Chapter 6: O.O.O(Over&Over&Over)

“Drop me here now, pretty boy~” a familiar voice said as she opened the door of the taxi and shut it as she left.

The woman who leaves the vehicle is none other than The Saint of Last Resorts, Kim Ji-yoo—a former idol turned Occult Investigator but what is she doing in a cat cafe? Is something paranormal happening in these very premises? Nope, she came here for a business with a certain witch.

She opens the door of the cafe as the bell rings in her presence, the receptionist is quickly alerted to the aura of the guest.

“Excuse me, did you see a petite girl about your height—she usually wears these pink pajamas and she has these two heterochromic eyes” Kim Ji-yoo describes the person she's looking for.

The receptionist pointed to a room with the number “0404” on it.

“Figured” she said as she took her blazer off as she put it in a rack.

She tried to reach for the door knob but it was opened using a psychic energy.

"Why have you come seeking me again, you fraud of a saint?" The celestial witch said with venom in her voice, passive aggressive in the presence of the Saint of Last Resorts.

“I have some questions—about him, your assistant,” she replied as she sat on the other side of the table.

"You mean Arth? That one’s the most complicated being I’ve ever encountered—even more so than you." The Celestial Witch said as a cat sat in her lap as she began to caress it.

“I want to know who he is—in the beginning” Kim replied with determination, wanting to know about the guy she helped a few months ago.

"Brace yourself for the four most contradicting origin stories of my assistant, Arth—the so-called Space-Time Voyager!" the celestial witch said with joy and enthusiasm as she held Kim Ji-yoo's head.

“Wait, Four?!” She asked as she got shocked by the sudden release of magic in her head.

“Let us start again—shall we?” Sera said, looking directly at the one's reading this chapter.

Issue#1: Don't Lose Your Smile

In a world vastly different from ours, a civilization represents the pinnacle of humanity’s future. This world thrives on technological marvels, where everything has evolved beyond our current comprehension. A utopia: no wars, no famine, and no crime. Here, people live not for survival, but to ascend, pushing the boundaries of science and spirit alike.

But even utopias can rot from within.

Despite the miracles achieved, humanity faces an undeniable truth: the universe’s resources are finite. Colonizing planets, engineering habitats in space—none of it was enough. The Intergalactic Council exhausted every solution, every theory, every hope.

Enter the unnamed scientist.

A man of unparalleled intellect, he saw what others couldn’t. While the council debated endless possibilities, he proposed the unthinkable—tearing a rift through space-time itself. Not to escape forward, but to reach back, to harvest what the past could offer.

His brilliance is unrelenting, yet haunted. Beneath the layers of genius lies a personal motive—a secret he guards more fiercely than his formulas.

The scene opens in his sterile, meticulously organized lab.

The soft glow of monitors reflects off his disheveled black hair as the sound of hurried footsteps disrupts his solitude.

“Professor,” a voice calls, sharp yet polite. The scientist, lost in thought, barely registers the young woman standing at the door. “The testing will begin shortly.”

“I’ll be there in a moment,” he mutters, pulling his lab coat from a chair. He straightens, brushing his hair back in a motion that feels more like habit than necessity.

As they walk through the sterile corridors, the female scientist at his side, she speaks hesitantly. “The generals are waiting.”

He nods.

In the meeting room, two men in military uniforms exude the weight of authority. One glares at him, his voice cold and clipped. “This project of yours has cost billions, Professor. It better work.”

Unfazed, the scientist sips his coffee. “I’ve calculated every variable, General.”

“You’d better have,” the man snaps. “This isn’t just theory anymore. We’re betting everything on you.”

A faint smirk touches the scientist’s lips. “When we succeed, General, the timeline of the universe will be ours to navigate. Every resource humanity needs—past, present, and future—will be within reach.”

The general’s aide interjects, “For all time?”

“For all time,” the scientist repeats, raising his coffee cup in mock salute.

As preparations unfold, the facility buzzes with activity. The air hums with tension, the weight of history pressing down on everyone present. Yet amidst the chaos, the scientist retreats into himself.

In a quiet moment, he gazes at a photograph. A young woman smiles back at him—her face a contrast to his weary expression.

Before he was the unnamed scientist, before the weight of humanity’s survival crushed his soul, he was a boy. A brilliant, lonely boy, shunned by peers and misunderstood by adults. His mind was a machine, always calculating, always solving—but never connecting.

And then, there was her.

Her name was Vera.

She came into his life like sunlight breaking through storm clouds. Where others saw a cold, mechanical boy, she saw a quiet child yearning to belong.

The first time they met, he was hunched over a rusted device in the alley behind his orphanage, tinkering with wires and circuits scavenged from broken machines.

“You’re making it wrong,” she said confidently.

He flinched, startled, and turned to see a girl about his age, her wild hair tied in a messy braid and her face smudged with dirt.

“What?”

“The wires. You’re crossing the red and blue ones. It’ll fry the circuit.”

Annoyed but intrigued, he squinted at her. “How do you know that?”

She shrugged, sitting down beside him. “My dad taught me before… well, before he wasn’t around anymore.” She paused, her expression softening. “I could show you if you want.”

For the first time, he let someone into his world.

From that day forward, they were inseparable. Vera wasn’t just his friend—she was his anchor. While he taught her the intricacies of engineering and programming, she taught him how to laugh, how to dream, and how to care.

But Vera had a secret. Her health was fragile, and as the years went on, her visits to the hospital became more frequent.

“You’re going to change the world someday,” she told him one night as they sat on the orphanage rooftop, staring at the stars.

He scoffed. “I don’t care about the world.”

She nudged him playfully. “You will. I know you. You just don’t know it yet.”

Her words stayed with him, even as her condition worsened.

The day she died, he stood by her hospital bed, clutching her hand as her breaths grew shallow.

“Promise me,” she whispered. “Promise me you’ll keep going. Even when it’s hard.”

He nodded, tears streaming down his face. “I promise.”

Vera smiled weakly. “Good. Then I’ll always be with you.”

Even in a utopia of his own making where death is almost a myth of the past, he couldn't save her.

“Someone important to you?” the general asks, breaking the silence and the unnamed scientist’s daydream.

“That’s irrelevant, General” the scientist replies curtly, his voice tinged with an exhaustion deeper than physical fatigue.

The countdown begins.

Machines roar to life, an orchestra of innovation poised to breach the fabric of existence itself. But the fragile symphony is shattered by an explosion.

“Sir! We’re under attack!” a soldier bursts into the room.

The facility descends into chaos. Military personnel scramble to secure the area, their weapons drawn. Through the smoke and fire, the scientist hears the chilling voice of the attackers.

“They’re here for the rift,” he whispers.

The general curses under his breath. “Intergalactic terrorists,” he spits.

These are no mere insurgents—they are radicals, their vision for humanity’s future as unyielding as the scientist’s. But where he seeks salvation, they crave domination.

The confrontation escalates. The general, armed and defiant, faces the terrorists’ leader—a man whose words cut deeper than any weapon.

“You think this machine will save humanity?” the leader sneers. “It won’t. You’ll only prolong the inevitable. But in my hands, it will remake the universe in my image.”

Shots ring out. Chaos erupts.

Amidst the turmoil, the scientist realizes the countdown cannot be stopped. The rift will open, regardless of who controls the room.

Racing against time, he makes a choice. Using a device of his own invention, he propels himself toward the testing chamber.

The general falls, his blood staining the sterile floor as he shouts his final warning: “Don’t let them take it!”

In a desperate act, the scientist throws himself into the rift. For a brief, blinding moment, time ceases to exist.

When he awakens, he is not in the lab, nor anywhere familiar. Instead, he stands at the dawn of creation—the Big Bang.

A voice surrounds him, ancient and unyielding. “You have meddled with forces beyond your comprehension.”

“I had no choice,” he pleads. “Humanity needed to—”

“Your actions have unraveled the fabric of existence,” the voice booms. “As punishment, you shall wander the cycles of the universe. Endless lifetimes, endless deaths.”

And so it begins.

The cycles blur together, an eternity of fragmented identities. A spy, a samurai, a vampire—each life ends in failure, his mission unfulfilled. Through it all, one truth anchors him: the memory of her.

“I’ve lived countless lifetimes,” he whispers in one cycle, gazing at her image. “But I can never be with you.”

Over millennia, his mind fractures. He forgets his name, his purpose, even his pain. Yet somewhere in the madness, he finds clarity.

One day, in a dimension where the sea glows with unearthly light, he meets her: the Celestial Witch Sera.

"And what, pray tell, is a mortal like you doing in my domain?" she asks, her tone playful yet sharp.

“I don’t remember,” he admits. “I don’t even know who I am.”

She studies him, intrigued. "I think I’ll call you Arth. It suits you perfectly."

Arth. The name feels right, as if it has always been his.

"So, tell me, Arth... what will you do now?" Sera asks, extending her hand.

He takes it. “Start again.”

—

“Right, Start again” Sera said as she took another of Arth's memories and showed it to the Saint of Last Resorts.

—

Issue#2: The Child of the Timeless Rift

In the void of the Timeless Rift, existence was a paradox. Here, the past, present, and future coexisted in an infinite web of possibilities, their strands weaving together in patterns only the Rift understood. Out of this chaos, a being emerged: a child with no past, no parents, and no beginning. The Rift gave him life but no guidance, and he floated through its endless streams, absorbing glimpses of every timeline.

Time, within the Rift, was not linear but cyclical, overlapping, and infinite. The child bore witness to it all. He saw the birth of stars, their death collapsing into black holes that churned the Rift’s edges. He saw the first spark of life ignite on barren worlds, and the silence that followed when those flames extinguished. He was neither a participant nor a spectator—he was part of the Rift, a fragment of its incomprehensible design.

For eons, he remained there, a silent witness to the rise and fall of civilizations, the love and loss of countless souls. He was a presence, unnoticed by those whose lives he observed. The Rift was his home, but it offered no peace. The endless flow of knowledge was isolating, each revelation deepening his sense of longing. He yearned to touch the worlds he observed, to feel the emotions that flickered like distant stars.

At first, his yearning was aimless, a vague ache for connection. But as millennia passed, his desires sharpened. The laughter of a child, the tenderness of a parent, the quiet resolve of a warrior—it was these moments that called to him, pulling at the essence of his being.

Then, one day, the Rift expelled him.

It was not an act of malice but necessity. The Rift, with all its boundless chaos, had no room for longing. The child, now more than a fragment of its design, was a disruption. With a final twist of its unknowable currents, the Rift hurled him into reality.

The child, now a young man, found himself in a strange world of stone castles and wooden carts. The air was heavy with the scent of earth and smoke, the sounds of bustling markets and distant bells. His senses, unaccustomed to the constraints of a physical form, were overwhelmed. Hunger clawed at his stomach; the sun’s heat scorched his skin. Time’s relentless march beat against him like a drum, each second a new burden.

As he wandered, he realized something was wrong. Time itself twisted around him, the threads of reality warping as his presence disrupted their flow. Wherever he went, paradoxes followed—events unfolding too early, people aging too fast. He watched in horror as a child aged into an elder in mere moments, their lifetime stolen by his proximity. Villagers whispered of curses and omens, their fear turning to anger. He became a fugitive, fleeing from a world he could not understand.

Finally, he stumbled upon Sera’s sanctuary, a place untouched by time’s chaos. The sanctuary was unlike any place he had seen, its gardens blooming with flowers that glowed faintly in the moonlight. A river ran through it, its waters shimmering with a silvery hue that seemed to flow both forward and backward.

Sera herself was an enigma. Her hair, streaked with black, shimmered as if reflecting the Rift’s essence. Her eyes, sharp and piercing, seemed to see into his very soul. She studied him carefully.

"You are a child of the Rift, aren’t you?" she said, her voice laced with both wonder and sadness. "You bear the Rift's chaos within you, yet you hold the power to shape it as well."

Her words were a revelation. Until that moment, he had thought of himself only as an anomaly, a mistake. But Sera saw something more. She gave him the name Arth, after Artemis, the hunter who seeks balance.

"You are no longer a mere child of chaos," she said. "You are a seeker of harmony, destined to bring order to the Rift’s untamed power."

Under Sera’s guidance, Arth began to understand his nature. The chaos within him was not a curse but a tool—a power to mend the broken threads of time rather than sever them. He learned to control his presence, to tread carefully through reality without causing it to unravel.

Yet, the question remained: why had the Rift created him? Was he its guardian, its emissary, or its prisoner? As Arth trained under Sera’s watchful eye, the sanctuary became his refuge, but he knew it was not his destiny to stay. The Rift called to him still, its currents whispering secrets he could not yet understand.

Arth’s journey was only beginning. He was no longer a child of the Rift but a hunter, a seeker of harmony. The worlds he had once observed from afar now lay before him, waiting to be touched, healed, and understood.

—

Issue#3: The Cursed Wanderer

On a Distant Past, In the heart of the Cavern of Echoes, the nameless man stumbled through shadows, his torch flickering against walls etched with cryptic warnings. Each inscription seemed alive, their jagged grooves whispering to him in tones he could not understand. Beneath his feet, the crunch of bone echoed ominously, a grim reminder of the fates of others who had ventured here before him. The air grew thicker with every step, heavy with the scent of ancient decay and promises unfulfilled.

He was not the first to seek the treasures rumored to be hidden in the cavern. Legends spoke of untold riches, relics that could rewrite destiny itself. Yet the man was not driven by greed but desperation. Debts, mounting and merciless, loomed over him like a shadow he could not escape. They had taken his home, his peace, and the last remnants of his dignity. The cavern was his final chance—a faint, dangerous hope to reclaim what he had lost.

After hours of navigating treacherous paths, he found it: the Hourglass of Eternity. It was smaller than he had imagined, delicate yet exuding a power that defied its size. The glass shimmered faintly in the dim light, and the golden sand inside seemed to pulse as if alive. Despite the clear warning etched above its pedestal—Do not turn; to hold time is to be consumed by it—he could not look away. The hourglass called to him, its beauty and mystery drowning out all caution.

“I have no choice,” he whispered, his voice trembling. His hand reached out, hesitant but determined, and grasped the hourglass. It felt warm, almost alive. Before his resolve could falter, he flipped it.

At first, nothing happened. The cavern remained silent except for the faint hiss of the sand falling inside the glass. Then, a low hum began to grow, vibrating through the ground and into his bones. The world dissolved around him, shattering into fragments of light and shadow. He screamed as he was pulled into a swirling maelstrom, his body weightless, his mind stretched thin across eternity. He saw flashes of stars being born, mountains crumbling, and civilizations rising and falling in an instant.

When he finally landed, it was in a place utterly alien to him. A city of soaring towers and machines hummed with life, their forms defying logic. Metallic creatures moved seamlessly among humans who wore clothing made of light. His awe was short-lived; just as he began to take a step, the world twisted again, and he was hurled backward through time. This time, he found himself in the midst of a battlefield, the clash of swords and the cries of knights overwhelming his senses.

The curse revealed its cruel pattern. Every time he grew comfortable, began to understand or care for the people and places around him, the hourglass would pull him again. It was relentless. He tried everything to stop it: burying the hourglass in the deepest caves, casting it into raging seas, even attempting to shatter it. But no matter what he did, it always reappeared in his possession, its golden sands taunting him.

The leaps through time began to erode his sense of self. His memories blurred, details of his past slipping through his fingers like the sands in the hourglass. His name, once a source of pride, faded into obscurity. He could no longer recall the faces of those he had loved, nor the home he had fought so hard to save. What remained was a hollow shell, a wanderer bound to an endless, cruel cycle.

Then, one day, he found himself in a realm unlike any he had seen before. It was a timeless garden, untouched by the chaos of the world. Flowers glowed with ethereal light, their petals shifting colors in a soothing, hypnotic rhythm. The air was warm and still, carrying a faint, melodic hum. In the center of this haven stood a figure cloaked in shimmering robes: the Celestial Witch Sera. Her presence was calming, a rare balm to the storm that raged within him.

“You have been cursed by time,” she said, her voice soft yet commanding, as if she had spoken the words countless times before. Her gaze fell upon the hourglass, which clung to him like a leech. “But curses can be gifts in disguise.”

The nameless man stared at her, the weight of his despair threatening to crush him. “I have lost everything. My name, my memories, my life—what gift could there possibly be in this torment?”

Sera did not answer immediately. Instead, she approached and placed her hands over his, silencing the pull of the hourglass for the first time. The stillness was profound, a silence he had forgotten was possible. “The sands of time have consumed you—because you have tried to run from them,” she said. “But to endure is to master. You have survived where others have perished. That is your strength.”

She traced a glowing sigil over the hourglass, and for the first time, its light dimmed. “I name you Arth,” she declared, her voice resonating with ancient power. “A name that means ‘traveler who endures.’ Through this name, you will transform your curse into a tool, your torment into purpose. You will no longer be at the mercy of time—you will command it.”

The glow of the garden intensified as Arth felt something stir deep within him. Memories did not return, but a sense of resolve took their place. For the first time in what felt like centuries, he felt whole, even as the hourglass trembled faintly in his grasp.

The Celestial Witch smiled. “Your journey is not over, Arth. But now, you are no longer lost.”

—

"Oh, this one’s a long one! I’m pretty sure this chapter alone has already surpassed the word count of my debut—remember, the one where I fought my own assistant?" Sera said as she took the last memory.

—

Issue#4; Destiny's Obsession

The traveler with no name had lived lifetimes slipping through time, unbound and unmoored, evading the grasp of fate itself. But freedom was not a gift—it was a curse, and it had led him here. He had wandered into the nexus of existence, into the web of the Goddess of Destiny, and in that moment, he realized too late that even the untouchable could fall.

She had been waiting for him, though not with patience.

"You," she hissed when she saw him, her voice trembling with rage and twisted longing. "Do you know what you’ve done to me? Do you have any idea the hell you’ve made of my existence?"

The air crackled with the energy of her fury. Her radiant form was still beautiful, but now there was something fractured in her eyes—something that glimmered like shards of broken glass.

"I didn’t mean to find you," he said, his voice steady even as he took a step back.

Her laughter erupted, jagged and wild. "Didn’t mean to find me?" she repeated, her tone rising to a shriek. "Liar! You’ve been running from me, slipping through my fingers, taunting me with your freedom! But it’s over now. Do you hear me? OVER!"

Before he could react, threads of crimson red strings lashed out, wrapping around his wrists and ankles. He tried to leap into the streams of time, to vanish as he always had, but her power pinned him in place, the threads burning against his skin like molten fire.

"You’re not going anywhere," she growled, her voice low and trembling with rage. "I’ve spent eons hunting you, tearing apart timelines, unraveling lives—all for you. And now you think you can just walk away? NO!"

The threads tightened, dragging him to his knees. The traveler grimaced in pain but refused to cry out.

"Let me go," he said through gritted teeth.

Her eyes blazed with fury, and she crouched in front of him, gripping his face with a force that sent sharp pain shooting through his jaw. "Let you go?" she hissed. "Why would I ever do that? Do you know what it’s like to be a goddess? To see every moment, every life, every choice? I’ve seen everything, every single thread, but you—you were the only thing I couldn’t control." Her voice cracked, and she slammed him down onto the shimmering floor of her realm.

"You made me weak," she snarled, her breath hot against his face. "You made me obsessed. I destroyed universes looking for you. I became a monster because of you!"

"Then let me die," he spat, glaring at her through the pain. "If I’m such a curse, kill me."

Her grip on him tightened, her nails digging into his skin. "No," she said, her voice trembling with unhinged fury. "You don’t get to escape me that easily. Death would be a mercy, and you don’t deserve mercy. Not yet."

She stood, dragging him up by the threads, her eyes wild and brimming with tears. "You’ll learn to love me," she said, her tone now a twisted mix of desperation and determination. "Even if I have to break you to do it."

The realm shifted around them, the once-flowing threads of time now jagged and sharp, like the teeth of some cosmic beast. She raised her hand, and a golden thread sliced through the air, striking him across the back. He gasped as the pain seared through him, but he refused to give her the satisfaction of a scream.

"Do you feel that?" she asked, her voice trembling with manic delight. "That’s what defiance earns you, my love. Do you think you can keep resisting me? I am eternity! I am everything! You are nothing without me!"

She struck him again, and this time, he couldn’t hold back the cry that tore from his throat.

"That’s better," she cooed, her tone softening as she knelt beside him. She reached out to cup his face, her touch strangely tender despite the violence she had just inflicted. "You’re starting to understand, aren’t you? This isn’t punishment. It’s love. I’m teaching you how to be mine."

He glared at her, his voice ragged. "You call this love? You’re insane."

Her smile widened, and her eyes sparkled with an almost childlike glee. "Yes," she said, her voice trembling. "I’m insane. Because of you! You broke me, my sweet traveler. You shattered my perfect existence. And now, I’ll break you, piece by piece, until you love me the way I love you."

The traveler’s resolve wavered as she leaned closer, her lips brushing against his ear.

"You can run in your mind, my darling," she whispered, her voice dripping with twisted affection. "But I’ll find you there, too. I’ll unravel every thought, every memory, every little piece of you until there’s nothing left but me."

She pulled back, her expression softening as she stroked his hair. "But it doesn’t have to be this way. Just say the words, my love. Tell me you’re mine, and all of this will stop. I’ll give you eternity. I’ll give you everything."

His silence was answer enough, and her smile faltered.

"Still so stubborn," she murmured, her voice breaking. "Fine. If you want to suffer, I’ll oblige. But remember this, my sweet anomaly: you’re not a prisoner of these threads. You’re a prisoner of my love. And love is eternal."

And so the days turned into years. The Goddess of Destiny tortured him not only with pain, but with her presence, with visions of fabricated love, with whispers of affection that turned to screams of rage.

Over time, his resistance began to erode. She shattered him again and again, breaking his mind and rebuilding it in her image. She wrapped him in her threads, whispering promises and threats, until the man who had once defied eternity was little more than a hollow shell.

One day, when she knelt beside him, her hand trailing gently down his cheek, she whispered, "Do you love me now?"

He hesitated, the remnants of his will trembling like the last ember of a dying fire. Then, finally, he nodded.

"I’m yours," he murmured, his voice lifeless.

Her smile bloomed, radiant and wild, and she kissed him, her laughter echoing through the void. "Yes," she whispered. "Yes, you are. Forever."

And in that moment, the traveler’s fate was sealed. He was no longer the anomaly who had defied destiny. He was her prisoner, her possession, her love. And for the Goddess of Destiny, that was all that mattered.

The traveler with no name was broken but not defeated. For what felt like lifetimes, he had endured the obsessive wrath and love of the Goddess of Destiny. She had held him in her threads, torn him apart and rebuilt him, whispered her twisted affection until it sank into his soul like a toxin. She had made him her prisoner, her plaything, her lover by force.

But she had underestimated him.

One day, when she left him alone in her shimmering prison—believing his spirit utterly crushed—he found a crack in her omnipotent design. A single loose thread. A flaw she had overlooked in her mad obsession to keep him close. It was the moment he had been waiting for, the ember of defiance she thought she had snuffed out.

He pulled at the thread, unraveling it just enough to slip through. With all the strength he had left, he hurled himself into the streams of time, into the chaos of existence, fleeing her realm and the suffocating weight of her love.

But she felt it the moment he was gone.

At first, there was silence—a calm before the storm. Then her scream tore through the fabric of reality itself, a sound of heartbreak and fury that reverberated across all of existence.

"NO!" she shrieked, her celestial form twisting with raw, unbridled rage. The threads of her realm snapped and coiled like serpents, reflecting her fury. "You won’t escape me, my love! You can’t! I’ll tear apart the cosmos to bring you back!"

And so began the chase.

The traveler darted through timelines, slipping into hidden corners of history, obscuring himself in forgotten moments. He lived among ancient empires, hid in the shadows of the future, and even dove into the voids between time itself. But no matter where he went, he felt her presence.

She hunted him like a predator stalking prey, her obsession fueling her every move. She ripped through timelines in her pursuit, unraveling entire realities as if they were mere cobwebs. Universes collapsed in her wake, their destruction nothing more than collateral damage to her relentless love.

"You can’t run from me, my sweet traveler!" her voice would echo through the void, booming and intimate all at once. "You’re mine! Do you hear me? MINE!"

The traveler felt her wrath in every step of his journey. In one timeline, he hid among the stars, but they burned out one by one as she approached. In another, he sought refuge in the heart of a bustling city, only for time itself to freeze as her shadow loomed over the streets.

"I’ll find you," she whispered in his mind, her voice soft yet filled with unhinged determination. "I’ll always find you. You belong to me. To run is to deny your destiny, and I am Destiny!"

For centuries—maybe millennia—they played their desperate game of cat and mouse.

He became a master of escape, finding cracks in existence where her power waned. But she was always just a step behind, her love driving her to tear through the boundaries of reality itself.

Once, she caught him in the ruins of a forgotten timeline. Her crimson threads lashed out, wrapping around his limbs and dragging him to his knees.

"Why do you keep running?" she demanded, her eyes wild with both fury and desperation. "Do you think I enjoy this, chasing you like some lovesick fool? I need you, my love. Can’t you see that? I was made to have you!"

He looked up at her, his chest heaving with exhaustion, but his defiance still burned. "You don’t love me. You only love owning me."

Her face twisted, tears streaming down her cheeks as she yanked him closer. "You’re wrong," she said, her voice breaking. "I love you more than anything! More than existence itself! That’s why I can’t let you go. You’re the only thing in all of creation that makes me feel alive."

With a desperate surge of energy, he used the distraction to break free, slipping through the cracks in her threads once again.

Her scream of rage shook the cosmos. "RUN, THEN!" she roared, her voice a mix of fury and heartbreak. "Run as far as you can, but know this: you will never escape me! I will chase you to the ends of eternity! I will destroy everything you hide behind until there is nothing left but you and me!"

And so it continued, an endless chase through the fabric of existence.

The traveler grew weary, but his resolve never faltered. Every time she came close, he found a way to slip through her grasp. And every time he escaped, her obsession only grew more desperate.

She became more aggressive, more unhinged, her once-beautiful form distorting with the weight of her madness. The threads she wove to hunt him became jagged and chaotic, tearing through realities with reckless abandon. Entire universes blinked out of existence as she screamed his name, her love consuming her like a wildfire.

"Do you hear me, my love?" she would cry, her voice echoing through the void. "There is no timeline you can hide in, no corner of existence where I won’t find you! You can run for all eternity, but eternity is mine! You are mine!"

The traveler’s life became one of perpetual motion, his every moment consumed by the need to stay ahead of her. But no matter how far he ran, he knew the truth: she would never stop.

And deep down, a part of him feared what he would become if he ever stopped running. For as much as he hated her, as much as he despised the prison of her love, her relentless pursuit had become the only constant in his fractured existence.

The hunter and the prey, locked in an eternal dance through the streams of time.

And so, the chase went on, forever and ever, her love as endless as the cosmos itself.

After countless lifetimes of running, slipping through the cracks of existence, the traveler finally found himself somewhere strange. Somewhere... untouched. He had been pursued for so long by the maddened love of the Goddess of Destiny that the idea of finding a place she could not reach seemed impossible. And yet, as he stumbled into this dimension, he realized the threads of time were gone.

This realm was different. The air shimmered like starlight, and the sky above was an endless swirl of galaxies. Floating islands of crystal and stone drifted in the void, connected by streams of golden light. The traveler felt something he hadn’t felt in eons: peace.

But he was not alone.

"You’re lost," a voice said, soft and melodic yet crackling with hidden power.

He turned, startled, to see a figure descending from the void. She was unlike anything he had seen before. Her hair was a river of ink, her two different eyes glowed with ancient wisdom, and her robes shimmered like the night sky. This was no ordinary being. This was the Celestial Witch Sera, a keeper of realms that existed beyond time and fate.

"Who are you?" he asked, his voice hoarse from exhaustion.

Sera tilted her head, studying him as though he were a riddle. "The better question, traveler, is who are you?"

"I don’t know," he admitted after a long pause. "I’ve forgotten my name. I’ve forgotten... almost everything. All I know is that I’m running."

"From her," Sera said knowingly, her expression darkening.

"You know about her?"

"Of course," Sera replied, stepping closer. "Destiny. She is unbalanced, obsessed. She tears through dimensions like a storm, searching for you. Her love has turned to poison, her power to chaos."

"Then you know why I can’t stay," he said quickly. "If she finds me here, she’ll destroy this place too. I have to keep running."

Sera raised a hand, and he froze—not bound, but stilled by a force so gentle yet so absolute that it felt like the universe itself was holding him in place.

"No," she said firmly. "You will not run anymore."

He stared at her, panic flickering in his eyes. "You don’t understand! She’ll find me! She always finds me!"

Sera’s lips curved into a small, knowing smile. "Not here. This dimension exists outside her reach. Her threads cannot touch this place. You are safe, traveler. But you are also... broken."

He flinched at her words, but he didn’t deny them.

"You’ve lost yourself," Sera continued, her voice softening. "You’ve spent so long running, so long being hunted, that you’ve forgotten who you are. Forgotten your purpose. Your soul is fractured, but it can be mended."

"How?" he asked, his voice barely above a whisper.

Sera placed a hand on his chest, and a warm, golden light flowed through him. "A name is the foundation of identity," she said. "And you, traveler, are without one. But I see it now. Your essence, your true self, hidden beneath the scars she left on you."

She closed her eyes, and the galaxies swirling in the void above seemed to reflect in her gaze. Then she spoke a single word:

"Arth."

The sound of the name resonated through him like a bell, shaking him to his core. For the first time in as long as he could remember, he felt... whole.

"Arth," he repeated, his voice steadier now.

"Yes," Sera said, smiling. "It is your name. Your truth. And with it, you will find strength."

Arth took a deep breath, feeling the weight of the name settle into him. It was like a missing piece of his soul had been restored.

"But even with a name," he said, his voice tinged with doubt, "she won’t stop. She’ll find a way."

Sera’s expression grew serious. "Perhaps. But you are no longer just a traveler. You are Arth now, and with a name comes power. She may chase you, but you are not defenseless. You have me, and you have this place, should you choose to stay."

"Stay?" he asked, almost disbelieving.

"For as long as you need," Sera said. "This is a refuge, a sanctuary. I can teach you to fight her, to shield yourself from her threads. You do not have to be her prey forever."

For the first time in centuries, Arth felt a flicker of hope. He looked up at Sera, gratitude shining in his eyes. "Thank you," he said.

But even as he spoke, a cold chill crept over him. Somewhere, in the far reaches of existence, he knew the Goddess of Destiny had felt his transformation. And she would not take it lightly.

Far away, the Goddess stood among the ruins of a timeline she had obliterated in her search for him. She froze, her eyes narrowing as she felt something shift—a thread she could no longer see, a presence she could no longer touch.

"Arth," she whispered, her voice trembling with a dangerous mix of longing and rage. "You’ve taken a name. You think that will save you?" Her lips twisted into a smile, sharp and wild. "You can run to the edges of existence, but you will always be mine."

Back in the Celestial Witch’s dimension, Arth shuddered, feeling the weight of her words echo through the fabric of reality.

The chase wasn’t over. It never would be. But now, with a name and a purpose, Arth was ready to fight.

—

Through her, Arth finds a purpose beyond the cycles, a chance to reclaim what was lost. But the truth of who he is—the way he is—fades into oblivion.

For in the palm of her hand, Sera holds his memories, their weight heavier than the universe itself.

“This is all useless” The Celestial Witch said as she threw the last orb of Arth's memories "So you've witnessed everything and yet nothing at all... how curious. This doesn’t quite add up, does it?"

“What is he then?” Kim said as she took a sip on a coffee mug. “He’s Enigmatic, Obscure and Cryptic”

"The thing about those origin stories I showed you? Arth isn’t just one of them—he’s all of them." Sera stated.

“Everything about him doesn't make sense, he's a scientist from the far future and then all of a sudden he's a cosmic being and then a human from a distant past? Then a time-traveller hiding from Destiny herself “ Kim said as she gripped her mug “Maybe his past is constantly changing like he's self-rebooting, I mean I did reboot his memories when we looked for you”

"He’s quite the peculiar one among us cosmic beings and entities of higher authority—as if the laws don’t apply to him. And unlike the rest of us, immune to reality’s shifts and always remembering everything, he seems... different." She replied "He’s like a puzzle piece that will never quite fit."

“Then what is he? Who is he?” Kim asked

“Who knows?” The Celestial Witch Sera replied to her "But let's be honest—If you think you know someone today, are they truly strangers at all?"

—

Chapter 6: O.O.O(Over&Over&Over) End