Ethan woke with a knot of dread lodged in his throat and an ache in his chest—like the world had hollowed out a cavity where his heart should be, and only he felt the bleeding.
The ceiling loomed too far above him, like the sky had stretched itself thin overnight.
Iria was gone.
Not a whisper.
Not a shadow.
He sat up slow, limbs lead-heavy, the bed creaking like a coffin under him. Coño, this wasn't right. Every night since the glitches began—every single fucking night—she'd been there.
Always.
Now?
Just… static.
Something was wrong.
Gut-churningly, bone-deep wrong.
He raked a hand through his hair, strands snagging on his trembling fingers. Maybe his mind was laughing at him. Maybe the obsession had finally chewed through his sanity.
But the excuse rang hollow—just like Iria's absence in the dream.
He couldn't just sit here. If reality was glitching, he'd make it spit out proof.
He jolted upright, tearing through his room—
Drawers yanked open.
Notebooks gutted.
Photo albums flung aside.
Every page without her name clawed at his chest. Panic metastasizing.
Dove into a childhood memory box—junk he'd hoarded for reasons he couldn't remember.
Then—there.
A yellowed paper, folded tight, buried under decades.
He unfolded it with trembling hands.
A handwritten note.
His heart slammed his ribs as he recognized the handwriting.
Not his.
Hers.
The words were scrawled in a light, almost hesitant stroke—like the writer had doubted every letter.
"If things change… don't forget me."
A chill snaked down his spine.
Couldn't stay here.
Needed proof. Now.
He bolted toward the school, dawn barely cracking the sky, class hours still a lifetime away.
If Iria had truly existed here before vanishing, there had to be scars.
He beelined to the library, clawed through dusty attendance logs.
Then—
Found it.
A moth-eaten ledger of student names from years past.
Pages flipped in a frenzy, eyes scanning lines until—
There.
But the name—slashed out.
Ethan gulped down acid.
The letters still bled through the slab of black ink someone had poured over them. Like they'd tried to scrape her off the page… but couldn't erase her fully.
Not a glitch.
He kept digging.
Old club rosters. Event sign-ups. Names. Dates.
Gaping blanks where a name should've been.
Like Iria had been yanked out of history, thread by thread.
He slammed back against a shelf, wood biting into his spine. Chest caving under a weight that wasn't his.
Something inside him—cracking apart.
The library air hung thick—suffocating. Ethan's breaths came in jagged gasps, hands trembling as he stared at the slashed-out records.
He'd known something was off. Felt it since day one.
But now?
Proof.
Iria existed.
Yet the world pretended she hadn't. Traces of her scrubbed away… but not all.
Like someone had tried to erase her… and failed. Like she was fighting back.
But—
What if the rot wasn't the world?
What if the rot was… him?
A chill split his spine. What if… he was the one forgetting her?
His fists clenched—desperate, nails biting crescents into his palms.
No. Fuck that.
He wouldn't let her fade.
He couldn't let her vanish. Couldn't let her dissolve into the rotten static of his dying memory.
If there was a way to drag her back…
He'd carve it into the dream.
With that resolve scorching his ribs, he trudged home, steps lead-heavy—like gravity itself was trying to shackle him.
In his room—no hesitation.
Collapsed onto the bed. The weight of reality pressed down—time itself hissing tick-tock in his ears.
A breath. Eyes shut. Clawing back panic.
"This time—I have to reach her."
Darkness swallowed him.
But this time… something waited in the dark.