Vanitas walked through the pathways with Zen by his side. Taking another look around, he realized he had been mistaken.

This was not the Joseon era.

It was merely something imitating it. A civilization attempting to recreate the past after losing the modernity it once had.

"The pillar Jihyeon mentioned," Vanitas began. "Have you figured out what caused it?"

The pillar of light. According to Zen’s teacher, Jihyeon, a massive pillar of light had suddenly appeared and was responsible for humanity’s regression.

At the question, Zen answered without even turning his head.

——I have.

"Then?"

——The Archives will tell you.

Vanitas frowned. "Don’t start acting vague on me now. Both of us know I don’t have much time left. You might as well tell me already."

But Zen merely smiled at him.

——It’s alright. I trust you.

Vanitas’s frown deepened.

"Listen here, you pretentious bastard," he spat. "What makes you think I can even get into the Archives? I’ve been searching for it for almost two years now."

Even in his frustration, Zen’s smile never broke. The kind of smile Vanitas wanted to punch straight off his face.

"...I just can’t seem to like you."

——I get that a lot. Though I imagine plenty of people have said the same about you.

"...."

For the first time in his life, Vanitas found himself unable to win a verbal exchange. Zen was good. Scarily good.

"Tsk."

Vanitas clicked his tongue and continued walking alongside Zen through the narrow pathways.

Electrical poles contrasted awkwardly with traditional buildings. Metal piping ran along rooftops constructed in the old architectural style.

Strange machinery powered by something could occasionally be seen in the distance, hidden beneath wooden frames in an attempt to preserve the illusion of an older era.

It was a civilization trying to imitate history after losing the world it originally came from.

And somehow, that made the entire scenery feel even more... pitiful.

——If I explained everything directly, you’d probably stop trying to find the answer yourself.

"...Like I said, I’m dying."

——Hehe.

Vanitas hated how calm this man was.

Even after witnessing the future. Even after seeing the state humanity eventually reached. Zen still carried himself with a strange sense of ease, as though he had already accepted every possible outcome long ago.

Meanwhile, Vanitas had spent nearly his entire life fighting against outcomes.

Against fate.

Against loss.

Against time itself.

And somehow, standing beside Zen only made him more aware of that difference.

"Jihyeon," Vanitas began. "Who is she to you?"

——It’s easier to show you.

"...I’m gonna shoot myself."

* * *

Five years after meeting Jihyeon, Zen had already grown accustomed to the life of a mage in hiding.

Apparently, people like him and Jihyeon existed all throughout the world, mages scattered across different regions, concealing themselves from society while living among ordinary people.

Humans naturally feared the unknown.

And to most people, magic was the very embodiment of the unknown.

The world they lived in had already lost too much. Civilization had collapsed, history had become something beyond recognition, and humanity itself had been forced to rebuild from the ashes of something it could no longer fully remember.

In a reality where people had already lost everything once before, the last thing they wanted was to accept even more change.

Because people did not truly fear monsters.

They feared uncertainty.

A monster could be killed. A war could eventually end. But uncertainty never disappeared. It revealed itself in everyday life and forced people to confront the possibility that the world they understood was incomplete.

Magic represented exactly that.

To acknowledge magic meant acknowledging that humanity no longer stood at the top of the world through logic and understanding alone.

It meant admitting there were laws beyond human comprehension, powers that could not be controlled through reason or authority.

And people hated that.

Perhaps that was why humanity constantly tried to reduce everything into categories it could understand, such as religion, science, politics, and morality.

After all, people desperately wanted the world to make sense.

Because once it stopped making sense, fear followed immediately after.

Smack——!

"You’re thinking too hard again."

Zen snapped out of his thoughts as Jihyeon lightly struck the back of his head with a wooden stick.

"Ow."

"Every time you start making that face, it means you’re spiraling into another existential crisis."

"...Could you at least be gentle, Noona?"

"You literally stared at a tree for twenty minutes."

"...I was observing nature." 𝒇𝙧𝙚𝓮𝔀𝓮𝒃𝙣𝓸𝒗𝒆𝒍.𝙘𝒐𝒎

"You were spacing out."

Zen clicked his tongue while Jihyeon sighed and sat beside him near the riverbank.

For a brief moment, neither of them spoke. The sound of flowing water naturally filled the silence between them.

"You know," Jihyeon eventually said, "humans are strange creatures. They fear change more than suffering itself."

Zen glanced toward her.

"What do you mean?"

"People can adapt to suffering surprisingly well," she replied. "But the moment you threaten the structure they’ve grown used to, even if it’s hurting them, they panic."

Zen remained silent.

"Most people would rather live in a painful world they understand than risk stepping into a better one they don’t."

Zen lowered his gaze toward the flowing river. "Then doesn’t that make humanity hopeless?"

"No. Just contradictory."

She picked up a small stone and tossed it into the river. Ripples spread outward across the surface as the stone skipped three times before sinking beneath the water.

"Humans fear change, but they’re also creatures that constantly seek it. They complain about their suffering while desperately holding on to the systems causing it. Then one day, someone finally snaps, tears everything down, and calls it a revolution."

"And then?"

"And then people start missing the old world they hated so much."

"That sounds miserable."

"It is."

Zen picked up a stone of his own before throwing it across the river. The stone skipped several more times than Jihyeon’s before finally sinking under the surface.

"That’s why history repeats itself."

Whoosh——

The wind brushed past them as the distant sounds of the village echoed from farther down the road.

For a while, Zen simply sat there thinking.

In his previous life, people had been no different. Governments collapsed, ideologies quickly changed, technology advanced faster than society could mentally keep up with, yet humanity itself never truly changed.

People still fought over power.

People still feared one another.

People still searched for meaning in things greater than themselves.

The world advanced, but humanity remained strangely stagnant.

"...Then what’s the point?" Zen finally asked. "If people never really change, then what’s the point in trying to improve anything?"

Jihyeon glanced at him for a moment before smiling.

"Because stagnation is worse."

"...."

"If humanity completely stops moving forward, then it starts rotting. Even mistakes are proof that people are still trying to move somewhere."

She rested her chin against her palm as she looked toward the sky.

"Besides, perfection was never the goal."

"Then what is?"

"Continuation."

"...?"

"Civilizations don’t survive because they become perfect," Jihyeon continued. "They survive because enough people continue trying to carry them forward, even while knowing they’ll probably never see the end result themselves."

For some reason, those words struck heavily in Zen’s chest.

Perhaps because they felt painfully human.

"You know..." Zen began. "It’s probably a good thing you never saw what humanity used to be like."

"Why?"

Zen stared at the river for a moment before answering. "Because people in my world had everything."

Jihyeon glanced at him silently as he continued.

"We had machines capable of crossing entire countries in hours. Towers that reached the clouds. Endless information at our fingertips. We could speak to people from the other side of the planet instantly."

He let out a faint laugh.

"Compared to this place, it would’ve looked like a fantasy."

"Then wasn’t it a good world?"

"That’s the problem," Zen replied. "It should’ve been."

The wind quietly brushed past them.

"The more humanity advanced, the emptier people seemed to become. Everyone was connected, yet most people felt alone. We created endless conveniences just to save time, only to waste the time we saved chasing meaningless things."

Jihyeon remained silent, listening.

"In a world where people no longer had to struggle to survive, they started struggling to find reasons to live at all."

"...That sounds lonely."

"It was."

"But were you happy?"

Zen lowered his gaze.

"...No."

Unfortunately for Zen, for Chae Eun-woo, he had never been one of the people who truly enjoyed that convenience-filled world.

"To tell you the truth, I spent my entire life running," he said. "And even now, it still feels like I’m running."

When he lost his parents.

When he lost his sister.

When his own nation discarded him as if he were disposable.

"I cursed everything," Zen continued. "The world. My circumstances. Even God Himself. There were times I genuinely wished I could tear everything apart."

The river continued flowing beside them.

"In my world, people always talked about justice and morality," Zen said with a scoff. "But the truth is, most systems only protect people who are useful to them. The moment you become inconvenient, they throw you away with no remorse."

"...."

"That’s why I kept running," he said. "Because if I stopped, it felt like everything that happened to me would finally catch up."

For a brief moment, silence settled between them again.

Then Jihyeon gently placed a hand on his head.

"You’re not there anymore," she said. "And you’re not the same person you were back then. Maybe it’s wrong for me to say this, but clinging to a past that only makes you miserable isn’t really a life worth living."

Her hand lightly ruffled his hair before she smiled faintly.

"So I’ll be blunt. Move forward, Zen—no."

She looked directly at him.

"Move forward, Eunwoo."

"...."

Zen’s eyes widened, if only slightly.

For just a moment, her features overlapped with someone else’s. That same face. That same expression. So eerily similar to Minjeong that it made his chest constrict in a way he couldn’t explain.

"...I knew someone who looked like you."

"Did you?" Jihyeon tilted her head slightly. "Well, if reincarnation really exists and you retained memories of your previous life, then what if I were—"

"She betrayed me."

"...."

"I already considered that possibility a long time ago. So please... don’t remind me."

The faint smile on his face disappeared.

"Just stay as Jihyeon."

"...."

Jihyeon could only let out a quiet sigh.

She had just spent all that time preaching to him about moving forward, yet this boy remained stubborn to an almost unbelievable degree.

* * *

Five years later.

"Oppa! Look!"

Zen’s little sister, Melissa, proudly showed off her magic. Just like him, her improvement had been unbelievably rapid.

Watching the two siblings, Jihyeon still couldn’t get used to their absurd talent.

"See? I did it this time!"

The moment her concentration slipped, however, her magic burst apart with a loud pop.

"Ah!"

Melissa stumbled backward while Zen barely reacted, casually raising a hand as wind magic dispersed the remaining sparks before they could hit the wooden walls of the hut.

"You almost burned the cabin down again."

"I had it under control!"

"Sure you did."

Jihyeon let out a tired sigh from the side.

"You two are going to be the death of me someday."

Unlike before, the atmosphere inside the forest hut no longer felt empty. Years had passed quickly, and the once-starving siblings who had arrived with hollow eyes had gradually begun resembling actual children their age.

Well... at least Melissa did.

For some reason, in Jihyeon’s eyes, Zen still looked miserable. Even after all these years, there were moments when Jihyeon would catch him staring off into the distance with an expression that didn’t belong on a teenager.

As though part of him was still trapped somewhere else entirely.

"You’re spacing out again," Jihyeon said.

"I’m thinking."

"That’s just a smarter way of saying you’re spacing out."

Melissa puffed her cheeks before pointing at Zen.

"Oppa always does that. Sometimes he stares at walls for scary amounts of time."

"...I do?"

Zen clicked his tongue while Jihyeon chuckled at the exchange.

For a moment, the forest hut felt peaceful.

Scarily peaceful.

And perhaps that was why Zen occasionally found himself afraid of moments like this.

Because happiness never seemed to last forever.

For Zen, happiness had always felt like the beginning of tragedy rather than its opposite. Just as life inevitably led to death, happiness often felt like nothing more than a temporary process leading toward suffering.

Now he had this small hut hidden within the forest. A teacher. A sister who smiled freely again. A life quiet enough that, at times, he almost forgot how cruel the world could be.

Which was exactly why it terrified him.

Because, unconsciously, part of him kept waiting for it to be taken away.

"Oppa?"

Melissa’s voice snapped him from his thoughts.

She tilted her head while looking at him.

"You’re making that scary face again."

"...Do I always make a scary face to you?"

"Yes!"

"That’s rude."

"It’s true!"

Whoosh——!

And perhaps Zen had been right all along.

Perhaps happiness truly did lead to tragedy.

Because the face that had just been smiling at him moments ago was suddenly swallowed by flames.

It had only taken a year for everything to come crashing down.

"O-Oppa..."

"Don’t touch it, Eunah!"

In that moment of desperation, Zen had mistakenly called Melissa by the name of the little sister he once knew as Chae Eunwoo.

It had only been a small mistake. But that single mistake ended up costing him everything.

One day, after discovering a strange artifact and thinking it beautiful enough to turn into a necklace for Jihyeon, Melissa had playfully tampered with it as a prank.

The next moment, dark flames suddenly engulfed her entire body.

"Zen!"

Arriving just in time, Jihyeon got in between the two, shielding Zen from Melissa.

"What the hell is going on?!" Jihyeon shouted. "Where did you two get that thing?!"

"I-I found it near the river a few days ago!" Zen answered frantically. "I thought it was just some old relic—"

"You brought an unknown artifact into the house?!"

Before Zen could respond, Melissa suddenly screamed.

The black flames surged upward.

Unlike ordinary fire, they gave off no warmth. The temperature around them rapidly dropped as frost began to form along the wooden floor.

"O-Oppa... it hurts..."

Melissa’s voice trembled weakly.

At that moment, Jihyeon’s expression changed completely.

"...Dark magic."

Zen froze.

The artifact lying on the floor had already cracked open, revealing a dark core pulsating like a living heart. Strange black mana leaked endlessly from it, as though the thing itself was breathing.

"How is something like this here...?"

Jihyeon immediately raised her hand. Several magic circles appeared around Melissa in an attempt to contain the flames.

But the moment her mana touched them, the black fire swallowed it whole.

"...!"

Jihyeon’s eyes widened slightly.

The flames were consuming mana itself.

"Zen!" she shouted. "Get outside! Now!"

"But Eunah—"

"Go!"

For the first time since he met her, Zen heard genuine fear in Jihyeon’s voice.