[A/N: So this chapter will be where it's revealed... I don't know how you'll feel about this 'twist' (?) and if it's nothing near what you expected, I'm really sorry. Hope you're not disappointed (⌒_⌒;) well I'll have to leave since I have work to do. Love you <3]

♫ Loneliness - Martin Czerny; Empty Memories - Martin Czerny ♫

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Instead of feeling like the celebrated princess she's supposed to be, she feels like she's being punished instead. They're back at the library, this time for a different purpose with the same people.

Narae is at the centre of attention, with the box placed in front of her like it's a gift about to be unwrapped. After what Hongjoong had said to her in her room, the desire for her to open the box to find what is inside becomes lesser; even more as she sees the solemnity on Hongjoong's face, the latter looking as if he refuses to even glance at her direction.

Everyone else is quiet, the tension obviously palpable and it's all directed towards the princess. None has offered any words of consolation, even her brother who is sitting at the far end, his shoulders slumped. Is this one of the powers of the Arcus too? Where it'll make the atmosphere horrible and the people around laden with negative feelings?

It's no wonder that she tried to keep the Arcus as far away as possible from her.

The box in front of her is made of heavy metal, the colour black and unsecured. There is no lock found anywhere, in which she would expect to see for something supposedly guarded with the highest security. It would only take her a lift of the lid to see what's inside, most likely then gaining access to the memories that she had lost. She would remember what happened that night... maybe heaving a sigh of relief, maybe breaking some ties with the people she knows.

Yet they're all here - including the one she suspected the most - her own lady-in-waiting, obediently standing by the library door. They don't seem scared of her finding out the truth, if that means they were a part of her accident. Why does it seem that she's the only one horrified of what's to come? She hates the cryptic words Hongjoong has spoken to her. She hates how he keeps repeating his love to her, until she feels that he didn't mean it as much as he said it.

She makes a move to place her hands on the lid, and this seems to make the rest stir too. They sit up straighter, eyes now fully focused on the box. Taking a deep breath she opens it slowly, getting ready in case something blinding would assault her eyes, or something would jump out from its case. She's expecting too much that she shudders when nothing happens as she puts away the lid.

As opposed to the size of the box, what lies inside is considerably smaller. In fact, even as she peers inside, it takes her a while to find what's inside as the object's laying flat on the bottom of the box, the colour blending in with the walls of the box. She fishes it out, unsure of how to react as she looks at the object in her hand.

This is the Arcus? Another book?

It looks similar to her journal, or she could even say it's the very same book as she traces the cover. She gets confused when she spots her nickname at the bottom corner of the cover. If the Arcus is a relic that gets passed from a generation to another, why does it have her nickname on it? Unless... that's where her nickname came from. She shakes her head- still, it doesn't make any sense.

Pearl. Jinju.

When she opens the book and looks through it, she almost drops it from the sheer shock of what she's seeing. They are only pages which seem to have some random scribbles, but they're not... Like a madman she thumbs through the pages, trying to absorb everything and her eyes are spinning from all the words written down and the drawings inked. The contents of the book are all over the place, like what's currently happening in her mind.

Everything is written in her handwriting, but the sketches she knows are not hers, but somehow she knows whom the strokes belong to. Serim.

She doesn't understand. She refuses to understand.

"Narae..." Hongjoong's soft voice gets to her but she flinches when he tries to touch her arm. "You have to realize..."

"No, no, no. I'll pretend that I didn't see it; this is a joke." Tears drop from her eyes as she shakes her head furiously. She wants to throw away the book, but it is as if it's glued to her palm; she can't let go. Her shaking hands form a fist, crumpling the open pages as she inhales and exhales heavily. "All of this..."

She looks at the pages in front of her, all of the details. On the pages she tries to make sense of what she has come to know. All the information from the moment she woke up until right at this very moment in the library; it was all in there.

She traces her fingers on the first page; on top of it, the word 'ARCUS' is written in bold letters, underlined twice. Then the following pages are all details of the other royals, along with the sketches of their portraits and every single detail of what happened to her. The only sketches missing are hers and Hongjoong's.

Her brain hurts as she takes a look at the first part, the title written as prologue: when the wind blows, before reading the paragraphs after, detailing what happened before she woke up. Then the first chapter... when she woke up, the first time she met her parents, her brother and her lady-in-waiting. Everything is exactly as what happened.

"Narae... you have to know that we're all only characters you made up in the story you've written," Wooyoung mentions. "We're all products of your imagination; we never existed before you penned us down."

"I don't- I don't understand-" she stutters. "The accident- the accident that made me lose my memories-"

"You wrote for it to happen," Yeosang replies. "But we would never know who did it."

"Because you never finished writing the story," Mingi adds solemnly. "None of us even knew what the Arcus is, because you never got to the point of the story where you will reveal it. In fact, this... world you're in only started when you woke up, supposedly having lost your memories."

"Please tell me that this isn't real," she says.

"It isn't, that's why you need to stop dreaming and wake up," San smiles sadly.

"You know that's not what I meant! Please tell me that it's not real, that all of you are only pulling my leg. Come on, I won't be angry if you tell me right now that you're only joking. Come on," she says through gritted teeth.

They ignore her plea as Jongho continues, "You do know that we only existed because of the Arcus- or rather, the story that you wrote, the story that you named as the Arcus. We don't even know what the Arcus is, because you never got to the point where you wrote about what it is."

"This is as far as we can go, and your time here is up. Narae... this is not your world. I'm not your brother, nor are we your family. You need to wake up," Seonghwa utters. "The more you stretch your time here, the more the people over there in the real world will suffer."

"But I can't; you know that I can't wake up!" she shouts hysterically. "The moment I leave here is the moment that I'll die in the real world. The only reason I'm still breathing is because I'm alive here."

They keep quiet, because they know that it's true.

She lets out a mixture of anguish screams and painful sobs, clutching the book in her shaking hands. It's all becoming clear to her now, the dreams that she had, the familiar faces of these people around her, the sounds that seemed to be a trigger to her memories... her real memories. Everything is coming back to her.

"Narae... you've been in coma for too long, you need to wake up. Stop trying to hold on to this fragment of your imagination; we're not real," Yunho tries to coax her. "Wake up."

"I... can't..." she croaks, obviously in pain. She stands up, but she collapses to the ground with the book still in her possession.

Serim rushes up to her, clutching her in her hold.

"Serim... tell them that I can't go back," she pleads to her lady-in-waiting. "Serim! Tell them that if I let go of what I know here... I'm going to die. I'm not going to wake up on the other side; I'm going to die! They're not listening to me... they're not listening..." Her plea has become something repetitive; a prayer that no one is accepting. "I don't want to go."

Yunho and Serim look at each other, shaking their heads. The rest of the royals are keeping mum; even Seonghwa who is looking down at her, the role of a brother gone from his stance. They don't know what to do; for as long as Narae is not accepting the fact, that's how long she's going to stay here, but that's not something they can allow. Narae needs to be let go.

"I want to stay here, please. I'm... scared..." she admits. "The story that I wrote because I wanted an escape; I can't let it end."

"Narae," Hongjoong's voice is firm as he kneels beside her collapsed form. "We're not meant to stay like this; we're not even supposed to exist."

"Narae," Yunho says, kneeling next to Hongjoong. "All of us, and that includes Serim too, we're all there, on the other side of your real world. Only... you may not remember us as what we are now. We're not princes or kings of some realms you made up; we're only normal people."

"That's not the point," she utters, aggravated but at the same time weak. Her head is throbbing from the sudden rush of memories, until she can't tell whether they're real or merely her imagination. Everything is a mess. "All of you know exactly why I refuse to leave. If I do... I won't ever open my eyes again on the other side."

"You have to accept your fate, Narae," Seonghwa utters. "We can't push it further. Your time... is up."

He sounds like the grim reaper about to rip her heart off right there and then until she wiggles out of Serim's hold. She pushes herself back, away from the royals who look like they're about to throw her out of the window. They're no longer the friendly people who would enjoy their banters together; they're people about to kick her out from the palace... from this world.

Whatever this world is supposed to be.

They're all against her now; including Serim, who back then was the outcast, is advancing towards her. The lady-in-waiting is not the outcast anymore; it's the princess. The princess who was made up by the imagination of a writer.

With her back against the wall and the royals advancing towards her, she pushes as far as she can before she gets up, using all the energy she has left. She holds on to the book, or the so-called 'Arcus' in her grip like it's her lifeline - maybe it is - before dashing through the doors of the library. Her flats tap noisily on the tiles, and she notices it, how the people in the palace are all staring at her like she's some kind of ghost flying through the palace halls.

She's not supposed to be here anymore. She's no longer Princess Narae.

But she refuses to accept it.

She knows that the others have started to follow her, but she doesn't know where her feet will bring her to. In this time of distress every path looks the same, her fragmented memories piecing itself one by one but they still have not fused to form a proper full picture. This world and that world... what does it mean to her? If she decides to leave right at this moment, she'll cease to exist, both here and in her 'real' world.

She can hear San and Jongho calling out her name, the others shouting something incoherent. They should have been using their powers to subdue her, since she's nothing but a weak human who lost her powers, but rather, they're chasing her with their own two feet. It's not like she'll stop to ask why they aren't tackling her to the ground right at this moment, halt this cat and mouse game.

She doesn't think as she runs up the tower, her feet seemingly having their own will as she bursts through the wooden doors and rolls on the stony surface, scraping her palms and knees. Even though she's in pain she doesn't stop to inspect the wounds, much urgent matters are in her hands when she's about to lose her life. But she has nowhere to go, and of course, she ends up at the place where the story started.

The tears feel cold against her skin as she stays on the ground, too weak to continue. Crying is all that she feels she can do now, her shoulders shaking violently as she lays her palms flat on the ground. Is it the tears that's making her vision blurry, or is she finally losing touch with this world?

The footsteps thunder behind her and the door bursts open to the rest of them, and she thinks that this is it, her final moments. She has nowhere else to run, nowhere else to hide. Only then she realizes how cold it is, the night that's wrapped around her as she hugs herself, pushing herself back against the wall. Her wounds sting but she doesn't tend to them at all, reminding herself that pain in this world is meaningless.

She stares blankly at the ground, before she sees a pair of feet coming to her and she looks up to see Hongjoong, pain evident in his eyes and fresh tears streaming down. He crouches next to her, and she lets him embrace her.

"Was this-" she stammers, "was this what you meant- when you said- that we won't exist- anymore-"

He squeezes her, his hand caressing her hair while his own tears soak her shirt. "I'm sorry," he mutters. "I'm sorry."

"So we really are- stopping- here-" she decides. "I understand now, why you kept repeating it to me like we didn't have any time left."

"I really do," he mumbles into her hair. "I really do love you, Narae. But this is how far our story can go, because this was where you stopped writing."

The rest look at them full of sorrow, and even Yeosang throws back his head, trying to stop his own tears from flowing out. Mingi and Yunho are crying in each other's hold, while San, Wooyoung and Jongho are holding hands, biting their lips so as to not let any sound escape. Seonghwa and Serim are side by side, looking on as they have no words of consolation to offer. Softly, Seonghwa holds on to Serim's finger, a simple gesture to show that their time is also up.

"If I go... I can never meet any of you again," Narae utters as she grips Hongjoong's arm. "Even if all of you were only characters that I created... I felt like I found some comfort with you. And for Serim... I'm sorry for suspecting you."

Despite the circumstances, the lady-in-waiting chuckles before slightly bowing her head. "Your Highness, we're merely acting based on your story. From what you wrote, Princess Narae did indeed suspect her lady-in-waiting in the earlier parts of the story."

"But right now we will not know how it will go... because I never finished writing it..." Narae trails off.

"But we had fun in this short time together, didn't we?" San claims. "And we even got a beautiful pet thanks to you. You described her perfectly, our lovely Byeol."

"We'll miss you, princess. Even though we may never be in human form again, just pretend as if we're floating around somewhere in this universe," Wooyoung jokes. "Thank you for making us exist, giving us amazing characteristics, making us royals who get the taste of power. But really, if you ever write again, can you please give me a gorgeous princess-"

With tears streaming down she can't help but laugh. "It's too bad, though. I don't think I'll be able to write ever again. My time here is up, and so is my time over in the real world. I'm just a phantom stuck in between two dimensions."

"Narae," Seonghwa's voice comes next. "Even though we may not be real siblings, only made brother and sister by writings on a page, I'm still happy to have you as my sister. You're still annoying, though."

"You're annoying too," she replies while smiling. "But you're possibly the best brother I could ever ask for. And the rest of you, I'm sorry that I couldn't finish the story and give you the life forward you deserve. I'm sorry that you had to be cut short because of my inability."

"Hey, it's not your fault," Hongjoong pats her head. "Life can be real shitty and unfair sometimes. You deserve to be happy, princess."

"Thank you," she sniffs. "To every single one of you. Seonghwa, Hongjoong, Yunho, Yeosang, San, Mingi, Wooyoung, Jongho and of course, Serim. Thank you."

"We'll meet again, maybe in another life, or maybe in another world. Maybe even in this world, if we somehow manage to save it."

San and Jongho look up to the sky, where there are lines resembling the patterns of a heartbeat are traced across the sky. They look at the princess again, before their expressions are delivered to her even without them saying anything. She knows, they know; their time can no longer be stretched. It has been long overdue. She goes to each and every one of them, giving them a hug.

"Can I make a promise with all of you?" she says as she moves away. "I want to make sure that we can meet again. How... I don't know. But I want to."

"We can't make a promise," Mingi says. "But we can try."

"As long as we try, there can be a way. Then that's good enough for me."

Using the stones as leverage she climbs up easily, standing up at the very place where she was said to have fallen to her death. How ironic it is for her to return back to where she had almost lost her life, only to see it being taken away again. She looks down to them, who are huddled together as they give her their final wave.

She closes her eyes and leans backwards, letting herself fall. As she falls downwards, she looks up to see them looking over the edge, crying. She doesn't cry anymore, but her heart feels like it is torn mercilessly.

It's true... they're only characters in her story that she made up, but each one of them are based on the people she has known in her real life. Where all the unassuming people were gathered under one roof, where they may not even know each other as much as they did here.

She remembers now; this is the story that she wrote because she wanted to escape reality, to bring her away from the pain that she had to experience back in that world. But now, even in this world she feels so much pain.

She smiles at them, she doesn't want to cry. She wants her last memory to them is her smiling, and not a crying princess. She's bracing herself to feel her body slamming onto the hard ground, her bones to crack and her blood to flow out... so she closes her eyes. She balls her hands, her ears blocked from anything else except for one: the haunting music.

How his perfume and the music are related, because it was Kim Hongjoong who created the song. He was the pianist with fingers dancing on the keys, creating the chilling sound. It was the piece he would play when someone dies... over and over again. So it is true, how it is a song played at a funeral.

The music is played for her, because now it's finally her turn.

The music blends with something else, another new melody, but somehow she knows that it is the same person playing it. A new piece of music, but the same pianist. A song dedicated to her? Kim Hongjoong...

Jinju... that's not my nickname. That's my real name.

The line in the sky have their pulsating reduced, until it completely flattens. By the time the line is nothing but a straight line, Park Narae's body is almost reaching the ground, the point where this world will finally end.

In her real world, the screen beside her body that has been showing a line that beeps steadily finally turns into a flatline. Even as they try to jumpstart her heart again, it's too late. After a month-long coma, she has finally succumbed to her illness and is forced to let go both of the worlds she knows.

Tears accompany her departure, but not hers.

Never hers.