𝓡𝓮𝔀𝓻𝓲𝓽𝓲𝓷𝓰 𝓱𝓲𝓼𝓽𝓸𝓻𝔂 (𝓑𝓸𝓫𝓸𝓲𝓫𝓸𝔂 𝓧 𝓡𝓮𝓪𝓭𝓮𝓻)

៚𝕮𝖍𝖆𝖕𝖙𝖊𝖗 33࿐

What makes love and obsession different from one another?

Devotion? Intimacy? Affection? Unwavering loyalty?

No. The distance between them is negligible, a trick of the light. After all, is it not love—pure, fervent, all-consuming love—that makes you obsessed? It is the wellspring of that maddening thirst. It makes you crave. To possess. To own. To drive you utterly, delightfully insane.

"My mistress, everything is in its place. All we have to do is wait for the perfect moment."

Red, incandescent eyes blazed, reflecting off the monitor screen back toward the woman seated before him. They watched together, a silent, predatory vigil over the digital feed that showed those pathetic fools, those believers who still clung to the notion that they could be saved.

A wide, malice-filled grin slowly, sensuously, crept onto the woman's lips. The pale moonlight filtering through the window seemed to caress the wicked joy in her expression.

"Very well, Red," she purred, her voice a low, silken rasp. "Patience is a virtue, and we have all the time in the world."

A cold, clammy shiver traced the path of Y/n's spine, shattering the fragile peace of the late-night air. She settled in her bed, but the sheets offered no comfort. Something was deeply, profoundly wrong.

She knew they were coming for her. She had been warned of the inevitable collapse of the cycle, the terrible fate that waited at the end of every timeline. Yet, with a stubborn, unrelenting spirit that had become her defining curse, she couldn't—she wouldn't—back down.

Restlessness was a fever in her blood. She stared at the ceiling above, the shadows stretching and contracting with the passing headlights. She hadn't made any solid progress; she should have broken through this mystery by now, but the trail was cold. The only tangible lead she held—a captured bot—was currently locked down by TAPOPS, untouchable.

"What's missing?" she muttered, her voice thin in the silence. She sat up abruptly, hands clutching at her hair, a frantic tension pulling at her scalp. "It's as if this person knows my every step. Is it because they've done this countless times through countless cycles? How is it that I can't do anything against it?"

The puzzle pieces were scattered, wet, and impossible to fit together. Everything felt wrong. And despite her efforts to maintain a veneer of normalcy around Boboiboy, to shield him from the encroaching doom, some things were irrevocably fractured.

"He was acting weird today, it's like he's keeping an eye on me."

She glanced down at the old, faded burn mark on her skin, a phantom souvenir from another lifetime. "Huh..." She sank into a deep, painful thought.

Caution. That was what had paralyzed her.

"No," she whispered, her voice gaining steel. "I can no longer afford caution. Be damned if I be damned."

A sudden, fierce courage ignited in her chest. She slipped into her slippers, pulled a worn jacket over her pajamas, and snatched her phone. She messaged Ying immediately.

Ying, meet me outside your house. I'll be there in 20 minutes.

She dearly hoped her genius friend was pulling one of her usual all-nighters.

Her lungs burned, screaming for a halt, but Y/n forced her legs into a punishing sprint toward Ying's home. The darkness of the pre-dawn streets swallowed her soundlessly.

Would it really be easy to find someone you have no clue about? When all the evidence is ghost-like and invisible?

With every stride, every ragged, desperate breath that tore from her lips, her thoughts were a whirlwind. She was no genius, but perhaps a little help from one could finally shed light on the identity of the mysterious murderer behind the cycle of Boboiboy's inevitable demise.