Asher had learned to expect the unexpected. But this?This was a whole new level of messed up.
Fate had a name now.And it wasn't some abstract concept or poetic metaphor. It was a person—cold, calculating, impossibly real.And that person wanted him dead.
Location: The Rooftops – 3:15 AM
The city below was a dead heartbeat.
Asher stood on the ledge, gazing down at the twisted arteries of the metropolis. Streetlights flickered weakly through the dense fog like dying stars, casting long, twitching shadows over buildings that seemed to sag under the weight of their own silence.
It had been twenty minutes since he'd left the bar. The man's words kept looping in his head like a corrupted track:
"You were never meant to wake up. The rewrite was an error. But now that you know, it's only a matter of time before you burn again."
Asher rubbed his arms through his coat sleeves, trying to ward off the chill. But it wasn't the cold. It was the feeling of being watched. Followed. Hunted.
"The rewrite was planned."
The thought spiraled through his mind like a virus, warping every memory he still had. Every truth.
"Why me?""Why now?""Who benefits from erasing someone's entire life—and failing?"
A gust of wind stirred the rooftop gravel, and Asher instinctively turned. His eyes scanned the shadows, his hand sliding into his coat for the Black Key.
But there was no one.
Just the sound of the city pretending to sleep.
Then, movement.A paper bird, impossibly light against the heavy air, danced along the rooftop's edge.
The same one that led me to the bar.
Its wings shimmered strangely, bending in and out of focus like it existed half-in, half-out of this world.
He stepped toward it. The bird dove off the edge—and Asher didn't hesitate.
He leapt.
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The Unseen Watcher
The alley swallowed him whole.
He landed hard, knees buckling on damp pavement. The paper bird fluttered down the corridor, unfazed by gravity or logic.
This alley wasn't on any map. He was sure of it.
The walls seemed… wrong. Like they weren't made of brick or concrete but some imitation of reality—peeling at the edges, flickering under broken neon signs that spelled nothing in every language.
His boots echoed too loud.
His breath frosted the air despite the warmth.
And then the bird vanished.
Blink.
A red light blinked twice in the distance. Then black.
And then, a voice.
"You've been looking for me."
Asher's hand moved—not to the Black Key—but to something else. Something colder.The shard of mirror.
Found in the morgue. Sharp. Unnatural. It hummed like it remembered things.
He raised it.
The mirror's reflection rippled, revealing not his face, but something older. Hungrier. Watching him through time.
"I know what you're searching for, Asher Blackwood," the voice continued, calm and cruel. "And I can give it to you."
A figure emerged. Tall. Hooded. Its cloak devoured the light. It wasn't wearing shadow—it was made of it. A living absence.
"You don't need to keep looking," it said. "You just need to accept what's been written."
Asher narrowed his eyes. "I write my own story."
A low chuckle rumbled the alley walls."You thought you did. But the moment you woke up again, the script changed."
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Creepy Event #9: The Shadow's Hand
Then the arm extended.
Not reached. Extended. Stretching impossibly long, distorting like a looping VHS tape caught mid-glitch. It moved like meat shouldn't.
Its fingers hovered inches from his face. And then—
The fingers unraveled into strands of darkness and re-formed in front of him.
"You can't run from fate," the voice whispered. "We are always watching."
Asher's heart stammered. His breath caught.
He slammed the shard to the ground, and it hummed violently, releasing a ripple of static power that made the air scream.
The figure flinched. A hiss escaped its hood. But it didn't vanish.
"Leave. Me. Alone!" Asher shouted.
The words echoed too far. Too loud. Reality bent with the echo.
"The rewrite was only the beginning," the voice hissed, calm once more. "You're not the only story we've adjusted. We can fix you—or unmake you."
A second arm extended—this one reaching toward the shard.
And Asher felt it—not fear, not even dread.
He felt unraveling.
Like pieces of himself being quietly erased.
--------------------------------
The Truth About the Shadow
The memories hit like a tsunami.
The fire.The scream.A girl's voice. Rachel's?The rewrite.A scream again—this time his own.
"You were never supposed to come back," the voice murmured, almost mournful. "But now, you have. And you're dangerous, Asher."
The shadow leaned in close.Its breath wasn't air. It was absence.
"It's not just your memories. You broke the timeline. The cost… is everything."
Asher gritted his teeth. I won't be your puppet.
He raised the shard again. Focused.
This is mine. My story. My memory. My choice.
It blazed—silver-gold light flaring from the glass, and Asher screamed as power surged through his arm like liquid lightning.
The shadow recoiled again. It wailed—not a sound, but a feeling of a thousand regrets clawing to be remembered.
"You're already losing," the voice hissed as it vanished, folding into the dark like smoke beneath the city's skin.
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Creepy Event #10: The Echoes of the Dead
Alone again.
Or not quite.
His phone buzzed. A single vibration, hollow and ominous.
A message. No, a video. From an unknown number.
He hesitated. Then tapped play.
Static. White noise.
Then—clarity.
A figure.
Rachel.
Standing in a hallway of flickering lights, eyes locked on the screen. Too still. Her mouth opened, slow and unnatural.
"Get out. It's already too late."
The screen glitched. Then blacked out.
----------------------------------------
Back to Reality
Asher's knees threatened to give out. He stared at his reflection in the broken shard—at the man who'd come back from the dead.
"Rachel's alive?""Or… was that a warning from before?""Or after?"
He didn't know anymore.
But he had to find her.
He couldn't run. Not now. Not with the truth whispering at the edges of every shadow. Not when fate had a face, a voice, and a hand that reached across time
.
[End of Chapter 7]
Preview for Chapter 8
– The Power of Rewrites
Asher's search for Rachel leads him into the uncharted archives of the city's elite—a library that doesn't exist on maps and is guarded by memories not his own. As he uncovers the origins of the Rewrite and the ones who wield it, Asher begins to see just how far the manipulation goes—and who might have betrayed him before the story even began.
Rewrites aren't just edits. They're erasures. And someone has the pen.