Chapter 185: The Hidden Manuscript

Eliza contacted investigators with a confession.

She had another manuscript.

Not one she created.

One she had recovered from a WAKE cache years earlier.

She had hidden it because she feared Vale would destroy it.

Investigators required her to surrender the storage device.

This time, she complied.

The manuscript was incomplete.

Its title was Wake Up in a Novel.

Freya felt as though the floor shifted.

The author metadata read Bailey Shepard.

Eliza insisted she had adopted the Bailey name after finding the file, not before.

That contradicted earlier assumptions.

Her Crosswind reader account had indeed been Bailey Shepard, but she claimed the display name came from a random suggestion generated by the platform.

Years later, when she found the manuscript carrying the same author name, she believed it was connected specifically to her.

Claire verified that Crosswind could generate suggested usernames.

No one could recover whether it suggested Bailey Shepard to Eliza.

The manuscript began with Freya waking among luxury bags and clothes.

The first chapters matched Freya's memories closely.

Not Claire's Gentle Devotion.

Freya's actual experience.

Chapter after chapter continued through events she had lived.

The text stopped at Chapter 170.

Freya's hands shook.

The final completed chapter described the personalized Bailey books.

The next chapter heading existed but contained no text.

Chapter 171: The Second Copy.

Exactly what had happened.

Exactly the title.

Investigators compared the manuscript against the recently printed books.

They shared material but were not identical.

Eliza admitted using the hidden manuscript to create the books.

She had copied completed events and inserted private information she obtained through surveillance.

"Why?"

"To make you believe the manuscript was active again."

Freya stared at her through the monitored call.

"That is an insane method of asking for help."

"I know."

Eliza claimed that after years of inactivity, the hidden manuscript had updated automatically with Chapter 169.

Then Chapter 170.

She panicked.

She believed Observer_0—or the unknown endpoint—had resumed writing.

She created the physical books to force Freya and investigators to pay attention.

The Chapter 171 title had already existed in the hidden manuscript before the second copy was examined.

That explained how Eliza knew it.

It did not explain how the manuscript knew it.

The forensic team examined the storage device.

The Chapter 171 heading predated the event according to multiple internal records.

Tampering remained possible.

But no obvious manipulation was found.

Freya asked the question everyone was avoiding.

"How many chapter headings are in the manuscript?"

Eliza looked down.

"Seven hundred forty."

Freya closed her eyes.

The number had finally found its source.

Somewhere, years ago, a manuscript carrying the title of Freya's life had been waiting for chapters that had not happened yet.

The manuscript device had remained physically disconnected for long periods, yet historical records suggested new blocks appeared after reconnection. That left open several technical explanations involving delayed synchronization. Researchers warned everyone not to describe the updates as spontaneous until those possibilities were eliminated.

Freya recorded the facts separately from her assumptions and continued with the next practical step. That habit had become one of the strongest protections she possessed. A dramatic explanation could wait; evidence could not. Louis understood the difference, and together they refused to let uncertainty turn ordinary decisions into reactions to a story neither of them had chosen.

Freya recorded the facts separately from her assumptions and continued with the next practical step. That habit had become one of the strongest protections she possessed. A dramatic explanation could wait; evidence could not. Louis understood the difference, and together they refused to let uncertainty turn ordinary decisions into reactions to a story neither of them had chosen.