The subway was empty.
Not just empty in the usual way, where the silence of the car was filled with the humming of tired commuters and the occasional announcement echoing over the speakers—but truly empty. The kind of emptiness that left echoes suspended in the air for just a second too long, like the world was still holding its breath.
I sat on one of the plastic seats, the window beside me reflecting a face that looked… far too familiar. And far too strange.
My Face.
The system was silent now. No notifications, no stat windows, no ever-looming threat of another scenario. Just the faint screech of wheels along rusted tracks as the subway moved forward into a world that had long since stopped spinning the way it used to.
Outside the window, Seoul was bathed in a soft morning light. Half-rebuilt buildings leaned against each other like wounded soldiers, cranes hovering like guardian spirits over the skyline. People walked the streets with hesitant smiles—survivors who hadn't yet figured out how to live again.
They were still trying.
So was I.
I adjusted the cuffs of my jacket—new, but still somehow too large, like it belonged to someone I hadn't caught up to yet. The government had issued it when I returned. Along with papers. An identity. A place to live. Meetings scheduled with people who spoke of order and recovery, of systems and registries. They all asked the same thing:
"Is it true you're the last constellation?"
I didn't answer them.
Not really because I couldn't. But because they wouldn't understand, only the stories I had remained in this world, after I came back the system flowed into me, only to those who had a part of the story retained their former powers. Like that lofty of Joo Junghyeok.
The train slowed, the familiar jolt tugging at something in my chest. I stood before the doors opened, stepping out onto the platform of a station that shouldn't exist anymore. It had been destroyed—no, erased—during one of the early scenarios. And yet here it stood, perfectly intact, the tile floor shining with dew, the air cold and clean.
The world was trying to forget the apocalypse. But the cracks were still there, just under the surface.
"Hey. You're late."
I turned. She stood at the top of the steps, arms crossed, black coat whipping in the breeze like some noir detective pulled out of a manhwa. Her hair was shorter than I remembered. She looked tired. But her eyes were still sharp—unapologetically alive.
Han Sooyoung.
I opened my mouth. Closed it again.
She sighed. "Still can't form complete sentences, I see."
And just like that, the breath I'd been holding let itself go in a quiet laugh.
"I missed you," I said.
She blinked once. Twice. Her lips pressed together, unreadable.
Then she stepped past me. "Come on. You're buying coffee. You owe me years' worth of emotional damage."
I followed her up the steps, the soft rhythm of our footsteps syncing like a quiet heartbeat.
Somehow, even after the end of everything, this felt real.
The café was still standing. Somehow.
It was one of those chain places, tucked between a convenience store and a rehab clinic—new additions to the neighborhood that hadn't been there before the world ended. The sign buzzed faintly, one of the letters flickering. Inside, the place was almost empty, except for a college student half-asleep over a textbook and a barista with earphones tucked under their cap.
Han Sooyoung ordered a black Americano without looking at the menu. I ordered the same, mostly out of habit. She shot me a look like she knew that. Maybe she did.
We sat by the window. For a while, neither of us spoke.
The coffee was bitter. It tasted like memory.
"You're not a ghost, right?" she said finally, eyes staring out at the street. "I was starting to think I imagined you coming back."
I looked down at the cup in my hands. The heat had already started to fade. "I feel like one."
"Don't start with the self-pity," she snapped, too quickly. Then she sighed and leaned back, rubbing at her eyes. "Sorry. That was… automatic."
"No, you're right."
Silence again. But it wasn't uncomfortable.
Outside, a mother was helping a small child step over a crack in the sidewalk. Across the street, an old man sold roasted chestnuts from a steel cart, steam rising into the spring air like incense.
"This world is still here" I said.
"For now," she replied. "You think it'll stay that way?"
I didn't answer immediately. Instead, I watched the mother pick up the child and spin them around, the sound of laughter faint through the glass.
"I don't know," I said. "I'm not the oldest dream anymore."
She gave me a sidelong glance, something unreadable flickering in her eyes. "You've not changed."
"Yeah?" I tried to smile.
"Still an idiot, though." Han Sooyoung snorted softly into her coffee.
We sat there for a while longer, not saying much. But there was something between us that hadn't been there before. Not tension. Not even distance. Just… time. Wounds that hadn't fully closed. Words we hadn't said.
"You know," she said, twirling her coffee cup in her hands, "I started writing again."
I looked at her, surprised.
She met my eyes for the first time since we sat down. "The story. The one I promised you."
My heart skipped.
"I don't know if I can finish it," she admitted, her voice softer now. "But I'm going to try."
I didn't know what to say. So I just nodded.
"I'd like to read it," I said. "When you're ready."
She gave a small, crooked smile. "Don't flatter yourself. You're not the protagonist."
"I never was."
We left the café sometime after that, stepping back into the waking world. The sun had climbed higher. The wind had softened. Somewhere nearby, someone was playing a radio too loud. An old love song drifted into the air like a half-remembered dream.
Han Sooyoung walked beside me, hands in her coat pockets. "So. What's next for the last constellation?"
I thought for a long moment.
"I think," I said, "I'll start living."
She didn't say anything. But when I glanced at her, there was the ghost of a smile tugging at her lips.
Maybe, just maybe, this was the real beginning.
We walked without a destination. Just side by side. The city around us was familiar and foreign all at once—like we had stepped back into someone else's life and were trying to wear it like it fit.
The buildings had changed. The people, too. But maybe we were the ones out of place.
Han Sooyoung stopped in front of a bookstore. The glass window was cracked in one corner, but inside, the shelves were full. She tilted her head toward it. "They rebuilt this one. Used to come here when I skipped class."
I smiled faintly. "You skipped class?"
She gave me a flat look. "What part of 'emotionally unhinged writer' made you think I followed rules?"
Fair point.
Inside, the store was warm and smelled of old paper and new bindings. A cat dozed on the counter, curled into the sunbeam like it owned the place. No one said anything as we walked between the shelves. No one had to.
Sooyoung stopped by the fiction section and ran her fingers along the spines. "They don't know how close they were," she murmured. "How many stories ended before they began."
I didn't answer. I just looked at the row of books. Some were familiar. Some were names I didn't know. And yet the idea that stories could still be written—that people wanted to write them—felt like a miracle.
She plucked a book off the shelf, flipped through a few pages, then tucked it back without buying it. "When I'm done with mine, I'll put it here," she said, like it was nothing.
Like it wasn't everything.
We left after that, stepping back into the drifting rhythm of the city. The streets hummed with quiet life. An old man played a harmonica at the corner. A little girl was jumping rope, her laughter cutting clean through the air, this part of Seoul not yet rebuilt despite the past time, an indelible sign of the previous apocalypse
It hit me then—this fragile peace. How easy it would be to lose it. How hard it had been to earn.
"I've been helping the government," I said after a long silence. "Consulting, mostly. On residual system anomalies. Gate remainders. Stabilization protocols."
Sooyoung gave me a sideways glance. "So, the last constellation is now a glorified civil servant."
"Someone's got to keep the world from unraveling."
She didn't say anything for a moment. Then: "Do they know what you really are?"
I shook my head. "They know what they want to know. I let them believe I'm a remnant of the system. A stabilizer. It's easier."
"And the truth?"
"The truth is complicated."
She snorted. "It always is."
We turned down a quieter street, one lined with trees in full bloom. Spring hadn't fully taken root yet, but there were exception. Signs of something new. Something growing.
Maybe that was enough.
She paused in front of a nondescript apartment building. "This is my place."
I nodded. "Right."
Sooyoung didn't go in immediately. She stood there, watching me like she was trying to read a line that kept shifting.
Then she said, voice low, "You know… you could've said goodbye."
I looked at her, and for a second, I saw it—past the sarcasm and sharp edges, the ache that never quite healed. The space I left behind.
"I wanted to," I said. "But I didn't know if I deserved that."
She nodded. Didn't smile this time. Just nodded, like that was an answer she could live with.
Then, quietly: "Don't disappear again."
It wasn't a command. It was a request.
A promise waiting to be made.
"I won't."
he approached me lightly touching my cheek, "if you abandon us again next time I'll really make you a squid."
She stared at me a second longer, then turned toward the door. "I'm still charging interest on the emotional damage," she called over her shoulder. "So don't think you're off the hook."
The door clicked shut behind her.
I stood there for a while, alone in the late afternoon light. The sky above was streaked with clouds, but there was sunlight breaking through.
For the first time in a long time, I let it touch my face.
I wasn't sure what came next.
But I was here.
And maybe, just maybe, that was enough.