The last thing Dae expected on a Monday morning was to be pulled into a classified training facility with two new girls who looked like they belonged in a video game DLC pack called "Trouble in High Definition."
He should've known something was off when the instructor—Ms. Cyra, tall and terrifying with half her face replaced by sleek tech—led him to the eastern sector that hadn't existed until, like, three days ago. Now it had an entire subwing called Vault Access Division, lined with hexsteel walls and motion-detecting torchlights that blinked too often to be just lights.
"The trial will test memory integrity, reality adaptation, and anchor consciousness," Ms. Cyra said with zero emotion.
Dae blinked. "Cool, and in English that means…?"
"You'll be fighting echoes of yourself in a realm stitched from corrupted memories."
"Right," he muttered. "Totally normal school thing."
She paused at the elevator, then tossed him a look that felt like a surgical scan. "Try not to die. It would be… inconvenient."
Great pep talk.
…
The elevator hummed down past the usual floors.
Then the screen glitched.
Numbers vanished. Symbols spun.
Suddenly, the doors opened into a fog-drenched hallway lit by overhead glyphs pulsing like heartbeats. The air tasted like static and nostalgia.
And standing there…
Two girls.
New students?
No. Not just students.
Something felt scripted about them, like they'd been written into his story mid-season, but their vibes were impossible to ignore.
One leaned against the wall like gravity was optional. Pale hair like cloudshine. Eyes shimmering with kaleidoscopic rings. She was sipping bubble tea from a glass vial. Wore a sleeveless academy uniform that had definitely been altered for maximum chaos.
The other girl sat cross-legged on a floating shard of glass. Hair dark violet, almost black, tied in a loose side braid. Reading what looked like a spell-scroll shaped like a manga. Her uniform was crisp. Too crisp. Like she'd pressed it using fire magic and guilt.
Ms. Cyra introduced them with the same tone you'd use for delivering a package: "This is Echo and Vale. They'll be part of your protocol sync session. Try to keep up."
Dae blinked.
Echo smirked and raised her tea.
Vale nodded politely but didn't look up.
The moment he stepped forward, the room pulsed.
And everything went dark.
…
He was falling.
Straight into the Glitch Archive.
It wasn't a place. Not really.
It was a stitched-together memory-space. Floating fragments of past, present, and might've-beens, tangled together like bad internet tabs left open too long.
He landed—gently, somehow—on a bridge made of broken desks and cafeteria trays. Above him? The sky was layered with floating blackboards scribbled in every language he didn't know.
And across the bridge, Vale stood holding a sword made of paper thoughts.
"Welcome," she said calmly, eyes now glowing faint blue. "We're inside the first loop."
"Of what?"
"Of you."
…
They moved through the fractured spaces.
Past a hallway where An walked by without seeing Dae.
He reached out… but his hand passed through.
"She's not here," Echo said from beside him, now floating on a neon book page shaped like a skateboard. "Just a memory stitch. Loop three, I think."
"She… she smiled," Dae said, voice breaking.
"Yeah," Echo said. "She always smiled before it started."
"Before what?"
"The collapse."
…
Each room was a piece of him.
A classroom where he failed a test and laughed with Rea, Kio, and An.
A mirror where he trained with Varo and accidentally burned off his eyebrows.
A quiet garden where Isha healed a tiny sparrow and made Dae promise he wouldn't die stupidly.
Each fragment bled into the next.
More unstable. More blurred.
Sometimes he'd see himself crying. Sometimes laughing. Sometimes… breaking.
And through it all, Echo and Vale moved like they'd been here before.
They weren't glitching.
They were guiding.
Echo tilted her head. "You really don't remember us, huh?"
Dae blinked. "Have we met?"
"In the vaults? No. Not yet," she said, sipping her tea. "But we've met in the mirrors."
Vale added softly, "He's still syncing. The ring's protecting his core."
"What are you two?" Dae asked, stepping over a floating slice of memory where he was yelling at a teacher who didn't exist.
"Vault-borne," Vale said.
"Echoes of what you forgot," Echo said at the same time.
Dae frowned. "You're memory constructs?"
Echo grinned. "Close. Think of us as… the girls who weren't erased. Just misplaced."
Vale smirked faintly. "Or repressed."
"Emotionally or magically?" Dae asked.
Echo winked. "Yes."
…
They reached the center of the archive.
A blank room. Silent. Cold.
A single chair sat in the middle.
On it? The Book of Knowledge.
But this time… open.
The pages flipped rapidly, like a storm of forgotten truths.
Images flickered.
A giant battle. A girl screaming. Chains made of language. The academy collapsing.
And a face.
His.
But not.
Older.
Crowned.
Blood on his hands.
Dae dropped to his knees.
"I don't want to see this."
"You have to," Vale said gently. "It's not about remembering who you were. It's about choosing who you'll be."
Echo sat cross-legged beside him, slapping his back way too hard. "Besides, drama king, we're not gonna let you go full villain arc just yet."
He chuckled weakly. "Thanks. That's comforting."
Then the Book screamed.
A real scream.
And the room broke open like a glass dome shattering.
…
Back in the real world—
Ms. Cyra waited outside the Glitch Archive's sealed door, arms crossed.
It had only been twenty minutes.
Then—crack.
The door unsealed with a hiss.
Smoke poured out.
Dae stepped out first. Disoriented. Pale.
Then Echo.
Then Vale.
All three were covered in faint glyph scars. Echo had one on her cheek that shimmered when she smirked.
"Trial complete," Cyra said simply. "And yet you three glitched the room."
Echo snapped her fingers like she just scored a goal. "We're overachievers."
Vale looked completely unbothered. "Recommend reclassification."
Cyra raised a brow. "Of?"
Dae answered before she could.
"Of everything."
…
That night, in their dorm, chaos resumed.
Zane had challenged Drayk to a chili-eating contest, and now the entire common room smelled like regret and betrayal.
Faye and Mira were having an impromptu fashion battle involving magic, scarves, and some light explosions.
Rea sat quietly next to Dae, occasionally reaching for his hand but never quite grabbing it.
Echo claimed the couch by announcing, "This is my kingdom now."
Vale silently stole Rea's chair and earned a single blink of acknowledgment.
And Dae…
He sat in the middle of it all.
The Book of Knowledge on his lap.
His ring glowing.
And something new…
A note from Vale, folded in perfect triangles:
You don't have to remember everything at once.
Just remember who makes you feel like home.
…
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[PIX SYSTEM LOG – MEMORY STABILITY CHECK v4.2.7]
Notice: Mnemosyne Protocol Anomaly Detected
Subject ID: An
Original Gender Identity: Male
Current Registered Identity: Female
Cause of Conflict:
→ Exposure to [CALADRA RELIC ENTITY]
→ Mnemosyne Protocol Override (Instructor: Sera)
Error Description:
• Identity overwrite successful
• Memory echo mismatch
• Class-wide retroactive perception altered
• Emotional residuals present across 89% of cohort
Result:
→ Public records list An as biologically female
→ Only An retains fragments of original identity
Status: GLITCHED
Emotional Fallout: UNRESOLVED
[ADMINISTRATIVE ACCESS BLOCKED]
[RECALIBRATION: PENDING]
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To Be Continued in Chapter 32 – The Vault's Real Name