The silence of **UNIVERSE 102-B** was not peaceful. It was heavy, like being buried under a mountain of glass.
**LEE JOON-HA** stood on the edge of the floating violet stone, his cheap **BUSAN** hoodie fluttering in a wind that smelled of ionized copper. Below him, the world of **AETHELGARD** was dying.
It didn't explode; it simply faded, its colors turning into a sickly, pixelated grey.
[**CONTRACT OBJECTIVE**: Stabilize the Reality Core.]
[**TOOLS PROVIDED**: Basic Manipulation Interface (Tier 0).]
[Warning: Physical hunger is suppressed. Mental fatigue is not.]
"A year..." **JOON-HA** whispered.
The sound of his own voice startled him. It was the only organic sound in this metallic wasteland.
The first month was a descent into madness.
**JOON-HA** had always been a loner, but 'lonely' on **EARTH** meant having no one to talk to while hearing the distant hum of traffic. Here, 'lonely' meant being the only heartbeat in an entire dimension.
He spent the first thirty days just learning how to move. The physics were different. Gravity shifted every hour. He had to learn how to 'read' the glowing threads of reality that leaked from the ground like golden oil.
[**TUTORIAL**: Identify the Fragmentation Point.]
A grid appeared over the crumbling crystalline city below. **JOON-HA** had to climb down the floating debris, his hands bleeding as he gripped sharp, violet rocks.
There was no food, no water, and no sleep. The **SYSTEM** kept his body in a state of '**STASIS**,' but his mind felt every second of the exhaustion.
"Data entry was easier," he grunted, his fingers glowing with a faint blue light as he touched a jagged tear in the air.
By the third month, his **BUSAN** hoodie was a tattered rag. His hair had grown long, reaching his shoulders. But something else was changing.
The fear was gone.
In its place was a cold, mechanical discipline. He stopped thinking about **EARTH**. He stopped thinking about coffee. He became a part of the machine.
He would spend weeks sitting cross-legged in front of a '**REALITY LEAK**,' stitching the golden threads back together with his bare hands.
His **EMPATHY**, the very thing that got him hired, was his only weapon. He could feel where the universe was 'hurting.' He could feel the tension in the space-time fabric.
By the sixth month, he stopped talking to himself. His eyes, once soft and wandering, became sharp and fixed. He moved with the grace of a predator. Every movement was calculated. Every breath was rhythmic.
He was no longer a part-timer. He was becoming an **OPERATOR**.
***
The ninth month brought the **STORMS**.
The dying sun of **AETHELGARD** began to collapse, sending waves of '**ANTI-DATA**' across the planet. **JOON-HA** had to sprint across collapsing bridges of light, his lungs burning, his mind screaming for rest.
He fell. He bruised. He bled. But he never aged.
He would look at his reflection in the violet crystals. His face was still twenty-three. His skin was flawless, polished by the cosmic energies he was manipulating.
But his eyes... his eyes looked like they were centuries old.
Finally, in the twelfth month, he reached the **CORE**. It was a massive, rotating sphere of pure information, cracked down the middle.
**JOON-HA** placed both hands on the freezing surface. He didn't use strength. He used his **SYNC**.
"Heal," he commanded.
The golden threads erupted from his chest, weaving into the cracks. The grey ash turned back into green forests. The bruised sky cleared into a brilliant gold.
[**CONTRACT STATUS**: 100% Complete.]
[**STABILIZATION SUCCESSFUL**.]
[Calculating Rewards...]
**JOON-HA** collapsed onto his knees. He was exhausted beyond words.
He had lived an entire year in this violet hell. He had forgotten what a car sounded like. He had forgotten the smell of rain.
"**SYSTEM**..." he rasped. "Take me home."
[Acknowledged. Returning to **PRIMARY NODE**: **EARTH**.]
[Time Elapsed on **EARTH**: 118 Seconds.]
***
The transition was a violent jerk.
One moment, **JOON-HA** was breathing the ozone-rich air of a stabilized galaxy. The next, the smell of cheap tobacco and salty sea air hit his lungs like a physical blow.
He stumbled, his boots hitting the gritty concrete of the **BUSAN** rooftop.
*Clatter.*
His plastic chair, which had been tipped over when he was taken, was still vibrating on the floor.
**JOON-HA**'s breath came in ragged gasps. He looked around, his eyes wide and wild. The city of **BUSAN** was exactly as he had left it. The neon signs were still flickering. The distant hum of the harbor was still there.
He looked at his laptop.
The screen was just lighting up. The clock in the corner shifted from 02:14 AM to 02:15 AM.
"Only... one minute?"
He looked at his hands. They were clean. The blood, the violet dust, the scars from the rocks—all gone. His tattered hoodie was whole again, smelling of laundry detergent instead of cosmic ash.
The **SYSTEM** had reset his physical state to the moment he left. But it couldn't reset his mind.
He felt the weight of those 365 days of silence pressing down on his brain. He felt a year's worth of muscle memory in his fingers.
He reached for his coffee cup.
His fingers trembled as he touched the ceramic. He flinched, expecting it to be frozen or pixelated.
It was warm.
A single tear escaped his eye and fell into the brown liquid. He had spent a year dreaming of this warmth. He had almost forgotten that life could be this simple.
*Ping.*
His phone, lying on the table, vibrated. It was a bank notification.
[**IBK BANK**: You have received a transfer of **1,000,000,000 KRW** from **HALO GROUP**.]
[Current Balance: 1,000,004,200 KRW.]
**JOON-HA** stared at the zeros. **ONE BILLION WON**.
More money than his father had made in his entire life. More than he could earn in a hundred years of data entry.
[Congratulations, **OPERATOR LEE JOON-HA**.]
[Your **TIER 0** status is confirmed.]
[A secure residence has been prepared in **SEOUL**: '**THE SIGNIEL SEOUL**' **PENTHOUSE**.]
[Transportation is waiting at the base of the building.]
**JOON-HA** stood up. He didn't move like the tired boy he was two minutes ago. He stood with a terrifying, absolute stillness.
He walked to the small, cracked mirror hanging near the rooftop door. He looked at his reflection.
His face was the same. The same 23-year-old visuals that made girls in **BUSAN** turn their heads. But his aura had shifted.
There was a 'heaviness' to his gaze now. He looked like a king disguised as a beggar.
He was biologically twenty-three. But mentally? He was twenty-four, with the experience of a **COSMIC ENGINEER**.
He didn't pack his clothes. He didn't take his laptop. None of those things belonged to the man he was now.
He walked to the edge of the rooftop and looked toward the north—toward **SEOUL**.
Somewhere in that glittering forest of skyscrapers, the **NATIONAL ACTRESS** lived. The woman the world worshipped.
To her, he would be a new neighbor. A mysterious, handsome young man who moved into the most expensive penthouse in the country overnight.
But to the universe, he was the only thing keeping the stars from falling.
**JOON-HA** turned away from the **BUSAN** skyline and headed for the stairs.
"Two minutes," he whispered to the empty roof. "My life ended in two minutes. And a new one began."
Downstairs, a black luxury sedan with tinted windows was already waiting, its engine idling silently in the dark **BUSAN** alley.
The **ARCHITECT OF REALITY** was moving to the capital.