Tyler sniffed, the sound echoing hollowly in the infinite black. He sat curled in the oppressive silence of the void, his mind drifting back to the one bright spot that had turned sour: Mike.

Tyler remembered the bitterness he used to feel watching Mike quit jobs on a whim, jobs that were easy, indoor work, while Tyler was still breaking his back hauling cement at the construction site, his lungs caked in dust.

He hated that effortless freedom Mike had. Mike moved from job to job like a leaf on the wind, unburdened. The last time Tyler saw him, Mike was rambling about some new health gig, something Tyler didn't understand, and casually mentioned he was quitting the convenience store. Just like that.

That was the same day. The day Sarah rejected him. The day he was transported to this world.

Tyler pushed himself up with a low groan, his joints popping in the silence. *But that life is behind me, i wont.... I wont let you use that against me* he thought.

The darkness suddenly shifted. It wasn't a visual change, but a physical one, the air around him began to vibrate with a low, bone-rattling hum. The blackness rippled like disturbed water.

"What?" Tyler muttered, turning his head frantically. "What's going on? What's happening?"

The void dissolved, the darkness bleeding away into color and light.

The scene sharpened instantly. He wasn't in the dark anymore. He was standing in a room he knew all too well.

Grone's house.

The air smelled of hard work and scrubbed wood. Lisa was there. She had just finished cleaning, wiping a bead of sweat from her forehead, her chest rising and falling with the exertion.

The door clicked open.

The sound of the latch lifting was sharp in the quiet room. The door creaked open.

Lisa's posture shifted instantly. Her eyes lit up, a soft, welcoming warmth spreading across her face. She turned toward the door, her lips parting to greet her husband, expecting Grone to be the one walking through the frame.

But it wasn't Grone.

It was Tyler.

He walked in, looking exhausted, his shoulders slumped.

Tyler, the observer, stood a few feet away, invisible and helpless. He watched the light die in Lisa's eyes. The smile didn't just fade; it collapsed, replaced by a visible wave of disappointment that hit him harder than any anger could have.

Tyler's heart hammered against his ribs, a frantic rhythm that made his chest ache. His breath caught in his throat.

Suddenly, Tyler's vision shifted again.

The perspective inverted. He was no longer watching from the sidelines; he was looking through Lisa's eyes. He felt the shift in gravity and the simmering irritation in her chest.

He looked at himself, the Past Tyler standing near the doorway.

Through Lisa's eyes, he didn't look like a victim. He looked like an intruder. A stranger Grone had dragged into their sanctuary, a helpless boy he insisted on "saving." Grone had claimed he knew the boy, but it was a lie. Lisa knew it instantly. Grone was a terrible liar; he could never meet her gaze when he was hiding something.

"Oh, so you've returned," Lisa said.

She couldn't keep the flatness out of her voice. She had held onto a quiet, wicked hope that he was gone for good. It wasn't impossible; the boy had arrived with nothing, no bags, no money. It would have been easy for him to just keep walking and disappear as quickly as he had arrived.

"Yeah," Past Tyler muttered.

"Are you coming from Hector's shop?" she asked, coating her tone in a thin layer of politeness.

"Yeah," he replied, shifting his weight. "I cleaned a lot today."

"Oh, must have been hard work," she said, though the concern felt hollow in her throat. "You shouldn't burden yourself too much."

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"No, it's fine."

He walked past her, heading toward the small room they had given him. Lisa let out a long, heavy sigh as he disappeared down the.

The facade crumbled. She didn't want him here. She wanted him gone. He was a burden, a leech attached to their family, eating their food and taking up space they didn't have. She had spoken to Grone about this, arguing in hushed whispers, but Grone wouldn't listen. It was as if her husband was obsessed, his pity blinding him to reality. He'll leave soon, Grone always insisted. I'm just helping him get on his feet.

Suddenly, the sharp, tearing sound of a crying toddler echoed from the bedroom.

Lisa's head snapped toward the sound. Heather had woken up from her nap.

She turned away from the room where Tyler had disappeared and hurried toward the bedroom door. She reached for the handle, her mind already shifting from the annoyance of the houseguest to the needs of her child.

But as her fingers grazed the wood, the vision fractured.

The house, the crying baby, and Lisa's resentment vanished instantly.

He was standing in a forest at night.

The cold night air hit him instantly, biting at his bare chest and rustling his hair. Goosebumps rose along his arms, but the chill on his skin was nothing compared to the cold spreading through his chest.

The phantom weight of Lisa's resentment still clung to him. He had always suspected she felt that way, deep down, but living inside her was different. It wasn't just a bruise on his ego; it was a surgical incision into an old wound, carving it deeper.

But then, the scene settled, and the pain of rejection was replaced by a sharp, terrified recognition.

He was looking at Rebecca.

She lay on the damp earth, her body convulsing as she coughed, forcing thick, dark blood past her lips. It stained her silver hair, hair that had always been perfect and radiant, matting the strands with crimson.

Beside her crouched his past self, encased in the the Shadow Armor.

Observer Tyler shook his head, panic clawing at his throat. He knew the pattern now. He knew what the Void was doing.

"No," he whispered, stumbling back. "No, stop this."

He shouted at the empty air, his voice cracking. "I get it! You don't have to do this! Please!"

There was no response. The memory didn't waver. He was a ghost here, powerless to stop the inevitable.

He knew the Void was going to launch him into Rebecca.

The memory of losing her was already a knife he carried in his heart every single day. But the thought of entering her body, of feeling her dying breaths, her pain, and worst of all, her final thoughts about him, brought hot tears stinging to his eyes. He couldn't bear to know if she had hated him too.

The vision shifted violently.

He was inside Rebecca.

Agony didn't just vibrate through her; it ruptured through every fiber of her being. It felt as if her bones were trying to tear their way out of her skin. Her ribs were shattered, each breath a jagged, scraping gasp that sent fresh spikes of torture through her chest.

He tried to open his eyes, but there was nothing.

Only absolute, sticky darkness.

Her eyes were gone. The sockets were empty, weeping a hot mixture of blood and tears that trailed down her cheeks.

He tried to clench his hands, but the signal died at the wrists. Her fingers had been broken, then severed. Her legs were useless. Her tongue pressed against the back of her jaw and found only soft, ruined gum; the last of her teeth had been ripped out.

She had been unmade. She had been beaten and battered by the people who had tortured her, the people who had taken her apart while Tyler was busy crafting, oblivious to her screams.

Tyler braced himself for the hatred. He waited for the burning regret he had felt in his father and the cold disappointment he had felt in Lisa.

But it didn't come.

Strangely, she did not feel hate toward him.

Instead, she felt a crushing, bottomless regret. It wasn't regret for meeting him. It was regret for this life. She mourned the path she had chosen, the loss of her parents, the series of tragedies that had led her to this dark, blood-soaked end.

She tried to speak. She tried to utter words to comfort the Tyler standing beside her.

It's okay, she tried to say.

But the act of speaking seared her lips, which were laced with cuts and swelling. It worsened the wounds on her mouth and her tongue, but she forced the words out anyway, prioritizing his comfort over her own agony.

She was a person who had needed so much help. She was broken, and in the end, Tyler hadn't been able to offer it. But she didn't blame him. She only wished things had been different.

Suddenly, the vision shattered.

Tyler was back in the void.

He crashed to his knees, the phantom sensation of severed limbs and shattered ribs ghosting over his skin. His breath came in ragged, hyperventilating gasps.

He let out a sharp, guttural scream, the sound tearing from his throat as he collapsed forward, before he caught himself with his hands.

He had felt what Rebecca felt that day. The girl he wanted to help so much. The girl he couldn't save. He had worn her skin. He had felt her dying thoughts, and they were tragically, heartbreakingly kind.

"I'm so sorry," he sobbed, his voice cracking in the darkness. "I'm so sorry."

"With all that I had, I couldn't do anything," he whispered to the darkness. "I couldn't save you. I didn't save you."

The realization settled over him like a shroud.

*I'm worthless,* he thought. *In the end, I'm just the same. I haven't changed at all. I'm just a useless burden.*

The despair coiled around him, tightening with every breath. The memories swirled in a sickening loop, confirming his worst fears.

His entire existence had brought his parents nothing but misery.

He had been a burden even to Mike. They had planned to pay the rent together, equal partners, but Mike was always months ahead, quietly covering for Tyler because he couldn't keep up.

He was a parasite to Lisa, a sudden weight dropped onto her struggling family.

He couldn't help Rebecca; he had just watched her break.

And even Serena... he had left her with nothing but anger and frustration.

He slammed his fist against the solid black floor.

He hit it again. And again.

"Why?" he choked out. "Why was I even born? Why was I thrust into this world just to fail?"

His thoughts spiraled, swirling around the darkest parts of his life over and over again. Tears spilled from his eyes, pooling on the cold floor beneath him. It felt like hours passed in that darkness, just him and his failures.

Suddenly, a muffled boom vibrated through the emptiness.

It sounded like roaring thunder heard through water, distant and heavy. The entire void shook violently, trembling like an earthquake.

But Tyler didn't react. He didn't look up.

The physical instability didn't matter. The shaking ground didn't concern him. Compared to the psychological torture he was enduring, an earthquake was nothing.

He felt like a dagger was buried in his chest, being twisted continuously, shredding what was left of his heart.

*Make it stop,* he pleaded silently.

He wished he didn't feel this way. He wished he couldn't feel any of this. The Void Entity's words echoed in his mind, no longer sounding like a threat, but like a promise of salvation.

*I wish I couldn't feel anymore.*

"Tyler!"

A voice shouted through the void, shattering the oppressive silence.

Tyler's eyes snapped wide. He scrambled to push himself up, his palms slipping against the cold, wet floor where his tears had pooled. He sat there, chest heaving, listening to the echo.

"Joy?" he muttered.

He recognized that voice instantly. He knew that sound, it was filled with a raw, desperate concern, a yearning that cut through the darkness like a beacon.

For a heartbeat, that voice pulled him out of the spiral. It offered a hand to drag him out of the pit.

But the despair was heavy, and its grip was tight. It dragged him back down.

The light that had flickered in his eyes died out. His shoulders slumped, and he looked back down at the darkness.

*She doesn't need me,* the thought whispered, insidious and convincing. *She only thinks she does because... well, she's a pet.*

*It's just the System. It's the Subjugation Skill.*

He convinced himself, the logic bitter on his tongue. *It's not real. It's just the skill making her feel this way. I'm not special. I'm just the person holding the leash.*

"Tyler..."

The word echoed through the void again, but this time it felt drawn out, laced with wavering doubt.

Tyler stared blankly at the abyssal black floor. He didn't answer. He didn't look up. He didn't care anymore.

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