Chapter 9
To Julian—
By the time you read this, I’m probably already gone.
Don’t feel bad. Don’t mourn. This was my choice.
I never regretted staying by your side, even if it meant dying.
Being with you made me happy. Genuinely happy.
There was a time when your eyes sparkled like I was the only thing in them. You once learned how to cook herbal soups for me. You’d doze off sitting beside the crockpot all night. On stormy days, you’d cross half the city to get me some chestnut cake, soaked to the bone but holding the box like it was made of gold.
Those moments? They kept me warm on the nights I waited for you to come home.
I’ve known about Rachel for a while.
Every time I deleted one of her videos, I wondered if I were more like her—bright, confident, radiant—would you still be tired of me?
But I couldn’t turn myself into some clingy vine, leeching off your guilt. That’s not who I wanted to be.
Julian, you were never a bad person. You just stopped loving me.
These past nine days, thank you for playing out the last dream with me.
The beach wedding, the porridge you made, the way you held me and said you’d love me forever…
It felt like we never drifted apart.
Don’t feel guilty for my death. The System wiping me out was always part of the deal.
The System said I stayed for you far too long. Maybe they were right. But you were here, in this world. And to me, that made it worth it.
My love for you was real. My reluctance to leave was real. But I never wanted to be your burden.
Without me, maybe you’ll be freer. You’ve got someone new now. Maybe even kids. A life. A future.
You’re no longer the lonely man I met.
Me? I had no purpose left. But I still hope you’ll live a good life.
Stay safe. Be happy. Never look back.
—Isla
Tears blurred the ink. Julian pressed the letter to his chest like he could trap her ghost in his heartbeat.
He was the one who fell first. He was the one who made her stay. So why the hell did he let her slip away?
He remembered that night after the wedding.
She was lying beside him, licking strawberry frosting off her fingers, and said in a quiet voice, “Julian… I’m from another world. I was sent here to win you over.”
He’d just wiped cream off her nose and laughed.
“Really? Then I guess I owe someone big-time for sending you to me.”
She blushed, but her voice was serious.
“I mean it! You have to love me forever, okay? If you don’t… I’ll vanish. You’ll never find me again.”
He’d brushed it off like some romantic fantasy. Just Isla being Isla.
Now, that memory burned like acid.
Julian collapsed to the floor, his eyes glassy, crumpling in on himself.
Then came the sound—just one low, broken sob.
He curled up around the letter and didn’t move all night.
The next day, Julian found himself at a Buddhist temple.
He dropped a bamboo stick into the divination box. The monk pulled it out and read: All illusions, like flowers in a mirror or the moon’s reflection in water—beautiful, but untouchable.
The monk placed his palms together and murmured, “You need to let go.”
Julian threw the stick to the ground and walked straight to the nearest church.
The priest gently laid a hand above his head. “Your obsession will only trap her soul.”
Julian kept going—temples, tarot readers, psychics with sage sticks and spells.
Nothing.
Not a single whisper of Isla Monroe anywhere.
Back home, her scent was fading. Gone.
Until his phone buzzed.
That ringtone—it was hers.
His heart stopped as he grabbed it. A scheduled email. A video message Isla had set to send after her death.
He opened it.
The moment it started playing, the sound—familiar, intimate, unmistakably sexual—made his face go pale as ash.
His hand started to tremble. His breath hitched. The panic hit him like a freight train.
And all he could think was: No. Please, no.
