The silence in Sector 3 was too clean. No monsters. No hunters. Just wind curling through forgotten alleyways, carrying the faint static of residual mana.
Kim Suho stood before the abandoned student dormitory, where rusted railings sagged and the glass above the main entrance had long since cracked and fallen. His fingers brushed against the soul pendant around his neck.
It pulsed softly, faint but steady—stronger now than before.
"Areum…"
He stepped through the half-collapsed doorway.
Areum's Room
The corridors of Dormitory 8-A felt like walking through preserved time.
Every step Suho took was muted by dust. The lights were dead, but the walls hummed faintly with lingering distortion. He passed rooms still cluttered with textbooks and clothes, rooms that looked like the students had vanished mid-sentence.
Then he reached it.
Room 317.
Her door was still shut. Her nameplate—Kim Areum, Seoul Awakened Academy—was stained but legible.
He pushed the door open.
Inside, the room was almost untouched. Her bed was made. Her mana battery charger sat on the desk. A faded training schedule was still pinned to the wall beside a photo of her and Suho, laughing beside a mana cafe near the station.
His throat tightened.
He stepped forward, and the pendant on his chest began to glow brighter.
The Fragment Awakens
[Memory Anchor Detected – "Last Phone Call"]
Resonance: 78%
System Notice: Echo Manifestation Imminent.
Warning: Fragment is unstable.]
Then her voice returned.
But not like before—not from his memories. It echoed from the walls, distorted and flickering.
"Oppa… heading in now. Just a C-rank. You don't have to worry so much."
"Let's get lunch later. Just you and me."
"...Okay?"
And then—
the call ended.
The room pulsed with a surge of corrupted mana. The frosted glass cracked. The walls peeled with age that hadn't existed seconds before. From the air, a faint silhouette formed.
Areum.
But not truly.
Her figure was ghost like, a glowing shell of who she had been. Her eyes flickered with static. Her hands trembled, as if unsure whether to reach for him or strike.
"You didn't come…"
"You promised…"
Her voice sounded like wind through broken glass. And then she screamed.
The Echo Battle
Suho didn't summon the wyvern. He didn't call bones to rise. He stepped forward.
"I know."
She attacked.
A spectral blade—shaped like the training sword she once used—sliced through the air. Suho barely dodged. She moved fast as she did in her mock battles back in the academy. He remembered every move.
Because he had watched her win, again and again.
She struck high, then low. Her form was precise. Flawless. Terrifying.
Suho blocked with a mana-forged shield but didn't counter. Her next strike caught his shoulder. He winced but didn't fall.
"You let me die…"
"You weren't there!"
"I wanted to be!" he shouted. "But I wasn't strong enough!"
She froze mid-attack.
That hesitation gave him time to step forward and hold out the pendant. It glowed blue—blinding now, humming like a heartbeat.
He didn't strike.
He embraced her.
"I didn't forget you. I never will."
She trembled in his arms—fading, dissolving into fragments of light and grief.
System Update
[Memory Echo Stabilized]
Fragment Absorbed: "Last Phone Call"
Emotional Resonance Achieved: +6%
Synchronization: 48%
New Trait Gained: Memory Bind – Class-1 Echoes may be stabilized into Sentient Undead
XP Acquired – Nonviolent Echo Resolution
— LEVEL UP —
Current Level: 15 (+1)
Aftermath
Suho dropped to one knee, blood trailing from his arm, eyes wide.
Areum's fragment had dispersed—not shattered, not corrupted. Just… gone. Absorbed into memory. Into him.
Her last words, the real ones, remained in his mind.
"Just you and me, okay?"
He wiped his face and stood slowly.
Outside the Dormitory
Han Yura stood outside, leaning on her rifle. When she saw him, her eyes widened.
"You're bleeding," she said flatly.
"I noticed."
"You went in alone. Again."
"I didn't want her to see anyone else."
Yura crossed her arms. "Did you find what you needed?"
He nodded. "She remembered me. Even if it hurt."
She was quiet for a moment. "You're not going to stop, are you?"
"No," he said. "Because this is what matters. She didn't get a second chance. But I can remember her right."
Yura looked at the pendant, which now glowed steadily.
"She's not just your Anchor anymore, is she?"
"No," he whispered. "She's the reason I keep going."
Interlude – Unknown Location
Far from Sector 3, deep beneath the Hunter Association archives, a sealed screen lit up.
[Unauthorized Echo Sync Confirmed – Anchor Purity 70%]
[Subject: Kim Suho – Class: Soulbound Necromancer – Threat Tier: Under Review]
A man in robes tapped the screen and whispered:
"So the sister's echo survived. Interesting…"
System Prompt
New Memory Anchor Detected – "The Train Station Goodbye"
Sector 6 Transit Hub – Status: Sealed Zone
Objective Updated: Trace the Final Farewell.
Suho looked up at the fading sky.
The wyvern's bones curled beside him, rising again.
"One step closer," he murmured.
He mounted without another word. The wind carried the dust, the grief, and the dead with him.
And far away, another gate stirred.