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**[Panel 1: A sprawling, neon-lit cityscape at dusk. Skyscrapers pulse with holographic ads for "EternalLife™" and "SoulSync 2.0." A faint grid-like shimmer overlays the sky, almost imperceptible.]**
**Narrator (Caption):**
*They say the universe is a question waiting to be solved. But what if the answer lies in the cracks of reality itself?*
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**[Panel 2: Close-up of Dr. KAI JIN-WOO, 28, a disheveled physicist with shadows under his eyes. He's scribbling equations on a glass tablet. Behind him, a wall of screens displays fractal patterns and error messages labeled "Quantum Anomaly Detected."]**
**Kai (muttering):**
"Energy decay rates don't align… Planck constants shifting by 0.0003% every 47 hours. This isn't random noise. It's a *pattern*."
**[Panel 3: Flashback—Kai as a child, staring at a moth trapped in amber. His father's voice echoes: "Son, entropy always wins. But what if someone's *cheating*?"]**
**Kai (Voiceover):**
Ten years since the accident. Ten years since Dad vanished into his own experiments. Now I'm chasing the same ghosts…
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**[Panel 4: Kai's lab. A machine labeled "Causal Matrix Scanner" hums violently. His assistant, LIRA, a sharp-tongued AI hologram, materializes.]**
**Lira:**
"Your vitals are spiking, Doctor. Again. Should I prep the defibrillator or the whiskey?"
**Kai (ignoring her):**
"Run the simulation again. This time, inject tachyons at the 17th dimensional axis."
**Lira:**
"Last time we did that, you hallucinated a talking cat quoting Nietzsche."
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**[Panel 5: The scanner erupts in light. Kai's pupils dilate as fractal code floods his vision. The city outside warps—buildings pixelate, civilians flicker like glitchy NPCs.]**
**Kai (internally):**
*There. The Fibonacci sequence in the cosmic microwave background… It's a signature. A* ***maker's mark***.
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**[Panel 6: Kai stumbles into an alley. A homeless man with mismatched eyes blocks his path. His name tag reads "ERROR 404."]**
**Error 404:**
"You're close, Jin-Woo. But the System doesn't like snoopers. Ask yourself—why do babies cry at birth? *They remember the code.*"
**Kai:**
"Who are you?!"
**Error 404 (fading):**
"A subroutine gone rogue. Or your conscience. Depends on the resolution."
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**[Panel 7: Kai returns to his lab. On his desk, a photo of his father's last note: "The womb isn't a beginning—it's a buffer zone. We're all unborn, waiting to render."**
**Kai (to Lira):**
"Initiate Protocol Lazarus. We're hacking into the base layer."
**Lira:**
"Your funeral. Literally."
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**[Panel 8: The scanner pierces reality. Kai's body disintegrates into binary strands. His POV: infinite server farms stretching into cosmic voids, each pod containing a glowing fetus connected by data cords.]**
**Unknown Voice (echoing):**
***Welcome to the Nursery, Dr. Jin-Woo. You've violated Term 42.1 of the Simulation Agreement.***
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**[Panel 9: Two figures materialize—agents in black suits, their faces shifting like Deepfake glitches. Agent 1 unsheathes a blade made of corrupted code.]**
**Agent 1:**
"Memory wipe protocol engaged."
**Kai (grinning maniacally):**
"Funny. I just *remembered* how to delete system files."
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**[Final Panel: Full-page spread. Kai's hand erupts with primal energy—neon-blue equations intertwining with organic veins. The agents recoil as reality itself fractures around them.]**
**Kai (caption):**
*If we're just data… Let's become a **virus**.*
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