[: Daniel's POV :]
Have you ever encountered a situation where you find yourself in a dream within a dream?
It sounds ridiculous, right? But that's exactly the kind of situation I'm in right now. Even now, I'm clueless whether or not I'm speaking within my dream or not.
I don't remember when it began.
One moment, I was standing in the silence of my thoughts… the next, I was somewhere else.
A place that should not exist.
The ground beneath me cracked and crumbled, bleeding pale light like veins splitting open.
It wasn't stone, wasn't earth—it was fragments, shards of something far greater, suspended in nothingness.
Above me was no sky, only a canvas of fractured stars and torn constellations.
Yet I wasn't alone.
Figures surrounded me.
Dozens of them, no...maybe hundreds.
My eyes strained to focus, but their shapes blurred, shifting between shadows and substance.
Some were giants cloaked in flame, others were silhouettes wrapped in darkness, their forms dissolving when I looked too closely.
I tried to see their faces—tried to understand who or what they were—but every attempt failed.
The dream itself refused to let me know.
They were speaking words that I couldn't hear...no...it was more like their words were sealed.
Their presence pressed on me like mountains collapsing. J
And then the void trembled.
The darkness split open as monstrosities poured through—a flood of horrors too vast to comprehend.
Are...they monsters...?
Their forms writhed against the fabric of reality.
Serpents with wings of burning ash, giants with mouths stretching across their entire bodies, beasts whose eyes alone were larger than worlds.
With every movement, they shattered stars, swallowing galaxies like crumbs scattered across the table of infinity.
I knew—without reason, without logic—that each of them carried enough power to extinguish entire planets.
The blurred figures around me surged forward, their silence breaking into violence.
One raised a colossal weapon carved from collapsing suns, cleaving through the body of a beast that split apart only to reform again.
Another tore at the edges of reality itself, binding a monster in chains of paradox that groaned and snapped under its weight.
The void became a battlefield, chaos unending.
I wanted to fight.
My instincts screamed at me to join.
But I couldn't move.
My body felt like stone, heavy and chained.
My throat strained to shout, yet no sound left me.
I was a prisoner in my skin, forced to watch the destruction unfold.
And then I felt it.
A gaze.
Among the chaos, one of the monsters turned toward me.
Its body was indescribable.
It was like a writhing amalgamation of void and teeth, but its eyes, they found me.
They knew me.
The others were fighting the blurred figures, but this one chose me.
It moved.
In the span of a breath, it was before me.
A shadow vast enough to blot out everything else.
Its claw rose, black fire dripping from talons sharp enough to tear dimensions apart.
I couldn't move.
I couldn't defend myself. I could only stare as death descended.
But before the end came, a hand touched my arm.
I turned and saw her.
A girl, a figure standing beside me, her face hazy, blurred like smoke, as if the dream itself hid her identity from me.
I couldn't see her features, couldn't hear her voice, but I felt her presence—gentle, unyielding, defiant against the nightmare.
"No—"
My voice cracked, breaking free for the first time in the dream. "Wait—don't—!"
But it was too late.
She stepped forward, placing herself between me and the monster's claw.
There was no hesitation.
The beast's strike fell.
Her body crumpled under the weight of an attack that could annihilate worlds.
She didn't scream.
She didn't falter.
She simply… vanished, fragments of her form scattering like ash into the void.
And I—
"No!"
The word tore out of me, louder than thunder, ripping through the dream like a blade.
My legs finally moved, my voice finally carried. I reached for her, but there was nothing left to hold.
The blurred girl who had stood in front of me—who had given her life for mine—was gone.
I screamed until my throat bled, but the battlefield drowned me out.
The monsters roared, the figures fought, and the void swallowed everything.
And then—
I woke.
My body jolted upright, drenched in sweat.
My breath came ragged, shallow, my heart hammering against my ribs as though trying to escape.
The darkness of my room pressed in, and for a long moment, I couldn't tell if I was awake or still dreaming.
My hands trembled.
My vision blurred.
Her sacrifice still lingered in my mind. T
hat faceless girl. That warmth. That choice.
I pressed a hand against my chest, as if I could hold on to the echo of her presence. But all that remained was emptiness.
I had died in that dream. She had saved me.
And the most terrifying thought of all.
It hadn't felt like a dream.
It had felt like a warning.
It couldn't be right...? That was just a dream, nothing more and nothing less.
But why am I crying...?
It was only when I touched my face that I realised I was crying.
Hot tears streaked down my cheeks, unrelenting.
I didn't know why.
I didn't understand.
She was a dream, a faceless shadow, a stranger who shouldn't mean anything to me—yet the ache in my chest was unbearable.
"Why…?"
My voice was hoarse, breaking in the silence.
"Why did you… for me?"
No answer came.
Only the echo of her sacrifice replaying in my mind, burning itself into my soul.
I kept questioning, whispering into the darkness. "Who are you? Why me? Why does it hurt this much?"
But there were no answers.
Only the hollow beat of my own heart and the lingering warmth of a hand that should never have existed.
The nightmare had ended.
But the pain… remained.
''Who are...you...?''
The silence lingered, broken only by the sound of my uneven breathing and the faint echo of my questions.
I sat there, drenched in sweat, staring into the dim glow of the early dawn that filtered faintly through the paper windows.
My chest still heaved, my face damp with tears I hadn't been able to stop.
And then—
BANG!
The door slammed open with enough force to rattle the frame.
"Daniel!"
A small voice rang out, cheerful and completely out of place in my despair.
My little sister, Mira, stood there with her arms crossed, her bright eyes narrowing in suspicion.
"You're awake?!" she gasped, almost offended. "Wait, awake this early?"
I blinked at her, still trying to shake off the nightmare.
"…What are you doing barging into my room in the morning?"
She ignored my question, instead striding over with her usual energy, her small steps full of authority only she believed she had.
"Don't 'what are you doing' me. You're never up before the sun. Usually, I have to drag you out of bed, or else you'd sleep right through the ceremony!"
I rubbed the side of my face, sighing.
Her gaze sharpened as she leaned closer, and then her eyes widened in mock horror.
"Waaait a minute—" she pointed a finger at me, a grin spreading across her lips.
"Are you… crying?"
Heat rushed to my cheeks. I looked away, muttering, "It was just a nightmare."
She burst out laughing. "Pfft—! My big brother, crying over a bad dream? That's rich! What was it? Did a big, scary rabbit chase you?"
"Mira…" I groaned, glaring at her.
But she only laughed harder, doubling over, her shoulders shaking.
"Oh no, oh no, the mighty Daniel, hero of blankets and pillows, felled by a fluffy nightmare! Should I fetch you a stuffed toy to protect you tonight?"
"Enough." I reached out and flicked her forehead, making her yelp and stumble back.
"Hey! Abuse! I'll tell Mother!" she cried, rubbing her forehead but still grinning.
Despite myself, a small smile tugged at my lips.
Her laughter was annoying, but… grounding.
The heaviness of the dream loosened, if only a little, under her teasing.
Then Mira suddenly puffed out her cheeks, pretending to be serious.
"Anyway! Joke's over. You should hurry up, or else you're going to be late for the Awakening Ceremony."
At her words, the last traces of sleep vanished from my mind. My heart skipped a beat.
The Awakening Ceremony.
Today.
I let out a long breath and nodded.
"Right. Thanks, Mira."
She tilted her head, smirking.
"Thanks? For what? For catching you crying in your sleep? You're welcome!"
"Mira…"
"Okay, okay, I'm going!" she giggled, skipping out of the room and leaving the door wide open.
''But don't keep everyone waiting, Brother~!"
As her voice faded down the hall, I sat there for a moment longer, staring at the ceiling.
The nightmare's shadow still clung to me.
The girl's blurred face, her sacrifice—it haunted me, even now.
And as much as I wanted to push it away, I couldn't. Not when today would change everything.
The Awakening Ceremony was waiting.