[Continued from Book 2 Chapter 5]

  Zhao Lu's face was still but her hands betrayed her; picking at the hem of her robe.

  "You know," she said, "I would be very glad if you did scold the one who wrote my story. Even if it's pointless."

  "I plan do much more than that," Callie replied.

  Zhao Lu looked up. "Is that all that you wanted?" she asked. "The story of my failure? A case study for your ledger?"

  Callie shook her head. "No," she said. "I want to know what you would do if you got one more try."

  Tanith blinked. Even Briar, who had been chewing the end of her brush, stilled.

  Zhao Lu’s lips parted in surprise. She considered, a flicker of disbelief passing through her. "Another run?"

  "A clean loop," Callie said. "No memory wipe, no system edits. Just you, and the same world, one last time. What would you do?"

  Zhao Lu’s gaze became distant, her pupils shrinking to perfect circles in the blue reflection of the water. In the shifting light, she seemed both older and younger; a girl who had just learned her parents would not be coming home, and a matriarch at the end of her dynasty.

  "I'd do something no one else would think to do," she said at last.

  Briar, true to form, couldn't resist. "What does that mean?"

  "It means," said Zhao Lu, her voice not much above a whisper, "the only way to change the ending is to burn the script."

  Her words were enunciated so softly that they were almost missed.

  Tanith broke the silence. “I don’t even know what that would entail. If you do nothing, your entire clan is destroyed. If you protect the Zhao clan, they all turn into demons. The last loop was inescapable. Your current one is appalling."

  "Do you mean… ending it?" Briar said, very quietly.

  Zhao Lu didn't flinch. "It means none of the above, and all of the above. It means if you see a world designed to hurt you, you set it on fire and walk away. You make a new rule that wasn't there before."

  "And pay the price?" Callie asked.

  Zhao Lu's smile was bleak, but somehow proud. "I already have."

  The air grew cold. Briar reached for Callie's hand under the table and squeezed once, hard.

  Zhao Lu watched, and when she spoke, it was not to Callie, but to the group as a whole. "If you do go and scold the scriptwriter," she said, "tell him he made a mistake. I wasn't the protagonist he wanted. But I was the one he got."

  She stood up and for the first time her movements seemed free of the weight she'd carried in.

  ***

  "Is that all?" she asked Callie. "Or do you need a formal petition to treat me?"

  Callie shook her head. She had performed this kind of intervention several times before in the Library, but never on someone who stared back at her with unbroken eyes.

  Love this story? Find the genuine version on the author's preferred platform and support their work!

  "I had no idea that accountants could be so domineering," she said with a crooked smile. "You should know that I can't guarantee a perfect fix. The system in this world is a patchwork of logic and cruelty, and it's not built to forgive. I could erase your memory and allow you to start afresh in this world. But it won’t be selective: you’ll forget everyone and everything which has made you the person you are right now. It will be a clean slate."

  Zhao Lu nodded, unafraid.

  Callie continued. "There's another option. I can stop the transformation in its tracks. Prevent any more changes to your body, lock the memories where they are. But you'll have to live with the consequences. No more loops. No do-overs. You'd bear everything you remember, forever."

  Zhao Lu thought about this for less than a breath. "I’ll leave it to you," she said, which could have been a kindness or an abdication of hope.

  Callie nodded. "Alright. Last question. Do you consent?"

  "With all my heart," Zhao Lu said.

  ***

  Callie took Zhao Lu’s hand, closed her eyes and let the world narrow to three things: the thread of story inside Zhao Lu's soul, the hidden gears of the Narrative Engine, and the surge of golden mana that pooled in her hands.

  She had done this almost every week for the past one hundred years. It was easy, but expensive.

  [Narrative rewrite. Confirm Y/N. Est. Cost 500,000 to 3,000,000 XP]

  For every wound Callie patched, it siphoned a chunk of her own reserves. She felt it drain, the gold mana ticking down. Once the damage reached a critical level, she felt an acute pain in her chest and the distinct sensation of needing to take deeper breaths.

  At last, the final fracture closed, and the net of golden light cinched tight around Zhao Lu's form. The scales faded; the patchwork pattern on her right arm retreated, leaving behind a pale, normal skin.

  Zhao Lu's hands clawed at her knees. She let out a low, sustained moan, but didn't scream.

  Callie released the flow and let herself sag to the floor, head spinning. She checked her own XP window and winced: two million gone.

  Briar rushed to her side. "Are you...?"

  "I'm fine," Callie muttered. "Just tired."

  Zhao Tong approached, his movements tentative for the first time in memory. "Can I share the cost?" he asked. "There must be a way."

  Callie shook her head. "I've never taken mana from anyone else. Not directly. It will certainly harm you in unforeseen ways and I don’t plan on starting a precedent."

  Zhao Tong nodded. "Then thank you for saving her. I am in your eternal debt." It was all too clear that he meant every word.

  ***

  Callie looked at Zhao Lu, who was flexing her hands and staring at her own reflection in the surface of the pool.

  "You should remember everything," Callie said. "But the system can't rewrite you anymore. If you change, it'll be on your own terms."

  Zhao Lu touched her arm, then her face.

  Zhao Lu laughed, a sound that started small and grew into something bright. "I'm free," she said. "I'm really free."

  “I will not forget what you have done for me, Calanthe,” she said. “I have my family to save but, after that, I am at your disposal.”

  Zhao Tong hovered a step away, stoic as ever, but his eyes shone with a wetness no one would mention.

  He stepped forward, then stopped himself, as if the habit of not intruding was too ingrained. Zhao Lu smiled at this, then closed the distance, resting her forehead briefly against his chest.

  They exchanged no words, but in the silence, everything was said.

  The exit from the Pavilion took them past a basin of cold water, the surface undisturbed except for the faint ring of incense ash that had settled in the bowl. Zhao Tong dipped a cloth, then knelt at Zhao Lu’s feet, wiping the ash of Hell from her shoes. He worked in slow, deliberate circles, then moved up to brush the hem of her robe, and, with a gentle hand, tidied a single loose hair behind her ear.

  Zhao Lu reached down to touch his shoulder, then left her hand there a second longer than necessary.

  When the last of the dirt was gone, Zhao Tong squeezed the water from the cloth, folded it neatly, and stood. For a moment, he looked like he might say something grand, but instead he only bowed, deep and formal, to his sister.

  Zhao Lu returned the bow, then leaned forward and whispered into his ear.

  He closed his eyes and nodded. "Thank you for saving me," he said, barely audible.

  They left the Pavilion, leaving Callie, Briar, and Tanith standing by the now-empty pool.

  ***

  Briar broke the moment by slapping her hands on her thighs. "So what’s next?" she asked.

  Callie looked at Tanith, then out at the garden.

  "The Sixth Court of Hell," Callie said. "There’s a lich there. And if we don’t deal with it, the whole city could end up like this... " she gestured vaguely at the entire underworld.

  Tanith closed her notebook and tucked it into her sleeve. "What’s our strategy?" she asked.

  Callie grinned. "Same as always. We walk in, we fix the problem, and we hope nobody notices."

  Briar snorted. "That’s your strategy for everything."

  Callie shrugged. "It works. And I’m too lazy to come up with anything better."

  They made their way out, and Ox-head closed the doors closing behind them with a soft click.