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In the director\'s office at Sehee Research Institute, Seoah and I were glued to the security CCTV footage playing on the monitor mounted on the wall.

I glanced over at Seoah, breaking the silence.

"Why did it suddenly decide to bolt? I\'ve watched this video a dozen times, and I can’t spot anything that might’ve provoked it. No attacks, nothing.”

Seoah responded calmly, her expression thoughtful.

“I did a thorough analysis of the Research Institute that quarantined it before Sehee Research Institute acquired it. I found some… suspicious factors.”

“Really? What did you find?” I asked, tilting my head slightly, my interest thoroughly piqued.

Seoah then pulled up a series of photos that looked like something out of a dystopian military thriller.

In the images, I saw an imposing structure surrounded by a thick reinforced exterior wall, complete with an explosive device that could blow at any moment and bury the containment room underground.

Wow, they really went all out, I thought, my eyes widening a bit at the sight.

"I think the reason for its escape is that our institute doesn\'t have such a high-intensity containment room. It might’ve seen a chance to escape and got a little aggressive to make it happen. Just look at its behavior after it broke out—it headed straight for the stairs instead of attacking anyone."

“So, you’re saying it pretended to be harmless when escape seemed impossible but decided to make a run for it when it saw an opportunity?”

I couldn’t help but feel a little offended, like the Object had decided we were an easy mark.

“Thankfully, that won’t be happening again.”

When I turned my gaze to the corner of the table, I saw a reliable and cute soldier standing with an upright posture. It was a Golden Reaper donning a helmet and spear made of water!

The combination of their confident stance and cute appearance made them twice as endearing in an instant.

After the Glass Flamingo incident, the Golden Reapers had somehow acquired helmets and spears and started patrolling the lab.

There was one in every containment room.

One in every office.

A bunch of them trotting cutely down the hallway.

And plenty of them standing guard by the puddings in the break room.

To us, they were undeniably cute. But for the Objects, it was a different story. Whenever the Golden Reapers were on patrol, the aggression of the other Objects dropped significantly.

The employees who frequently encountered the adorable Golden Reapers were also thrilled!

We’d officially become the safest—and most content—research institute in the world.

*********I was enjoying a dreamy rest on the artificial beach in the water park. Beneath me, Yerin was sprawled out on a hard plastic bed that couldn’t hold a candle to the soft sandy beach.

Even though the bed was hard and should’ve been uncomfortable, Yerin still had her eyes closed, looking utterly blissful. Meanwhile, I was lying on top of her, all relaxed and cozy. Above me, the Golden Reapers, usually so energetic, were taking a break.

Some of them rested on my stomach, while others were happily bouncing up and down on it.

Yerin looked happy, and I was equally delighted—I mean, I got to lie on a soft bed instead of a hard one!

It was paradise, really, with even the Golden Reapers frolicking about.

Watching the Golden Reapers scampering around the water park, I felt a warm satisfaction, like their playfulness, which had been fading lately, was finally back in full swing.

Oh, right! I hadn\'t messed with the Blue Reapers who whacked me with the marshmallow hammer. Since I didn’t want to upset the Golden Reapers, I figured I’d have to treat the youngest Reaper like I did the others.

But the youngest was so delicate, and it was tricky to come up with a harmless prank. If I tossed them in the washing machine like I did with the Golden Reapers, they’d probably fall apart!

As I munched on sweet snacks and watched the Golden Reapers joyfully splash about, Yerin started nibbling on my antennae.

But the end of that peaceful day came with a sudden crack in the air. When I saw the crack stretching out, aiming straight for Yerin’s head, I panicked and quickly summoned the Garden of the Mini Reaper around it.

Luckily, the crack didn’t tear through my space, just stopping midair.

"!"

Yerin, clearly startled by the sudden turn of events, forgot to even make a sound. She just stood up and wrapped her arms around my neck.

The space that had split quickly snapped back to normal, but the ground affected by the crack started to crumble.

What in the world was happening?

I felt a bit angry—okay, maybe more than a bit—thinking that whatever this was almost hurt Yerin. So, I got up and spread my senses around.

I was ninety percent sure it was that pesky tree that could cut through space and devour it.

Just as I was plotting how to turn that tree into sawdust, James burst into the containment room, fiddling with his phone.

“Why couldn’t I reach you? Everyone, get out! We need to evacuate James City right now.”

James was drenched in sweat, like he’d run here at full speed. Yerin, seeing the crack slicing through steel walls like pudding, quickly covered the top of her swimsuit and hurried after James without a word.

As we made our escape on the electric cart, I could see how chaotic the research institute had become. All the doors were flung open, as if everyone had fled in a rush, leaving papers and high-tech gadgets scattered all over the floor. Occasionally, I spotted dismembered bodies near the space cracks.

“A little while ago, I got a report that something was off with the barrier. Even though the calculations say we’ve got six hours to evacuate, I’m not so sure. The tree’s messing with time, so no one knows if six hours will turn into one hour, one second, or one year. We’ve got to move fast…”

James explained, his face tense with worry.

“But at least the barrier’s holding, for now. When the tree first expanded the space beyond the barrier, everyone was scrambling to escape, and the damage was severe.”

James muttered under his breath, “I never imagined the Vice Mayor would make such a choice.”

As we sped past the Institute’s grounds, the streets outside were deserted. It looked like several cracks had appeared in the space beyond the research institute too.

Most of the tall buildings were crumbling, and the low ones looked ready to collapse at any moment.

I placed two Golden Reapers on Yerin’s and James’ heads, respectively, and then leapt out of the cart.

“Reaper?”

I glanced back at Yerin, who was walking away, and then dashed toward the barrier in my phantom form.

Whatever had put Yerin in danger was going to pay for it—I’d make sure of that.

*********Where am I?

Even as I tried to grasp my surroundings, all I felt was confusion.

Ah… I was in the barrier control room, wasn’t I?

I need to protect the wall.

I have to protect citizens from that dangerous Object...

But the reality before my eyes wasn’t the control room. It was a shattered, chaotic space, like a mirror broken into countless fragments.

It was a mosaic of incomprehensible moments.

The space was silent, as though I were submerged deep beneath the ocean.

Colors and shapes twisted together, a kaleidoscope of disjointed visions.

My thoughts, like the world around me, had fundamentally changed, leaving me utterly disconnected from everything.

I looked down and saw my palms, rooted to the console, anchoring me like a ship’s anchor in this storm of chaos.

The timer on the console displayed six hours, but then the numbers blurred, overlapping with one hour and then minus thirty hours.

The time displayed on the console was a mess, rendering the ‘remaining time’ meaningless.

Yes! This must be it—the time distortion beyond the barrier I’d only read about in the records.

A world where time didn’t flow linearly, but instead jumped and twisted.

The control panel I was touching had already fractured into several pieces. It looked ancient and broken, as though thousands of years had passed. But whenever I glanced away for just a moment, it was whole again, as if it had never been damaged.

And I—or something I presumed to be me—was mixed up too.

I was dead. And yet, somehow, still alive. Staring at my own corpse.

Six hours should have passed, but it felt like time had stopped—or maybe it had never stopped at all.

It felt like I’d been trapped in this shattered world forever, repeating this situation endlessly.

A maze with no exit, where the past, present, and future collided, merged, and looped endlessly.

It was my prison.

*********Plop-! Plop-!

I wandered alone through the once lively streets, now deserted and empty. Each step echoed with a soft, lonely rhythm in the middle of the quiet city.

Oh, there was a restaurant that looked like it sold the tastiest food, and the facilities were amazing too! This city would’ve been so much fun to explore with Yerin tomorrow. But now, the roads and buildings were in ruins, with only traces left behind of people who had hurriedly fled.

Like a little salmon swimming upstream, I made my way closer and closer to my destination, stepping on the remnants of those who ran away to save themselves. With every step, I could feel the ominous vibration of the barrier growing stronger, and the closer I got, the more I could sense that tree’s presence.

Occasionally, cracks would appear in the air, tearing through the city like lightning on a stormy night.

When I finally arrived in front of the large barrier, it looked… really bad. Honestly, it was a miracle it still held together. It was like a barrier made of shattered pottery, somehow stuck back together with sheer willpower.

Then, all of a sudden, a gap opened up in the cracked barrier, like a wound seeping dark blue light—like it was bleeding or something.

I raised my head, peering up at the barrier, and without a second thought, I leaped right into the wound.

*********The chaotic, unrecognizable world, once scattered in a thick fog, began to align, but only the control panel and I remained clear amidst the confusion.

It felt as though a powerful Object had set its gaze upon this fractured reality.

When I forced my head to move and looked up, the world was still shattered, but now it was something else entirely.

It was a landscape of countless realities, torn apart and pieced back together—a living, breathing mosaic of distorted existence.

The ground beneath me was a patchwork of mismatched land, forced together like pieces of a puzzle that didn’t belong. Yet, it was filled with white flowers that pulsed with a sinister life.

At the same time, it was a ghostly land where long shadows danced alone, eerily disconnected from anything casting them.

And at the far edge of this fragmented world, a towering tree spread its long, thick roots, desperately clutching the torn pieces of land, trying to hold them together.

Above, the sky was a dizzying chaos, a curtain of dusk and dawn, day and night, all mixed together. It was as if time itself had shattered into the sky, each fragment reflecting a different moment.

Yet, it wasn’t the tree that dominated this surreal space.

It was a colossal, dark blue moon, floating in the broken sky, its heavy light pressing down on the trees, casting an oppressive shadow over everything below.