Current task, October 29, 2026: generate one Outside-route page, 04-O, the final page of Chapter 04. Keep New as currently displayed for this pass. Present the new page in the conversation; existing pages are the visual continuity references.
Scope: Chapter 04 has four pages: two shared pages, the Inner ending and the Outer ending. Continue from the existing 04-02 into the alternative Outer outcome. Preserve the current 03-B, 04-01, 04-02 and 04-I artwork.
Visual anchors: Use the current portrait 03-B — AWAKENING for cast, dimensional comic rendering and natural dialogue. Match the Chapter 04 pages' faces, two-column/three-row layout, restrained navy headers, white gutters and speech balloons. Before the time jump the protagonist wears his pale technical jacket; the formal dark slate-blue/cyan uniform belongs to Inner after its two-year jump.
Damon and route logic: Damon dies under the regime's execution order in BOTH alternative histories. He is never a fellow escapee, rescued passenger or surviving resistance member. The illustrated variants show compliance on Inner and refusal on Outer; this does not redefine the broader review as a one-button kill-equals-promotion/refuse-equals-detention rule. The institutional outcome follows the full review.
Rescue cast: the Assistant retains short silver-white hair, amber eyes, orange forehead goggles and practical white/gray-black-orange clothes. She is one member of the multi-person resistance operation. Other members visibly secure the convoy, open the transport, free the protagonist and cover extraction; he actively cooperates. The Chief Inspector does not accompany custody officers. Hunter is away confronting the higher ruler and does not join the rescue. Headquarters and the later team-leadership scenes show the wider resistance, without a romantic couple focus.
The protagonist starts as a capable Senior Systems Auditor, already a technical professional inside the system. Two years later on Inner he is a trusted senior technical official with project-review, team and sign-off responsibilities: growth along the same technical-audit/technocratic career, not a rewrite into an ordinary clerk or a new military career. His short black hair, youthful face and lean build stay recognizable. His formal dark slate-blue jacket, restrained cyan trim and small silver chest badge replace the early work jacket only AFTER the time jump; no lanyard, ornate medals, cape or excessive gold. The precise new formal job title is not yet fixed.
The Chief Inspector is now the accepted broad, muscular, clean-shaven male official: candidate A's short dark buzz cut and square face with the heavier shoulders, thick neck and torso requested from candidate C. He wears charcoal tailoring with burgundy details and a small restrained insignia. He is the Mayor's capable political enforcer, not merely a bodyguard. Retain his political intelligence and the planned compact body-reconfiguration threat. His earlier female design is superseded. Further promotion is a possible development; “Deputy Director of Municipal Inspection” was an assistant proposal, NOT a confirmed rank. Do not invent or display that promotion as settled canon.
Both two-year transition endings belong to Chapter 04. Chapter 05 Inner begins the substantive resource, authority, certification and liability struggle at the high-level roundtable; do not repeat another two-year opening montage. The Director chairs, the Mayor defends municipal jurisdiction, the corporate executive has independent interests, and the protagonist participates through technical responsibility rather than suddenly becoming a ruler. The dispute should cause the later evidence confrontation. Detailed diversion amounts, departmental titles and exact meeting dialogue remain proposals, not newly established facts.
Production order: finish the current 04-O page, then develop Inner Chapters 05–08 continuously, followed by Outer. Readers follow one alternative history at a time.
ONE portrait page per image, exactly TWO COLUMNS by THREE ROWS, read across each row. No landscape board, three-column grid, single-column six-strip layout, extra panels or numbered “1. REFUSAL / 2. DETENTION” step cards. Natural speech balloons, clear speaker tails, visible facial acting and causal actions carry the story. Narration is optional and sparse, not a mandatory explanation in every panel. Keep only necessary time labels such as TWO YEARS LATER and a minimal page/route header. Do not replace storytelling with six labelled summaries. Show the protagonist's expressive face, not repeated back-of-head compositions. Ordinary doors work normally; do not bend or destroy intact architecture merely to advertise strength.