Teleported into My Own Novel as the Author!

The warmth of the restaurant hit Charon like a blanket, but it did nothing to stop his body from shaking. His soaked clothes clung to his skin, cold and heavy, and every inch of him ached from the struggle in the river. He let himself be guided to a seat near the fire, the wooden chair creaking beneath his weight.

One of the servers—a middle-aged woman with soft eyes but a firm grip—draped a thick woolen blanket around his shoulders and shoved a steaming mug of something into his hands.

"Drink," she ordered, her tone brooking no argument.

Charon obeyed, if only because he didn't have the energy to protest. The liquid was hot and slightly bitter, with a hint of honey and spices. It scorched his throat, but at least it wasn't river water.

He stared into the flames, his thoughts swirling as fast as the storm of emotions inside him.

Why did I do that?

He wasn't a hero. He wasn't a warrior, or a healer, or anything remotely useful. He was just… a writer. A writer who had somehow stumbled into his own world, and now couldn't seem to stop throwing himself into danger.

But when he saw the man sinking beneath the water, he hadn't been thinking about any of that. He hadn't been thinking at all.

It was his world.

The city, the people, the history—it had all come from his head. And the moment he saw someone dying in it, his body had moved before his brain could catch up.

Was it guilt?

Some weird sense of responsibility?

Whatever it was, it didn't matter now. Because, in the end, it hadn't been enough.

The bearded man was dead.

Charon's grip tightened around the mug as the sting of failure settled in. He'd risked his life to save a man, only for him to bleed out on the docks anyway. And worse—he hadn't even been a good man.

Before Charon could spiral any further, a shadow loomed beside him.

Ishmael.

His clothes were still damp, but he looked completely at ease as he dropped into the seat across from him, resting his sword on his lap. His expression was unreadable—somewhere between amusement and scrutiny.

"He talked, you know," Ishmael said, swirling the dregs of his own drink.

Charon blinked. "What?"

"The guy you dragged out of the river. He was half gone already, but right before he died, he managed to choke out something."

Charon looked away, staring into the flames again. "What did he say?"

Ishmael leaned forward, voice lowering just enough to make it feel conspiratorial.

"'The garden's been poisoned.'"

Charon frowned. "That's… cryptic."

Ishmael snorted. "No kidding." He took a slow sip of his drink before setting it down with a quiet clink. "But here's the thing—I know exactly what he meant."

Charon glanced up. "You do?"

Ishmael nodded, stretching out his legs. "Those two? The ones fighting? They weren't just some drunk idiots with bad tempers. They were major players in an… ongoing problem."

He exhaled through his nose, considering his next words.

"The guy you tried to save—his name was Braelen Marrow. He ran an operation in the lower district, mostly smuggling and extortion, but his real business was in alchemy." Ishmael swirled his mug absentmindedly. "And the man who killed him? That was Silas Roake. A dealer with connections to the Syndicate, just as Braelan did."

Charon stiffened. He knew that name. The Syndicate. A powerful, underground network that controlled the flow of illegal goods in the city—smuggling, black-market enchantments, and most importantly—drugs. He knew the names of those two men too, as they were the names of characters he remembered being important to some storyline.

He had written them.

And now, there were dead, right off the bat, at the beginning of the story...

Did that mean Charon being in this world made changes to the story? It was believable, but also confusing.

Ishmael continued, oblivious to Charon's spiraling thoughts.

"Word on the street is that a new drug's been making its way into circulation. Stronger than anything before. More… unnatural." He gave Charon a sharp look. "And from what Marrow said before he kicked it, I'm guessing someone's been tampering with it. Which means this war between dealers? It's about to get a whole lot worse."

Charon swallowed, suddenly feeling lightheaded.

This wasn't just some random street fight. It was a plotline. One he had started writing but never fully developed. He had left it unfinished, half-formed in his notes, meant to build tension in the city's criminal underworld.

But now, it was real.

And he had just thrown himself headfirst into it.

"Hell of a mess," Ishmael muttered, finishing his drink. "And now you're in it too."

Charon exhaled shakily, staring into the fire as the weight of those words settled over him.

What the hell have I gotten myself into?