Chapter 7: Shards of Silence

The glass fell like rain.

Kazuki shielded his face as the mirror burst apart, its pieces clinking across the ground—but none cut him. When he looked again, the room had changed.

No more walls.

No more ceiling.

Just an endless plain of broken mirrors, stretching out in all directions like a frozen sea of shattered reflections.

And yet, not a single one showed his image anymore.

He stepped forward, crunching glass beneath his shoes. Every fragment held something else—a memory, a scream, a face that wasn't his.

One shard showed a girl crying. Another, a hand reaching out from water. Another, the same boy he'd seen in the mirror… bleeding from the eyes.

> "What am I seeing?"

A voice replied, but this time, it wasn't from any flame or reflection.

It came from inside him.

> "Memories you've denied. Truths you've forgotten. Lies you chose to believe."

Kazuki dropped to his knees. His breath shook. "Why? Why me?"

> "Because you're not who you think you are."

One large mirror rose from the ground ahead of him like a gravestone. Unlike the others, this one was whole.

He approached slowly. Dread tightened in his gut.

Etched at the top of the mirror were five words:

PROJECT REFLECT – SUBJECT K-06

His heart stopped.

> Subject…?

A handprint glowed in the center of the glass. Instinctively, Kazuki placed his hand against it.

The mirror lit up.

It showed not a memory—but a lab. Fluorescent lights. Wires. Bodies in tanks. One of them… him.

Or at least someone who looked exactly like him.

And standing behind the glass?

The girl he thought was his sister. Crying.

> "Initiate memory override—Subject unstable."

> "Begin termination protocol."

Kazuki screamed. The mirror went white-hot.

And then—

Everything vanished.