The "Green Scream" of the grass was no longer a metaphor. It was a physical wall of vibrating, razor-edged stalks, a tidal wave of hunger that threatened to spill out of the white void and into the reality of the world I had left behind.

  Master Liu. The title felt like a collar. The "01" on my palm pulsed in sync with the heartbeat of the rising houses. The village wasn't just rebuilding; it was waiting for its logic. A world without rules isn't a world of freedom—it’s a world of pure, unbridled consumption.

  "Jun, look at me," my uncle whispered. His legs had already vanished into the white floor. He was becoming part of the foundation. "They need a cage. If you don't build it, the whole world becomes the cellar."

  "I won't be their jailer," I spat, my eyes watering from the sheer, blank brightness of the void. "I won't sacrifice people just to keep a ledger balanced."

  Unknown Sender:

  Then the Harvest begins with your mother. Then your friends. The count will not stop until the world is silent.

  The grass was inches away. A single blade brushed against my boot, and the leather disintegrated instantly, as if aged a hundred years in a second.

  I looked at the blank wooden post. My fingers were bleeding again—the "ink" that the ledger demanded. I didn't reach for a tool. I pressed my blood-stained thumb against the raw cedar.

  I didn't write No lights. I didn't write Don't answer your name.

  I carved a single sentence, fueled by the cold logic of a man who had seen the bottom of the well.

  "The Master of the House is the only one who truly exists."

  The moment the last stroke was completed, the white void buckled.

  The roaring of the grass stopped mid-note. The tidal wave froze, the blades of hay turning into harmless, dried stalks. The village around us—the low houses, the narrow lanes, the smoking chimneys—snapped into focus, but with a horrifying, surreal clarity.

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  The color bled back into the world, but it was wrong. The sky was a deep, bruised indigo. The air smelled of ink and old paper.

  My uncle stopped fading. He solidified, but when I reached out to touch him, my hand passed right through his chest. He looked at me with eyes that were no longer full of fear, but a hollow, echoing void.

  "What did you do?" he whispered. His voice sounded like it was coming from a long-distance telephone line.

  "I changed the subject," I said, my own voice sounding booming and distorted to my ears. "If only the Master exists, then the village can’t take anyone else. There are no witnesses. No ninety-nine. No one to correct."

  Unknown Sender:

  A clever paradox, Master Liu. You have saved the 'others' by erasing them from the ledger. But a village of one is still a village.

  I looked down at my hands. They were becoming opaque, the skin turning the color of weathered wood. I looked at the village square. It was beautiful, silent, and utterly empty. No old woman with a scythe. No man with a cigarette. Just me.

  But then, I heard it.

  Knock. Knock. Knock.

  It was coming from the house I had just "built." The Liu family home.

  I walked toward it. The door was closed. On the other side, I could hear voices. Thousands of them. The "Histories" I had released in the cellar weren't gone. They were just... redirected.

  By making myself the only "real" thing in the village, I had turned myself into the jar.

  "You're the witness now, Jun," my uncle said, his form becoming a flickering shadow on the wall of the house. "You are the only one who remembers them. And as long as you remember, they can never leave."

  I reached for the doorknob. My phone vibrated.

  Unknown Sender:

  Rule Two is pending. The ghosts are hungry for a name.

  I opened the door.

  Inside, the house was filled with people. But they weren't the villagers. They were everyone I had ever known. My mother. My friends from the city. The bus driver. They were all sitting at a long table, staring at empty bowls.

  They looked up as I entered. Their eyes were blank, reflecting the indigo sky outside.

  "Welcome home, Jun," they said in unison. "Is it time for the ceremony?"

  I looked at the phone. The "01" on my hand had changed.

  It now said 00.

  I wasn't the Master of the House. I was the last rule.

  And then, from the hallway—the door that must always remain closed—came a sound that made my blood turn to ice.

  A soft, digital chime.

  My phone, sitting on the table in front of my "mother," lit up.

  Unknown Sender:

  Chapter One has been rewritten. Would you like to see the new cast?

  I looked at the "mother" at the table. She picked up the phone. She looked at the screen. Then, she looked at me, and her face began to stretch, her jaw unhinging, her skin turning into red, frayed cloth.

  "Don't turn on the light, Jun," she whispered. "It invites attention."