The world could no longer rewind.
So it improvised.
Anos Voldigoad felt the shift the instant it happened—a coarse adjustment, clumsy and desperate. Instead of looping time, fate began stacking probability, forcing events to align unnaturally in hopes of recreating a familiar outcome.
"So you choose excess," Anos said. "How inelegant."
In the lower districts, three incidents occurred at once.
A carriage lost control and raced toward a crowded street.A warehouse fire erupted without cause.A blade slipped free from a guard's hand at the top of a stairwell.
All accidents.
All lethal.
All converging toward one fragile human.
The black-haired boy—Subaru Natsuki—stood frozen, sensing danger but unable to name it.
Anos moved.
He did not rush.
He arrived.
The carriage stopped inches from Subaru, its wheels sinking harmlessly into softened stone. The fire died before it could breathe. The falling blade dissolved mid-air into dust.
Three corrections.
Denied simultaneously.
The world shuddered violently.
Probability collapsed back into normalcy, snapping like an overstretched wire.
Subaru fell backward, gasping.
"W-what was that?!" he shouted.
Anos looked down at him.
"The world attempted to kill you efficiently," he said. "It failed inefficiently."
Around them, reality stabilized.
People stared in disbelief at the stopped carriage, the vanished fire, the impossible calm.
"So even without looping," Anos continued, "you insist on sacrifice."
He raised his gaze.
"This is your first warning."
Far beyond sight, fate reeled.
It had exhausted one of its oldest tools.
And gained nothing.
High in the capital, alarms rang as anomaly reports flooded in.
"This wasn't random!"
"The probabilities were forced!"
"We're under correction-level interference!"
Anos turned away.
"Very well," he said calmly. "If you insist on acting—then act directly."
The air fell still.
The world hesitated.
Because for the first time, fate realized something was wrong.
It was no longer correcting mistakes.
It was making them.