Chapter 013 - The Infinite Train 13

  How could this be?!

  My heart plummeted, an anchor sinking into the depths of my chest.

  This wasn’t right—this wasn’t…… how it was supposed to be!

  Elliot exhaled heavily, his footsteps slow and deliberate as he moved toward the security guards. His voice was steady, a quiet warning edged with restraint. “Don’t act on impulse.”

  The guards on the other side, growing impatient with our hesitation, fired warning shots into the air. The sharp crack of gunfire echoed through the vast station, but another, stranger sound followed—high-pitched, almost crystalline. I looked up.

  The ceiling of Waterbloom Station shimmered like a fractured mosaic of light and shadow. Bullets had lodged themselves deep within its surface, and as the fissures spread outward, something else emerged—a void. An abyss darker than night itself. It flickered in and out of view, as if reality had been torn apart, revealing the gaping maw of some unfathomable entity.

  The sight of it sent a chill down my spine. That darkness wasn’t just empty—it was consuming.

  The three of us exchanged glances, unspoken understanding passing between us. Whatever that thing was, whatever lay beyond it, it wasn’t meant for us. It couldn’t be our escape. And even if it was—how could we possibly reach it?

  Yet, against all logic, I found myself laughing—a low, humorless chuckle.

  “I almost forgot,” I murmured. “We still have one mirror left unbroken.”

  With a steady grip, I raised the bronze mirror—its back adorned with intricate waterbloom engravings—and, without hesitation, brought it crashing down against the floor. The impact sent a dull shock through my arms, but the surface remained unscathed. Again, I slammed it down, and again, the mirror held.

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  The ground beneath us, smooth and polished like a mirror itself, refused to yield.

  Elliot and No. 137 sprang into action, scrambling to grab anything heavy—metal trays, chairs, whatever they could get their hands on—and hurled them at the floor with desperate force. But it was like trying to shatter the sky with pebbles.

  Gritting my teeth, I stole a glance at the guards. They were still aiming at the ceiling, but it wouldn’t take long before they turned their sights back on us.

  I made my decision.

  “Take cover and brace yourselves!” I shouted.

  Before they could react, I flung the bronze mirror—and a small knife—straight at the lead security guard. The knife whizzed past his face, narrowly missing his eye. He staggered back, then caught himself, seething. His hands tightened around his weapon.

  “Stop! Or I’ll open fire!” he barked.

  I answered him with a raised middle finger and a mocking whistle before tossing a metal tray in his direction.

  That did it.

  The leader’s face twisted with rage, and in the next instant, he tilted his gun downward and pulled the trigger. A hail of bullets erupted, striking the floor with violent force.

  And that was all it took.

  The moment the first round hit, I heard it—the sound I had been waiting for.

  A shattering, like the breaking of an ancient spell.

  The entire floor beneath us—once solid, once untouchable—began to crack. Fissures rippled outward, splintering like ice under sudden pressure. Through the widening gaps, an eerie white light bled through, growing stronger, brighter, until it was all-consuming.

  Then, the world began to tremble. Not just the hall, not just the platform—Waterbloom Station itself quaked as if reality were fracturing around us.

  There was no time to think, no time to hesitate.

  “Jump!” I roared.

  And as the floor gave way beneath us, as everything crumbled into chaos, we leapt—into the blinding white void.

  For a moment, there was nothing. No sensation, no sound, no pain.

  Then, realization dawned.

  I had won the gamble.

  — *The Infinite Train · The End* —