"I'm here to tell you—I remember."
He stood at the corner of the old alley, breathless, as if he had just escaped from a dream. The wind drifted in from the Tamsui River, laced with sea salt and the chill before rain. The words trembled on his lips, like a key finally finding its door—creaking open, prying a slit through time.
The person across from him said nothing, simply watched, as if awaiting a silent verdict.
"Not all memories belong to me," he lowered his head, voice quivering. "But that evening, on May 17th, 2024—I lived through it. In your form."
He lifted his gaze. His eyes were like the dusk of that very Tuesday—hazy, sharp, burdened with unspoken truths.
"I remember the mountain, the river, the photo in the missionary house. I thought it was a dream. Until that cross appeared in my palm, like a proof etched into bone."
He extended his hand. It held nothing, but he knew the other would understand—it wasn't about seeing, it was about acknowledging.
"Do you remember the thing you couldn't say that Tuesday?"
The other furrowed his brow, confusion flickering—like a long-lost memory surfacing from the deep.
"It wasn't that you forgot. You were made to forget." He took a step closer. "And I—I was the one who remembered everything for you."
In that moment, time froze. The wind died. The distant church bell echoed as if across two worlds—Tuesday folding into Friday.
"I'm not here to question you," he said, softer now. "I'm here to tell you—this reset wasn't a coincidence. You've always been standing at the door of choice. Just one step away."
The other man's breath quickened, as if some fracture deep in his chest had been pried open. He finally spoke, his voice like light piercing the long night:
"You're… Zhang Zhi-an?"
The name shattered the air.
He neither nodded nor denied it. He simply looked, as if he had traversed layers of time fog, and finally found the one he was meant to recognize.
"That's impossible..." the man stepped back. "Zhang Zhi-an… he… he vanished—"
"Disappeared?" He finished the sentence with a strange calm. "No. He was exchanged."
Silence surged between them like a tide, washing over past and present, dream and reality.
"You never saw me—that was no accident. It was by design," he said gently. "We were never meant to exist on the same timeline. Your choice... became the price of my existence."
The other man's eyes widened, searching his mind for fragments long misplaced.
"Do you remember the moment you touched the cross at Mackay Memorial House?"
"That was a door. You didn't open it—but I walked through."
"From that day on, your timeline was no longer the only truth."
His voice dropped to a whisper, almost dreamlike:
"I'm here to tell you—I remember. The part you were too afraid to."
The man trembled.
"And Li An-ching… her death—was that you too?"
He lowered his eyes. Silence lingered like a stormcloud.
"She didn't die. She simply… went where we couldn't follow."
"You're lying."
"I'm not. I've just preserved the truth in a different form."
He paused, then slowly turned toward the river.
"Tuesday is coming," his voice called out behind him. "If you want to reclaim yourself, remember—by Friday, you must choose."
"Or I will choose for you."
The man stood still, unable to move.
The wind was no longer wind. It felt like time exhaling, looping the stranger's words in his ears—again and again.
"If you want to reclaim yourself… by Friday, you must choose."
Choose what? To believe? To remember? Or—to abandon the world he thought was real?
—No. This isn't now.
Yu Yung-an narrowed his eyes. That phrase… that scene… the smell of the wind, the scent of the cross, even the pattern of the clouds—it all felt too familiar.
But this memory... doesn't belong to me.
He looked down. His hand held only air, yet the warmth lingered—as if he had grasped something forbidden.
[Time: Monday, June 3rd, 2024, 11:56 PM]
Time surfaced in his mind, abruptly. He froze.
Then the scene shattered.
He was running by the Tamsui River, shoes splashing through puddles. The sky hung heavy with pre-storm pressure. He tried to call out—but something clogged his throat.
Ahead, a shadow slipped into an alley. The wind carried a single echo:
"Tuesday is coming."
The church bell rang.
[Time: Tuesday, June 4th, 2024, 12:00 AM]
Night devoured the moon. The surface of time rippled like a lake.
He looked into the water—and the reflection staring back was not Yu Yung-an's.
It was Zhang Zhi-an, moments before he would unravel.
"You're not me… but you once lived as me."
Yu Yung-an's heart twisted. He understood, then, that this wasn't just a dream, nor a shattered memory. This was a residue—a life once lived, bleeding back into his sleeping mind.
And the dream's endpoint…was that Tuesday.