They stood on a canvas the size of a continent.
White. Untouched. Floating in the middle of Realm 0.1 like an offering to the unknown.
Kai held his pen.
It trembled for the first time.
Kai-Null beside him said nothing.
He didn't need to.
This was Kai's choice.
> "What happens if I draw here?" Kai asked aloud.
The teacher answered gently from behind.
> "Then this world becomes what you believe it can be."
"And if I don't?"
"Then it becomes what it believes you are."
---
He turned to Elai and Reya, who had followed him across reflections and rewritten systems.
> "Are you… real? Still?"
Reya shrugged.
Elai nodded.
> "We're what you accepted," she said.
"We became real because you loved what you feared."
Kai lowered the pen.
And whispered—
> "Then I want to draw… something impossible."
---
The first line he drew was a circle that had no end.
The second—a door that opened in all directions.
The third—a heart, with his own name written backward.
And then, for the first time—
He let go of the pen.
---
> [FINAL SYSTEM RESPONSE]
Status: Interface Dissolved
Role: Author-Class Freed
Last Input: "?"
---
The canvas didn't explode.
It breathed.
And instead of becoming something defined,
it sang a question into the universe:
> "What would you draw… if no one ever saw it but you?"