Lacosta

In a world where time is a weapon and the System governs all, Lin Wei is just another name on a list—until the day he awakens an ability that shouldn't exist. With enforcers hunting him and the city’s underbelly teeming with secrets, his only chance at survival is mastering his newfound power: Time Manipulation.  

But bending time comes at a cost. Each use brings him closer to unraveling not just the System’s grip on reality, but his own past—one erased, rewritten, and buried beneath layers of deception. As he pieces together the truth, Lin Wei is thrust into a war between those who seek to control time and those who dare to break free from it.  

With every second stolen, the lines between fate and free will blur. The deeper he dives, the more dangerous the choices become. Will he dismantle the System, reshape history, or lose himself in the fractures of time itself?  

Because not all timelines are meant to be saved—and some should never exist at all.

Fractured Eternity

[Quest Alert: Survive the Containment Cell – Time Remaining: 10:00]

Lin Wei's breath hitched as the sensation of falling overtook him. The world had vanished—no walls, no ceiling, no floor. Just an endless void stretching in all directions. His pulse pounded against his ribs, but there was no sound. No air. No sense of self.

Soft. Familiar. Close.

Lin Wei tried to move, but his limbs felt distant, like they belonged to someone else. A cold pulse rippled through the void, and suddenly—

[System Error: Unauthorized Access Detected]

Lin Wei's body lurched forward as he gasped for air, the sensation of weight crashing back onto him. The sterile walls of the containment cell flickered in and out of existence, glitching like a broken simulation.

His head throbbed. His hands trembled. His vision was not his own.

The glass barrier separating him from Director Xian had been replaced by a shifting haze of distorted shapes. And standing at the center of it was…

His duplicate stared back, expression blank. Eyes dark, depthless. The figure stood in the same clothes he wore, the same rain-drenched jacket, the same bruises on his knuckles. But the resemblance ended there.

The thing did not breathe.

A cold whisper crawled up his spine.

He forced himself to move, shaking off the haze clouding his mind. The room still flickered between dimensions, but something was shifting. His body felt different—lighter, faster.

It mirrored him, an exact reflection, as if the space between them was nothing more than a glass pane.

[System Alert: Time Manipulation Lv. 1 Available]

Lin Wei's mind snapped to attention. He had used it before—but what if he could use it now?

He focused, reaching for the same sensation that had saved him in the alley. A cold, electric pulse rippled through his spine.

The world slowed.

His duplicate's movements stretched, the flicker of its form becoming sluggish. The falling raindrops from the cell's damaged ceiling froze midair, suspended in time.

But just as he was about to strike—

A jolt of pain tore through his skull.

The ability collapsed. The slow-motion world snapped back to full speed. His duplicate did not flinch.

Lin Wei barely had time to register the gesture before his body locked in place.

He couldn't move. He couldn't breathe.

The duplicate had used Time Manipulation too.

A wave of horror surged through him as the realization hit—this thing wasn't just mimicking him.

It was learning.

A countdown flashed in his vision—

[Quest Update: Survive the Containment Cell – Time Remaining: 3:21]

A deafening crack split the air as the room collapsed inward, the walls folding like paper. Director Xian's form flickered on the other side, his voice barely audible over the alarms.

Lin Wei's vision blurred as the world twisted around him, a sensation unlike anything he had ever felt. A pull—not outward, but inward, as if something was dragging him into himself.

The last thing he saw before the void swallowed him again—

Echoes of the Unknown