice."
Klein's eyes widened even more behind his monocle.
He remembered his very first divination[2]—the vision of the Original Creator being devoured, whispering, "...I must save... the universe..."
"Does that mean you are..." Klein started.
"Yes," I said, my voice becoming a chorus of a billion unwritten futures. "I am the Sixth Pillar."
[The Infinite Branch;
Origin of Possibility;
The Unchosen;
Weaver of Divergence;
The One Who Denies Fate;
Dominator of the Unmanifest.]
The three of them stood in stunned silence.
I let the weight of my status settle before Dokja spoke.
"Sixth Pillar. No... Alov, right..?"
I nodded.
"Alov... you were the one who forced the collaboration? The Convergence?"
"I was," I nodded, once again and my head shifted into disapproving shook, "And I wasn't."
Klein, Dokja and Hajin exchanged looks and remained silent.
I waited for them to speak.
Each minute seemed to stretch into eternity.
"But can you return back to normal. To how it were?"
Hajin's eyes filled with hope.
"I can. But as I mentioned in my first message to you, I will need something."
"Message? Which message..?"
"Hajin, don't tell me you don't remember the first message you received in this same white room."
Hajin's mind raced back to the beginning.
The email from the 'Co-Author.
That was the only message that came to his mind.
===
...
...
Subject: Emergency Resource Re-allocation...
...
...I've run into a resource issue... a critical shortage of Conceptual Resources...
...
===
I saw that Hajin couldn't understand what I was talking about.
"You seem to not understand or acknowledge whose Soul supported the Universe of your own novel. It wasn't the Co-Author's, Hajin," I said, walking toward him. "It was yours. When the universes converged, the Co-Author lost control. I had to replace him to pull the universe in the correct direction. I needed your stories. I needed the Fifth Pillar's power. I needed your items, your gifts, your Authorities."
I looked at Hajin's empty hands.
"I have already reclaimed them. Everything you gained through the possibility of convergence was the fuel for this moment."
Hajin scratched his chin, looking utterly bewildered.
"I still don't get it."
I face-palmed.
"Your intelligence stats really are disappointing, aren't they?"
"YA! JINJJA SHI(BAL)..!"
"I mean," I sighed, "that I am the Pillar of Choice. And now, I give that choice to you."
A blue window erupted in front of them.
===
Category: Final
Difficulty: Indeterminable?■■?■?■?■?!■?■?■■■■■■...
Clear Conditions: Choose the Divergence.
[Option 1: The Possibility of Separation.]
(Return the three universes to their original, separate states. All who died during the Convergence will be restored. The protagonists will return to their roles, but the memory of this collaboration will fade into a strange, distant dream.)
[Option 2: The Divergence of Unity.]
(Complete the divergence of the three worlds into a single, permanent Universe. You stay together, but the world will remain a magnet for cosmic disasters due to the sheer narrative weight.)
Time Limit: 01:59
Reward:???
Failure:???
===
"You don't have much time," I said, my form beginning to flicker. "The Oldest Dream is unsealing. If you don't choose, the world either regresses, and the cycle of suffering starts again, or the timeline will be destroyed faster than Klein's seal is broken."
The room began to shake.
The three of them looked at the screen, then at each other.
There was no argument.
No debate.
They had seen enough death.
"Dokja," Hajin said, his voice unusually soft.
"I know," Dokja replied, a sad smile on his face.
Klein adjusted his hat.
He reached into his pocket and pulled out two gold coins—simple things, but they hummed with the aura of the gray fog.
He pressed one into Dokja's hand and one into Hajin's.
Klein cleared his throat awkwardly.
"A gift," Klein said.
"I hope we can meet again," Dokja said, his eyes tearing up.
"Don't lose control, Klein," Dokja added. "And you, Hajin... quit smoking?! WTF?"
Hajin, who had somehow produced a cigarette and was currently lighting it despite the lack of oxygen, just smirked.
"Where the hell did you get that?!" Dokja yelled.
"Author's secret," Hajin winked, taking a long drag. "My companions. My brothers. It was a hell of a story."
[Time Limit: 00:10]
They stood in a circle, arms around each other's shoulders—the Reader, the Fool, and the Author. Three protagonists who had broken the script.
Together, they reached out and pressed Option 1.
I nodded, a genuine smile touching my lips.
"Let it be, then."
I snapped my fingers.
[The Sixth Pillar: 'The Dominator of the Unmanifest' has manifested.]
[The Story 'Viewpoint of Mysterious Extra' has reached its Conclusion.]
"Klein. Dokja. Hajin," I whispered as the white room began to dissolve into the three separate hues of their home worlds. "Live happily."
The smoke from Hajin's cigarette swirled into the gray fog of Klein's coin, disappearing into the black ink of Dokja's story.
The Convergence ended. The worlds diverged.
And for the first time in a thousand turns, the protagonists were finally home.
One last message appeared before my dissolving body.
[Your ■■ is 'Possibility'.]
"That was the Viewpoint of Alov, the Mysterious Extra, who connected three Universes in impossible Collaboration."
I bowed before all of my audience reading this sentence(and cringed a little after doing that, I'm sorry, I don't know how to aura-farm, I'll take lessons from Master Sung Jin-woo, I promise ;3).
And, finally, I disappeared.
--- 🆃🅷🅴 🅴🅽🅳 ---
[1] Look up the Chapter 16: A Game of Fate[3], if you forgot where this card came from.
[2] Look up the Chapter 2: The Author, The Reader, The Fool[2], if you've forgotten.