"There is a distance that can only be crossed by thought.

  A place that definitely exists, yet feels like a dream.

  Only by reaching it in your mind can you truly go there..."

  This is not a fantasy. It is a vivid memory my senses have endured.

  To recall my memory is like looking at a drawing on a blank canvas where the thin lines are broken here and there. The harder I try to trace those gaps, the more they tangle, like sand swirled in a shaken bottle.

  Whenever I chase the tail of a thought, I hit a dead end. And in that stillness, just as my mind begins to sink, I arrive there again.

  "Three knocks. Enter immediately. Don't hesitate."

  Following the nurse's dry instructions in front of Dr. O's room, I rapped my knuckles on the door—one, two, three—at a steady tempo and slid it open.

  The room was empty. Through a gap where the sliding door had recoiled against the wall, I could see the adjoining room.

  I remembered walking into that other side when I first came here. Dr. O conducts his consultations by moving between these two rooms, which are joined by a desk that straddles the boundary wall.

  The other room was an exact replica of this one—same size, same layout, same furniture. They stood like reflections in a mirror.

  Only the paintings on the wall set them apart. In one room, a green apple sat on a chair before a mirror. In the other—the one I stood in now—a small pouch rested on the painted chair.

  These two paintings were my only compass in this disorienting symmetry.

  Dr. O hurried in from the other side. He was a gentleman with bold features, long white hair tied back neatly, and a crisp, white lab coat. His look never changed.

  He nodded at me, then immediately began scrubbing his hands with sanitizer. Scrub, rinse, repeat. The ritual was obsessive, the count always the same. I could feel the subtle vibration of his anxiety filling the silence.

  Piles of my test results formed a small mountain on his desk. Brain waves, psychological profiles, and charts measuring wavelengths that defied standard physics.

  He stared at the jagged lines on the monitor for a long moment, as if seeking final confirmation for a hypothesis he had feared to prove.

  "So. How have you been, Adin?"

  "Ah... Fine."

  My heart always made a dry, rustling sound whenever I spoke to him.

  "Still lost in the gaps between the lines?"

  "...Yes. Sometimes." (Every single day, actually.)

  "Hmm..."

  Dr. O hesitated, then shoved the mountain of charts aside.

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  He turned to a whiteboard, completely blackened with marker, and drew a single, unerasable white dot in the center.

  "Adin, the data leads to one conclusion. In fluid dynamics, there is a concept called 'Displacement.' When a new object enters a full vessel, something must be pushed out to maintain the system."

  His eyes bore into mine.

  "Ebony is a world saturated with the density of sorrow and darkness. In that pitch-black void, you were a foreign light that refused to be dyed black."

  His voice rose, trembling with suppressed excitement.

  "Usually, light fades in the dark. But you were different. The darker it got, the more vividly you shone. That world simply couldn't handle your brightness anymore."

  "You weren't abandoned. The vessel of darkness couldn't contain your radiance, so you spilled over—an 'Overflow'—into this place.

  You are a singularity that exceeded the capacity of your world."

  "I have been waiting for a 'Singularity' like you to appear amidst this increasing entropy.

  My family has been collecting data for a long time, waiting for you to finally stand before me."

  I stared blankly at the board and then at Dr. O.

  I wasn't trash thrown away; I was light that was too vivid to hold.

  "Now, you must leave this place and go beyond. To where the world needs your light.

  Take that pouch from the painting and go. The Solet inside must not be shown to anyone easily; use it only when absolutely necessary."

  "Solet. In the ancient tongue, it means 'The Finest Flour.' It is the purest essence obtained only when the rough shell is peeled away, and the hard kernel is crushed and ground until nothing more can be broken."

  "Long ago, the founders of this land possessed this light. But drowned in desire and pleasure, their light turned turbid and eventually burned into black ash.

  Only your bloodline, facing pain head-on, has returned with this 'Original' purity after all this time!"

  He paused, staring at the pouch in my hands with a profound sadness.

  "Adin, listen to me. You must fear the lightening of that pouch, yet accept it willingly."

  "What... does that mean?"

  "That powder is the last breath of your parents, Tildin and Ah Reum.

  They carved their bones and burned their time to leave this for you. Every time you scatter it to perform a miracle... a trace of them left in this world will be erased as the price."

  His voice quivered.

  "Their photos will blur, people will forget their names, and eventually, their very existence will evaporate from history.

  You are burning your parents' 'Past' to live your 'Future.'"

  "This is the 'Incineration of Time.' Solet is finite. Once burned, time never returns.

  On the day the last grain vanishes, the world may be saved, but you will become the loneliest chief mourner on earth. That is the weight of the 'beneficial sacrifice' it carries."

  "But remember. 'Yeast' that puffs up with pride, or 'Honey' that seduces with sweet lies, can never mix with this flour.

  Only the pure dust born of sacrifice can bring down the walls of The Monolith."

  "The softest thing overcomes the hardest. At the end of this journey, you must become the ultimate Underdog—standing at the lowest place to change the world."

  Displacement, Singularity, Yeast and Honey, Incineration of Time...

  His words were like the broken lines in my memory—fragmented and dizzying. But one thing was clear: I had to leave.

  And for the first time, amidst the fear, I felt the adrenaline of purpose.

  "You must leave tonight, before dawn. Tell no one.

  Take only the Solet and go through the tunnel to the place I told you."

  "May good souls be with you on your journey."

  Dr. O stood up.

  Then, to my shock, the old gentleman lowered himself to the floor.

  He bowed deeply—the most humble, traditional gesture of reverence—to me, the boy his family had waited generations to find.

  I couldn't explain the complex surge of emotions I felt. It was overwhelming, and yet...

  it felt like a strange validation of my existence.

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