I don't remember the precise moment when fiction devoured my soul.
All I know is—since the first time I could form a thought of my own,
I wanted to escape.
Escape this reality.
Why?
Even I don't know.
Was it the pain?
The hypocrisy that stinks under every polite smile?
Or was the world simply too dull—too predictable—for someone like me?
I was only four when I began to think like this.
Not an age meant for introspection or philosophical turmoil.
An age meant for toys and tantrums.
But I was different—
I always have been.
As the days passed and the curtain lifted, I saw the world for what it truly was.
A stage, yes, but not for truth—
For masks.
People wore them like skin,
Layered in lies, hiding behind hollow smiles.
You could never be sure if the voice next to you was sincere—
Or rehearsed.
And then it happened.
A moment—
A shift.
A trigger.
Something changed in my childhood,
And though I cannot name it, I felt it:
Like being pulled out from the fire into moonlight.
I was saved—
By fiction.
The first time I opened a novel,
My world shattered and rebuilt itself.
Reality cracked, and through that fracture,
I saw something better.
That day, I changed.
Completely.
I started to see this world as fiction.
And if I couldn't escape reality—
I would rewrite how I perceived it.
But there was a cost.
I lost my empathy.
I stopped seeing people as people.
To me, they became… characters.
Pieces on a chessboard.
And I, the lone player.
Think about it.
Have you ever cried for the nameless soldier in a war film?
For the extras who die before the hero arrives?
No.
They are just... numbers.
Background noise.
That's what happened when I changed my lens.
Everything lost meaning—
Everyone, a silhouette.
But escaping reality through perspective comes with rules.
You don't blink when a character dies?
Then don't blink when someone dies in real life.
That was my code.
And God, it was hard.
At six, I understood one thing:
I needed protection.
I couldn't rely on the police, the government,
or anyone else in this scripted world.
So I trained.
Martial arts became my religion.
Judo. Karate. Taekwondo. MMA.
I sought strength.
I meditated beneath waterfalls.
I starved.
I hung myself on crosses.
I searched for ki, for mana, for aura.
Something—anything—to make this fiction feel real.
But reality never played along.
Still, I studied.
Lived.
Played my part.
Insanity?
Absolutely.
Because no sane man sees the world as fiction.
No sane man turns his heart to stone
and burns his soul just to stay sane.
But my roots were poisoned.
I was born into a family that wore masks better than anyone.
A second-generation heir to a prestigious lineage.
My mother died giving me life.
My father remarried.
And love?
It vanished—before I even knew its shape.
So I stopped caring.
About family.
About people.
About everything.
And now?
I tell my story like a novel.
Because I've long believed…
Someone out there is reading me.
For a while, I had no goal.
I drifted—
A fictional being without a plot.
But then I remembered it.
My first fiction.
My first love.
The novel that raised me.
"No Happy Ending in the 999th Regression"
I read it every day for a decade.
Not a single day skipped.
I knew every word.
Every line.
It was more real to me than life.
Until one day,
The author died.
A car crash.
Sudden.
Cruel.
It shattered the little heart I had left.
And then—
The publisher did the unthinkable.
They hired a new author.
A hack.
A butcher in disguise.
He ruined it.
Changed the ending.
Mocked the journey.
And so I did something no reader should ever do.
I took revenge.
Using my father's wealth,
I kidnapped that author—
And every editor who let it happen.
Twelve people.
Eighty million dollars.
Twelve knives.
One by one—
I carved justice into flesh.
I felt nothing.
No satisfaction.
No peace.
Because...
I was the one who killed the original author.
Drunk.
Reckless.
Unforgivable.
It was me.
So I ended it.
Took the same knife.
And bled beside the very people I destroyed.
But not before I gave the author's family
everything I could.
And now—
Here I lie.
Bleeding.
Dying.
Alone.
SWOOSH SWOOSH
My blood—
A darker hue than I expected.
Strange.
Beautiful.
Who cares?
Death is just the final page, right?
I wanted to read the novel one last time…
How many times had I read it?
Hundreds?
Thousands?
Each time like the first.
The characters were my only friends.
I feel it now—
The end.
Oh—my name?
Hahaha... who cares?
Maybe I'll tell you in the next life.
If there is one.
==================
"Lucifer! Hey! Wake up—why are you sleeping in the middle of class?!"
A voice.
A girl's voice.
"…Emelia…? From Class D…?"
"No, dumbass. I'm your mother."
"..."
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