There's something no one tells you about seeing the future:
It's addictive.
Not because of power.
Not because of control.
But because it's the only way to feel like the world is actually listening to you.
And after the crack in the collar, I didn't want to listen anymore.
I wanted the world to answer me back.
---
I escaped the camp two days later.
Not completely. Not yet.
Just far enough to explore the edges without being noticed by the guards.
There was an invisible line none of the slaves crossed.
A forest of gray roots, dead trees that bled black sap, and whispers that mimicked your mother's voice.
I crossed it.
And the system... saw me.
---
I didn't feel it at first.
Just a breeze.
Then, a sort of electric hum in my chest.
And finally — a figure.
It didn't walk. It hovered.
It wore a robe of living code, strings of numbers swirling around its neck like incense.
It had no face, but three symbols burned above its head:
a crossed-out sun, a shattered moon, and a question mark.
—"You do not have protagonist permissions," it said.
Its voice wasn't a voice. It was a notification.
—"Narrative error detected. Reinserting extra into main plotline."
And then it threw a system dialogue at me.
Like a damn pop-up window.
---
> [ANOMALY ALERT]
Extra #9,387 has accessed restricted information.
Available actions:
a) Memory reformat
b) Body deletion
c) Assimilation as hostile NPC
Awaiting decision from the Dramaturgy Council.
---
I didn't choose to run.
Didn't choose to fight.
I chose to glitch.
I closed my eyes and searched the shadows of futures.
Searched for one where everything broke.
Where the system lost track of me for just a moment.
And I found it.
A single error.
A blind spot caused by the buildup of "unexpected choices" I'd made so far.
One second where the system no longer knew what was supposed to happen to me.
And in that second, I stopped existing for it.
The figure vanished.
The notification shattered into a thousand letters and fell like ash.
And the forest… went silent again.
---
I dropped to my knees.
Not from fear.
But because I had tasted something worse than punishment:
The system's attention.
And I survived.
---
That night, I returned to the camp.
No one noticed I was gone.
But I noticed something:
I had earned an invisible "title."
I could feel it etched on my skin like a conceptual burn.
> [Persistent Anomaly]
That which walks between unwritten lines.