Ji-hyeon stood in the void, surrounded by fractured time.
His steps echoed across a floor of glass, beneath which played fragments of memories—wars he did not remember fighting, beasts he could not name, a throne of shadows… and a baby crying in a wooden hut.
Ahead of him, the figure in white robes still sat upon a throne shaped like an hourglass.
> "Tell me," the voice echoed, "What remains of you when your memories are stripped away?"
Suddenly, a blinding light seared the sky. Ji-hyeon screamed. His chest tightened as if something was being ripped from him. One by one, his memories began to vanish.
His mother's laughter—gone.
His father's weary smile—faded.
The screams of war… the feel of power—swallowed by fog.
He collapsed to his knees.
> "I am… Ji-hyeon…"
The words echoed uncertainly, fragile and hollow.
From the mist, a shadow stepped forward—a version of himself, without glasses, unscarred, untouched by hardship. An innocent face full of doubt.
The shadow looked down at Ji-hyeon and asked softly,
> "Are you really him?"
Suddenly, amidst the shattered currents of time, someone else appeared.
A young girl, about his age, clad in deep purple robes and a necklace shaped like a cracked hourglass. She didn't belong to the illusion. She was not a memory.
She was real.
Her eyes seemed to pierce through the layers of his soul.
> "He still carries it," she murmured, addressing the robed figure. "The remnants of a forgotten crown. But he does not remember."
Ji-hyeon struggled to stand, his breathing ragged.
> "Who… are you?"
The girl gave a small nod.
> "A witness. Nothing more… for now."
Then, as if the world held its breath, everything shattered.
The shadow of Ji-hyeon faded. The robed figure vanished. The glass floor cracked, and he fell into darkness once more.
When he opened his eyes, he was back in his bed. In his home. In the real world.
The scroll lay burned on the floor.
But on the palm of his hand, a mark had formed—an hourglass etched in ash.