Prologue

𝘋𝘳𝘦𝘢𝘮𝘴 𝘥𝘰𝘯'𝘵 𝘤𝘰𝘮𝘦 𝘵𝘳𝘶𝘦 𝘴𝘰 𝘦𝘢𝘴𝘪𝘭𝘺.

𝘞𝘦𝘭𝘭, 𝘺𝘦𝘢𝘩. 𝘐 𝘮𝘦𝘢𝘯, 𝘐 𝘤𝘢𝘯 𝘣𝘢𝘳𝘦𝘭𝘺 𝘩𝘢𝘯𝘥𝘭𝘦 𝘳𝘦𝘢𝘭𝘪𝘵𝘺.

𝘚𝘰, 𝘪𝘯 𝘰𝘵𝘩𝘦𝘳 𝘸𝘰𝘳𝘥𝘴, 𝘢𝘭𝘭 𝘸𝘪𝘴𝘩𝘦𝘴 𝘢𝘳𝘦 𝘯𝘦𝘢𝘳𝘭𝘺 𝘶𝘯𝘢𝘵𝘵𝘢𝘪𝘯𝘢𝘣𝘭𝘦.

𝘞𝘦𝘭𝘭, 𝘺𝘦𝘢𝘩, 𝘣𝘶𝘵 𝘯𝘰𝘵 𝘢𝘭𝘭 𝘯𝘦𝘢𝘳𝘭𝘺 𝘶𝘯𝘢𝘵𝘵𝘢𝘪𝘯𝘢𝘣𝘭𝘦 𝘵𝘩𝘪𝘯𝘨𝘴 𝘢𝘳𝘦 𝘸𝘪𝘴𝘩𝘦𝘴.

That's a single fragment of Zerozaki and me. A small sample of our conversation.

Let's suppose that it hadn't been a nonsensical babbler, like me, who was there. Imagine, instead, it was someone who harbors at least a soupçon of doubt about the world — the person would still have had a more or less similar experience in conversation with Zerozaki.

When you were in conversation with him, the exchange wasn't influenced by cheaply supplied empathy, or a pathetic desire to conform. Nor was it ever a product of the miraculously common synchronicity you see everywhere. Instead, a conversation with Zerozaki was a meditative realm within a mirror, that preceded meaning and conceptualization; it simply said, "This is the way it is."

There was no speck of realism, or any fragment of necessity, or any segment of a theoretical formula, or clarification or cloudification; not a single puff of congruence and no such word as allusion; no solution nor illusion; not a drop of cogency; not a streak of the world order; and above all else, there was no romance.

The true comedy of it, however, was that in spite of all the things conversation with him wasn't, there was still something. It was the kind of comedy that bred sorrow, demanded compassion, and that had an even poignant air.

I think he was an irregularity, to begin with.

An untouchable.

When I think about Zerozaki as someone "on the other side of the water" — as the person I saw on the other side when I saw my reflection on the surface of the water — that's the only way I can think to make any sense of him. And without being able to make any sense of him, there's absolutely no point in trying to put his existence into words.

But then again, regardless of what he may have been, was there even any meaning to Zerozaki in the first place? If he was like me and possessed no meaning whatsoever, then to look at Zerozaki from the outside and expect to come up with any kind of judgment was a misguided train of thought from the very beginning. How could one go about describing this sensation? Explaining this miraculous, entirely too familiar tale?

Being with Zerozaki was like looking into my own face and talking to myself.

Yeah.

It was an impossible, chance meeting to begin with.

Maybe it had all begin long ago, with our very first experience.

The very first word we ever heard.

Our root memories.

A past both easy to recall and easy to metaphorically describe.

We were traveling in the same direction from the same point.

From the beginning of days.

Like reflections in a mirror.

That is to say, I think we were similar.

We were like two congruent figures, so similar that there was no need for a geometric proof. And we were both incredibly aware of this. From a subjective viewpoint, when we spoke to each other, I was, of course, myself; and Zerozaki, of course, Zerozaki.

Neither of us was anything more or less than just that, and we were well aware of this. And yet we identified with each other, were unified with each other. That was the paradox that we shared — a paradox that surpassed the limitations of language.

He was on the opposite side of the water's surface.

Now, imagine an innocent, young girl.

Imagine the first time she ever looked in the mirror. Surely, in her perfect innocence, she didn't know that the image before her was a mere reflection of the light. Instead, she imagined. She created something more: On the other side of the mirror, she saw an endless world, separated from her by a single pane. A perfect replica of her "here," yet existing in an infinitely distant place. An enormous paradox of a world — living inside of her imagination.

It wasn't ignorance that allowed such a paradox to exist. It mattered little which world was the true one and which was false. If one side was real, then the other was fake, but if reality was, in fact, fake, then both sides had equal value, and equally lacked value.

That's what I think.

So did Zerozaki.

In a sense, my relationship with Zerozaki was very much like that. We realized we were the same, but we also understood that, at the same time, we were completely different.

"I might have once become like you, so I feel a certain affinity."

"I definitely could not have become like you. That's what I like about ya."

This was another fragment of us.

Truly nonsensical.

Ultimately.

I'm pretty sure we both despised ourselves. Likewise, we despised our own kind and scorned our own species. We both hated ourselves, resented ourselves, cursed ourselves so much that we were able to acknowledge each other with a bit of irony.

I think it was something special.

Wait, of course, it was: I was the passive onlooker, and he, the homicidal monster. We existed at such extremes; it really did feel like there was a mirror between us.

But as soon as that dreamer of a girl reached out her graceful hand and placed a finger on that mirror, all she would feel was a void. Nothing but nothingness. The thing she had allowed to exist, someone else had not. Moreover, the thing she had allowed to exist didn't mean anything to anyone else. And this, she finally realized. For that girl, at that moment, without any exaggeration, a world had been destroyed.

And so begins the story of the downfall of a single world. A world that falls apart not due to the interference of an azure-haired Savant or a crimson-haired Mankind's Greatest, but simply because that's the way it was. When a fallacy bearing a justifiable paradox descends upon a human failure and me, a pile of damaged goods, everything goes back to zero.

So...