PROLOGUE 2

The Moment That Should Not Exist

Darkness.

Not the kind that comes with night. Not the kind that fades with dawn.

This was—still. Endless.

Nothing moved. Nothing breathed. Nothing existed.

Then—a sound. Faint. Distant.

A heartbeat.

...No. Two.

One—weak. Fading. Slipping away.

The other—steady. Unfamiliar. Wrong.

They overlapped. For a moment. Only a moment.

Then they collided.

---

Pain. Sudden. Violent. Unforgiving.

It tore through the silence—ripping it apart.

Fragments of memory shattered open. Rain. A rooftop. Falling.

A room. Silk sheets. A locked door.

A voice—crying. Begging. Breaking.

Another voice—laughing. Soft. Cruel.

They didn’t belong together. They were never meant to meet.

But now—they were the same.

---

Something resisted.

A fading will. A dying consciousness. It tried—to let go. To disappear. To end.

But something else refused.

A second will. Colder. Sharper. Unfamiliar.

It didn’t break. It didn’t surrender.

It took.

The darkness trembled. Cracked.

And in that fracture—something changed.

Fate. Time. Ending.

All of it—shifted.

---

The weaker heartbeat faltered. Once. Twice.

Then—gone.

The other remained. Stronger now. Claiming. Replacing.

Air rushed in. Sharp. Burning.

Pain followed. Heavy. Real. Alive.

And somewhere—in a room that should have been silent—a body that should have been empty—

Breathed.

---

The Moment Before Awakening

Silence. Not complete. Not peaceful. Fragile.

Like something had just ended—and something else had taken its place.

---

A room. Dim. Heavy. Curtains drawn. Air thick with the faint scent of medicine.

A body lay on the bed. Still. Unmoving. Too still.

For a moment, nothing happened.

Then—fingers twitched. Once. Then again. Slow. Uncertain. As if remembering how to move. 𝚏𝐫𝚎𝗲𝕨𝐞𝐛𝕟𝚘𝐯𝚎𝗹.𝕔𝐨𝗺

A breath followed. Shallow. Uneven.

Pain came next. Low in the abdomen. Sharp. Persistent. Real.

The body reacted before the mind caught up.

A hand lifted. Instinctively. Resting over the stomach.

Warm. Alive. A heartbeat. Not hers.

---

The realization came quietly. Not as shock. Not as panic. But as certainty.

Something had changed.

Fragments surfaced. A marriage without warmth. A man without mercy. A sister with a smile too perfect to trust.

Accusations. Whispers. Judgment.

A future—already written. Already doomed.

And an ending—already seen.

---

Her breathing steadied.

Then something else settled in. Clarity. Cold. Precise. Unforgiving.

This was the beginning.

Not of life—but of destruction.

And she had arrived exactly at the moment it started.

Outside the door—faint voices. Footsteps. Waiting.

For her to wake. For her to break. For her to fall—exactly as she had before.

Her fingers pressed slightly against the fabric over her stomach.

Not fear.

Awareness. Calculation.

Then—slowly—her eyes opened.

Dark. Clear. Different.

Not the woman who died. Something else. Something that already knew how this story ended—

And refused to let it happen again.

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