"Some structures are never meant to fall. Others are never meant to sound. But the ones that remain silent the longest carry the loudest truths."
They didn't return to the train terminal after the collapse of the peace-loop.
Junie said nothing.
Neither did Orin.
The silence between them wasn't empty. It was echoing. Something had cracked inside them both. The System hadn't just tried to overwrite their minds—it had nearly succeeded in seducing their souls.
The worst part wasn't how close Orin had come to accepting it.
It was how beautiful it had felt.
For a moment, he hadn't wanted to fight. He hadn't wanted to resist. He just wanted the cabin, the silence, the forgetfulness.
But the memory of Kaito's voice pulled him back.
And so did Junie.
Now they walked in twilight that had no source. The sun was suspended above the city like a glitching spotlight, unable to commit to either night or day.
It was 6:17.
Again.
And the bell hadn't rung since.
[01 – A Whisper That Wasn't a Voice]
Junie stopped in the middle of an old garden trail just east of the library ruins. Her breath caught. Her eyes flicked to the sky.
Orin turned toward her.
"What is it?"
She didn't answer immediately. Then she whispered, "I felt it."
"Felt what?"
Junie's fingers tightened around the edges of her sketchpad. "Not a voice. Not Kaito. Something older. Deeper. Like the echo of something I was supposed to remember… but never lived."
A faint breeze rolled across the path.
And with it—
The sound of a bell.
Faint.
Three tones.
Out of sync.
Orin froze.
"That wasn't a memory, was it?"
Junie turned slowly toward the west.
"No," she said.
"That was a call."
[02 – The Sealed Courtyard]
The bell led them.
Not literally, not by footsteps. But the closer they got to the Old Quarter's historic district, the more certain they became that they weren't wandering—they were answering.
They arrived at a stone courtyard nearly swallowed by vine and time. Ivy crept through the fractured tiles. The walls were lined with columns, each carved with fragments of forgotten languages. A small circular dais sat in the centre.
Above it, supported by four collapsed pillars, was a rusted bell frame.
But there was no bell.
Only chains hanging down like forgotten limbs.
And on the ground—
A fragment slab, half-buried, made of memory-glass and obsidian steel.
Junie gasped.
"It's a vault shard."
Orin knelt beside it. The surface shimmered under his fingers. Faint inscriptions pulsed with his Diver mark.
[SEIRA_01-BELL.PROTOCOL-FRAG]
[Echo-Class Memory Vault – Rejected Future]
[Access Denied: Diver-Class Only]
[Override accepted – Crown Diver signature detected]
The slab glowed.
And began to speak.
[03 – Seira's Hidden Fragment]
The voice was soft.
Familiar.
But not alive.
This wasn't Junie's voice.
It was Seira's.
"If you found this… then I failed to protect him.
Or perhaps you are him, rewritten again.
Either way—listen closely.
The bell was never meant to ring.
It was meant to remember."
The courtyard shimmered as the memory shard projected itself across the stone.
Images formed.
The bell tower—once pristine, white marble, soaring above the city. At its base stood Kaito, younger, alive, in ceremonial black. Seira was beside him, sketchpad in hand, drawing not the city—but the moment.
"This tower was built as a time-anchor. A recursion stabilizer. A fail-safe.
But when the System fractured, it rewrote the bell's function.
Now it tolls only when someone chooses to forget what they once died to remember."
The memory flickered.
Seira stepped toward the image of the bell.
"I left this here as a warning. Not all peace is earned.
And not all Diver-class are reborn clean.
If she comes to ring the bell—run.
She was my sister once.
But Diver Zero no longer rings for remembrance.
She rings for silence."
The memory faded.
The slab cracked.
And the sound of the bell tolled once.
For real.
[04 – The Warning Toll]
It reverberated not in air—but in code.
Orin stumbled as the ground vibrated.
Junie covered her ears.
Lights above them flickered.
A drone high in the sky blinked red—then crashed straight down like a stone, slamming into the side of a nearby building and erupting in a short burst of static.
The courtyard's columns trembled.
The chains swayed.
And something shimmered just behind the shattered bell structure—
A figure.
Faint.
White.
Watching.
Not approaching.
But present.
Junie whispered, "She's already here."
"Diver Zero?" Orin asked.
Junie nodded.
"She's not intervening."
"She doesn't need to. She's listening."
[05 – The Choice in Stone]
Orin looked back at the slab.
There was something else.
A final line of text carved into its edge—not part of the System.
Hand-etched.
A personal addition.
"If he comes back… tell him I never stopped drawing him.
Not even when I forgot his name."
– S.
Orin stared at it for a long time.
Then at Junie.
"She remembered."
Junie nodded slowly. Her voice was fragile. "I think… I remember writing this. Or wanting to."
A moment of silence passed between them.
Then the courtyard began to glitch.
Not violently.
Just subtly.
Time around them began to stutter.
The vines moved in reverse.
The sky flickered between morning and dusk.
Reality was trying to seal the slab again.
Orin grabbed Junie's hand.
They ran.
Not out of fear.
But because the bell had rung.
And that meant the next phase was starting.
[06 – Aftermath Echo]
They didn't stop running until they were blocks away, hiding in the shadow of a half-collapsed civic hall.
Junie stared at her hand.
There was charcoal under her nails.
But she hadn't drawn since yesterday.
She opened her sketchpad.
And found a new image waiting for her.
A tower.
A cracked bell.
And a woman facing it.
But this time, the woman wasn't Seira.
It was Lira.
And in the sketch, she was reaching out—
To ring it.
Again.
The bell has sounded—but not as a warning.
As an invitation.
Seira left behind more than a memory.
She left a countdown.
And Diver Zero intends to finish what Seira feared.