Memories weren't just slipping away.
They were bleeding into each other.
Twisting.
Smearing.
Like someone had scribbled all over Alepou's past with the wrong pen and dared her to read between the lines.
She stared at the horizon—distant, colorless—and rubbed her temples like the pain might leak out through her fingertips.
"Something's wrong," she muttered.
"Like… really wrong. It's like my memories have been edited. Rewritten. And not even well."
Yuki sat nearby, arms folded tight like she was holding herself together.
"You're not the only one."
Her voice was low, but sharp—too sharp for comfort.
"Lately, I keep getting flashes of places I've never been. People I never met. But they feel real. Like dreams leftover from someone else's life."
They sat in silence—thick, suffocating silence.
No birds. No breeze. Just the uncomfortable weight of timelines tangling up inside their heads.
Then, from the side, Prince Gabrielle—no longer hiding behind his polished act—spoke up.
His voice wavered. "Are we still… talking about me? Or someone else now?"
Alepou's eyes snapped toward him.
Cold. Calculating. Familiar.
"We're talking about Taiyo. My brother. The kid who used to talk about Yuki like she was his goddess."
Yuki's eyes widened slightly. She hadn't expected that.
"He did…?"
Alepou nodded, slow. Controlled.
"But here's the kicker," she said, "you two were never even in the same class. He wasn't even supposed to know you."
She leaned forward, tension coiling in her posture.
"So how the hell did he always know where you'd be? What you liked? Even your damn favorite soda?"
Yuki blinked.
And then—there it was again.
A flicker.
A flash of something not now and not here. A hallway. A vending machine. A boy with messy hair smiling and holding out a can of peach soda.
Her breath hitched.
"He… did give me that once. But…"
She looked down at her hands.
"I don't remember telling anyone about it."
Gabrielle, cornered between questions and a storm he didn't start, finally spoke.
"Look, I don't know who this Taiyo guy is."
He hesitated.
Then:
"But sometimes I dream about stuff that doesn't make sense either. Like I've lived another life. Like I've died… and come back with the wrong name."
Alepou's eyes widened. Just for a second.
Then narrowed again, like pieces of a bigger puzzle were finally moving into place.
"Then say it." Her tone sharpened.
"Say what you're really hiding."
Gabrielle hesitated—then, like air collapsing in his lungs, he whispered:
"Sometimes… I think I was Taiyo. In a past life. Or a parallel one. Or maybe just a different version of this one."
He looked at Yuki, voice breaking.
"And you were the only one who ever remembered me."
Yuki's heart felt like it had cracked open.
Everything—the goblin dungeon, the slime, the name slips—it wasn't coincidence.
It was resonance.
Something—or someone—had twisted their timelines.
And now the echoes were bleeding through.
Alepou stood still.
Her shadow long. Her aura unreadable.
"So, this is it," she murmured.
"We're not just dealing with a broken world. We're part of the glitch itself."
---
What's the fallout?
Alepou's memories don't match the timeline she lives in.
Yuki's remembering things she never lived—but felt.
Gabrielle may have been Taiyo all along—or worse, he might still be.
And someone—or something—is pulling the strings.
> Reality is starting to bend.
Identities are cracking.
And whatever comes next… won't wait for them to catch up.