The moment he turned the first page, he couldn’t help but recall where the laughter had begun.

Years ago, Ha-im was part of a classified government project under the National Institute of Neuropsychiatric Research.

Its official title: “Cognitive Pattern Dismantling and Addiction Recovery Acceleration Program.” Among researchers, it was simply called “Project TMS-A”—short for Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation with Augmented Hypnosis, an experimental treatment combining magnetic brain stimulation and deep hypnosis.

Their goal wasn’t just to suppress addiction. It was to erase the memory of addiction itself—disrupt the neural circuits that preserved the very story of dependency.

The lab was located underground, with strictly restricted access.

Every wall was coated with soundproofing material, and time seemed to dissolve in the silence. There, Ha-im met the first participants.

These were patients who had failed every known treatment method—cases at the end of the line.

“We’re not treating emotion,” said Dr. Seo Jung-min, the project lead, often and emphatically.

“We’re cutting the roots of the story. If we dismantle the narrative—those memory paths that lead to addiction—the structure collapses.”

“Do you really think that’s possible?” Ha-im turned his head skeptically.

Dr. Seo smiled. “It’s not about belief. It’s about evidence. And we’re already seeing some results.”

The data from the early sessions impressed Ha-im.

Participants showed an astonishing degree of emotional stability. Some reported having no craving at all for substances they had used for decades. Brain scans showed a surprising calm in the dopamine circuits.

It wasn’t just suppression.

“It felt like… the memory of desire itself had been wiped away.”

That statement from one participant remained etched in Ha-im’s notebook.

And yet, Ha-im felt something off.

A subtle dissonance, hard to explain.

“Can a memory truly be erased?”

He asked a colleague in a low voice. The response came with a shrug.

“Maybe the memory wasn’t erased, just buried under something else. But if the craving is gone, isn’t that enough?”

Ha-im nodded, but a heaviness settled in his eyes.

He began reanalyzing some of the hypnosis session footage—studying facial expressions, speech patterns, eye movements.

Something wasn’t right.

One day, a participant began murmuring mid-session:

“The 901st night… she has stopped…”

Ha-im froze, eyes locked on the screen.

That phrase—those exact words—had existed only in his hallucinations. Words that should never have emerged in the real world.

He had experienced them years ago, alone, deep in a feverish vision.

“In the first hallucination… that voice, that phrase… exactly the same.”

He whispered to himself, barely audible.

No one else could have known those words. He had never spoken of them—not once.

And yet—they were right there, in the video.

He rewound the footage slowly and watched again.

The patient’s eyes, the trembling lips, the rhythm of the speech—

“That face… it looked just like the one I saw.”

Ha-im bit his lip. The laughing mask’s eyes from that hallucination rose unbidden in his mind. That cold, piercing gaze.

From that night on, the first page of Ha-im’s research journal read:

“The memory wasn’t erased. It hid inside a story.”

And for some, that story had become more addictive than any substance.

Then, days later, it began again.

But this time, it wasn’t just one patient.

Three. Then five. More.

Participants began whispering the same phrases at different times and in different conditions:

“She stopped… Laughter is coming… The 901st night…”

Their smiles distorted unnaturally. Their eyes emptied of meaning. Their words repeated like echoes trapped in a chamber.

Ha-im was certain now.

This wasn’t a residual effect.

“Some kind of story… It’s growing inside them.”

He began collecting data more intensely. And in his private notebook, he wrote:

“Repetitive verbal loops. Meaningless phrases. Laughter disconnected from emotion.”

“Spontaneous speech, not post-hypnotic suggestion. Participants are conscious, yet their responses are unnervingly synchronized.”

Something had already begun.

He could feel it in his bones.

This was no side effect.

—A story was waking.