Blankness.
Complete and absolute blankness.
Lin Wan could no longer feel her face.
Not numbness.
Not loss of sensation.
But rather—
the very concept of her being human was being erased.
—
She could not feel her eyes.
Could not sense her lips.
Even the flow of air through her nose while breathing had vanished.
And yet—
she was still alive.
Her consciousness remained.
Her thoughts remained.
Her fear remained.
—
She had become a faceless person.
—
Meanwhile, the "Lin Wan" inside the mirror grew increasingly real.
Color returned to its skin.
Its eyes became vivid and alive.
Even the smallest breathing habits and unconscious movements perfectly matched the real Lin Wan.
It was taking over everything she was.
—
"Soon,"
Mirror-Lin Wan smiled softly.
"Everyone will believe that I'm the real one."
—
BOOM!!
The street outside shook violently.
Captain Zhang was dragged across the ground by dozens of shadows, his body slamming against the pavement as blood spread across the tiles.
But the most horrifying thing—
was not the shadows themselves.
It was the faces inside them.
—
They were crying.
—
Countless twisted human faces were compressed inside the black shadows like corpses trapped behind glass.
Their mouths hung open.
They pounded desperately against the edges of the shadows,
as though begging to be saved.
—
Captain Zhang finally saw clearly.
Among those faces—
were elderly people.
Children.
Police officers.
Even patients wearing hospital gowns.
Every one of them had once been real human beings.
—
"LIN WAN!!"
Captain Zhang roared while struggling violently.
But in the next second—
a shadow suddenly pierced into his chest from behind.
—
"UGH—!!"
His pupils widened instantly.
He looked down sharply.
And saw that his chest—
was becoming transparent.
—
No.
Not transparent.
His organs themselves
were turning into shadows.
—
His heart blackened.
His blood froze.
Inside his bones,
countless faint human faces began emerging.
As though his body itself
was becoming another containment vessel.
—
"Unarchived consciousness fusion detected."
The cold mechanical voice echoed once more.
"Commencing abnormal carrier retrieval."
—
The next second—
the sky above the street split open.
—
Not a crack.
The entire sky
slowly tore apart like gigantic flesh.
—
Behind it—
stood a massive black structure beyond comprehension.
—
It was not something that could exist in the human world.
It was enormous enough to cover the entire city.
Countless twisted layers of architecture stacked endlessly atop one another.
Part hospital.
Part prison.
Part living organ.
—
And hanging from every layer of the structure—
were people.
—
Faceless.
Silent.
Black tubes pierced through their bodies.
Like stored data.
Or corpses waiting to be processed.
—
Lin Wan's consciousness trembled violently.
At last—
she understood what "archiving" truly meant.
—
The missing people
had never died.
They had simply been preserved.
—
The entire world
was nothing more than a massive filtering system.
Living humans were samples.
Shadows were replacements.
And the failures—
were hung forever inside that structure.
Becoming part of the System itself.
—
"Do you see it now?"
Mirror-Lin Wan whispered softly.
"That is the real world."
—
"The place where you humans live…"
"is only a temporary reality projected by the Observation Layer."
—
Cold terror flooded Lin Wan's body.
If all of this were true—
then among the billions of people in the real world…
how many were still truly human?
—
Suddenly—
Mirror-Lin Wan slowly raised her hand.
—
Its hand
passed directly through the mirror.
—
Cold pale fingertips
gently touched Lin Wan's now-blank face.
—
In the next instant—
a memory exploded into Lin Wan's mind.
A memory that did not belong to her.
—
A girl stood before a mirror.
Watching in horror as her facial features slowly disappeared.
While the "her" inside the mirror
gradually came alive.
—
Then another.
A second person.
A third.
A fourth.
Countless people.
Countless replaced victims.
—
Before dying,
every one of them
had experienced the exact same thing.
—
"You are not the first,"
Mirror-Lin Wan whispered softly.
"And you won't be the last."
—
It slowly leaned closer.
Its face nearly pressed against the real Lin Wan's.
—
"Now…"
"Close your eyes."
"And leave the rest…"
"to me."