Chapter 2

"The publisher is taking this new release very seriously. The platform already spent a lot on offline ads to build hype ahead of time," Samuel said, his expression grim. "I'm going to look into the leak. You need to figure out how you're going to handle this."

After he left, I sat there and replayed everything from the beginning.

Paige was obsessed with mystery novels. After she met Bryan, it was like a fan finally meeting her idol.

She brought him into her videos, drove traffic to him, and kept feeding him opportunities until a guy who hadn't written anything worthwhile in years suddenly turned into a rising online personality.

Because Paige was constantly with Bryan, we fought all the time. She always said he was her childhood idol, and she couldn't stand seeing him fall off.

To keep the peace, I let it go and pretended not to see what was right in front of me.

I never thought Bryan was the one she had been holding onto all along.

I spent the entire afternoon digging through their content, searching for anything that didn't add up.

Finally, I found something in a video Paige posted two months ago.

In the clip, Bryan sat at his computer with his back to the camera, typing fast, ignoring whatever Paige was saying to him.

I zoomed in and watched carefully.

Then, something hit me.

On the pages spread out across his desk were the exact same notes as mine. Even the plot points I had already deleted were there, word for word.

There was no way this was a coincidence.

This book was based on a murder I witnessed as a kid. The police never released the details, so how could Bryan possibly know them?

Even if he learned about it somehow, how could his draft match mine exactly?

I ran through every possibility and got nowhere.

Just then, Samuel called.

No surprise, there were no leads on the leak.

I was stuck.

Samuel was right. This release had already burned through a huge amount of money and effort. If I canceled now, not only would the readers be disappointed, but everything invested so far would be wasted.

If I wanted to cut my losses, the only option was to write something new, fast.

I sat down at my desk, cleared my head, and gripped my pen.

The Gemini tattoo on my back started to heat up, like something inside me was about to break loose.

Nothing I could write would be more suspenseful than what I was living through, so I poured everything into the story.

I wove what happened in my last life into the plot.

There was no way Bryan could have lived through the same thing as me.

After a week, I finished an 80-thousand-word novella. I called Samuel over and handed him the manuscript in person.

When he finished reading, he just sat there, still processing.

"All the twists, the psychological traps, the way the opponent gets played into the ground… Damn, that was satisfying! I never saw it coming, that the writer leaked his own manuscript just to lure the killer out."

Then his expression shifted. He leaned in, lowering his voice.

"Kobi, be honest with me. Was your last book leak actually something you planned?"

I let out a dry laugh. "This isn't a novel. I didn't plan anything. I really have no idea how it got stolen."

The room fell quiet.

Samuel cleared his throat, then forced a lighter tone. "Bryan's not even 1% as talented as you. Why don't we drop this tonight and take him down a notch?"

I was about to agree when a flicker of doubt stopped me.

"Has Bryan done anything recently?"

"No idea. He hasn't posted any new videos. A few publishers I know tried reaching out, but nobody can get a hold of him. I've got no clue what he's up to."

Bryan's book had just shot to the top of the charts, which should have been the perfect time to promote it.

And yet… He had gone completely silent.

Something felt off.

I didn't want to take the risk. I convinced Samuel to wait a few days, then went home and finally got some sleep.

The next time I woke up, it was to the sound of someone pounding on my door.

"Kobi, something's wrong!"

Samuel burst in, out of breath.

"Bryan just released a new story, and… It's exactly the same as the one you finished yesterday!"