The light beyond the gate didn't blind. It didn't burn, didn't pulse — it simply existed. Warm, steady, silent. Albert stepped in first, immediately followed by Kaelya and Leon. Instead of a tunnel or a conventional chamber, they found themselves in a space without clear boundaries. The floor was smooth, textureless, like frosted glass that reflected nothing.
"We're not dreaming anymore," Leon said. "But we're not fully awake either."
Kaelya looked around. There were no walls. No sky. No shadows.
"This place... has no past. No future. It's built only from now, from a hollow present," she added in a low voice.
Albert stopped and looked at the ground. Under his feet, a line started to form. Then another. Ancient symbols, from long-forgotten tongues. A wide circle appeared, drawing itself slowly but steadily.
"A stabilization seal. The gate brought us here, but the space wasn't fully ready to receive us. It's building itself in real time."
A faint sound, like a low vibration, began to fill the air. A blurry shape detached itself in front of them — not a person, not a clear being. More like a projection, a dense idea still unformed.
Kaelya tensed her fingers on the hilt of her sword, but Albert raised a hand.
"It's not hostile. It's an observation instance. An echo of the one who created this space."
The form stopped a few meters away, then spoke without a mouth. The voice had no tone, only intention:
"You have stepped into a thought that hasn't yet taken shape. Each step you take here will mold it."
Albert nodded. "Then let's begin with truth. We want no illusions. Only essence."
The shape dissolved. In its wake, the floor began to shift. Outlines of a room appeared. Chairs, walls, doors. Still incomplete, but recognizable.
Leon took a deep breath. "I think the real trial starts now."
Albert turned to them. "We're no longer in a trial. We're inside its answer."
Albert touched the ground again, now solidified into a complete circle. Symbols lit up subtly, and the air grew denser, harder to breathe — not from danger, but from some kind of internal tension within the space. Reality was contracting.
— We can't stay here long, he said. Reality is starting to reject the dream's structure.
Kaelya closed her eyes for a moment.
— Then let's end it. I don't feel any more future distortions — only a single source. It's close.
From ahead, the space began to open like a torn curtain. Inside was a white room, empty, with a single bed. On the bed lay a girl, sleeping. She looked young, with long white hair and a calm, though worn, expression. Around her, distorted reflections of the outside world moved like uncertain shadows.
Albert approached. She didn't seem like a threat. Just an absence of awareness.
— She created the entire dream. But not consciously. Someone or something trapped her here. She's stuck in a loop between memory and a future that never came.
Leon leaned in, examining her carefully. — She's not connected to dream magic. It's something else. A fragment of human reality, lost in the network.
Albert opened his palm. One of the colors in his eye — white — glowed briefly. The space vibrated, and the bed began to dissolve slowly. The girl opened her eyes.
— Where... am I?
— Back, Albert said calmly. In the real world.
A subtle, silent shockwave passed through the entire area. Everything compressed into a single point: the door, the room, the undefined space. In an instant, the group was back in reality.
They stood in a quiet forest, at the edge of a hill. The sky was clear. Nothing vibrated. Nothing was torn. They were there. All of them. Including her.
The girl stood leaning against a tree, weakened but awake. She looked at them one by one.
— You... pulled me out of the dream?
Kaelya nodded.
— Not just a dream. A space that would've destroyed you if you'd stayed any longer. What do you remember?
— I don't know who I am... but I know I was sent by someone. I was a piece in a plan. Until you came.
Albert stepped closer and said simply:
— Then you're no longer a piece. You're free. And if you want, you can stay with us.
She nodded. — I have no other path. But I feel that near you... something inside me is rebuilding.
Leon raised an eyebrow. — Some kind of regenerative self-detection. Maybe your subconscious needed us to redefine your purpose.
Kaelya looked at her carefully. — Do you have a name?
The girl shook her head slightly. — No. Or I don't remember it.
Albert turned toward the horizon. — Then we'll give you one. Not as a symbol of ownership. But as the beginning of a new life.
A brief silence settled among them. Then Albert said:
— From now on, you will be called Reina.
The girl smiled faintly. — Reina... yes. That feels like mine.
Kaelya placed a hand on her shoulder. — Welcome to the team, Reina.
The group set off. The forest felt real, normal, with no trace of the dream. Everything was stable. Time resumed its natural flow.
Albert closed his eyes for a moment. The dream was over.
Now, truth would begin.
In the Shadow of the Amber Citadel
Silence ruled the great circular hall of the Library of the Unseen, a space at the border between the real and what only a few dared to dream. There, between walls made of condensed memories, an old man with ashen eyes leafed through a manuscript that had never been written.
— It has opened, he whispered. The new door… the dream was accepted.
Above him, the spirals of light from the Life Archives danced without pause, silently writing and rewriting the deeds of Albert and those who followed him. Two figures, cloaked in robes that seemed woven from night's smoke, looked down at a map.
— They've passed through the dream, one said. And understood it. They recognized the question and responded without answering.
— That means they're close to the next threshold, the other added. They don't know yet, but their path has begun to resonate with the prophetic lines. The sphere that spins around the Absolute Silence quivered today.
A heavy silence followed. In the distance, the clock of the unspoken beat slowly. One strike for each fragment of rewritten reality.
— What do we do? the old man asked.
— Nothing. Yet. We only watch.
— But if...
— If it becomes necessary, one of us will descend. Not to help them. But to witness with their own eyes.
The archive lights dimmed for a moment — a sign that somewhere, deep in an unlived future, a decision had been felt. Not made. Only felt.
The gentle light that had enveloped them slowly faded, and the contours of reality reformed around them. Albert, Leon, and Kaelya found themselves standing exactly where they had fallen asleep before the dream overtook them. The air was clean, the temperature steady, and the sounds of the nearby forest confirmed they were back in their world.
Leon was the first to speak.
— I don't feel anything anymore... no pressure, no distortion. We're out.
Kaelya ran a hand through her hair, trying to collect herself.
— Yes. The dream has ended... or it let us go. But it was real. The emotions, the test, everything.
Albert looked up, where the sky was a clear blue, no cracks or pulsing shadows in sight.
— It wasn't just a dream. It was a gate. A doorway left open by someone who wasn't there anymore... but who was waiting for us.
A few steps away, sitting in the grass, was a young woman with long black hair, dressed in a simple cloak. Her eyes were closed. But when she opened them, all three tensed. Her eyes were a deep gray — exactly like the entity from the dream.
The girl stood slowly and bowed her head.
— Thank you for not fearing my question.
Albert stepped forward. — Was it your dream?
— Yes... and no. It was a part of me, separated for far too long. I wandered without form, trapped between a forgotten reality and a future that never came. But now I'm whole again. Because of you.
Kaelya studied her carefully, though without hostility.
— Who are you?
— I never had a name that mattered. But if you'll allow it… I'd like to come with you. Not for protection. But because I want to see the world with my own eyes. As it is — not as it was shaped in broken dreams.
Albert looked at her in silence for a few moments, then extended his hand.
— Then you're not a stranger. You're part of the journey. And our journey just became a little clearer.
She touched his hand with hesitant precision, and in that moment, a calm aura settled around the four of them. It wasn't magic. It was acceptance. The beginning of a bond.
Leon smirked. — A new member, huh? Hope you know how to cook.
The girl closed her eyes briefly, then replied calmly.
— I can learn. But I do know how to follow silence, and how to recognize danger behind words.
Albert nodded. — Then you already have two useful skills.
The group set off without haste. Their direction was the same as before — southeast, toward the suspended city where the next stage of their journey awaited. But the atmosphere had changed. As if something had been put back in place. Or perhaps... someone.
The road no longer seemed so difficult. Maybe because the dream had reminded them of the fragile lines separating the past, the future, and what could have been. Or maybe because, for the first time in a long while, the group felt complete — in the deepest sense.
The new member walked alongside them, not looking out of place, though she didn't speak much. There was no fear on her face, only pure curiosity. Sometimes she would gently touch her chest, where the dream had left an invisible mark.
— If you were inside the dream... in that space between realities, how did you return? Leon finally asked.
— I didn't return. I was never truly gone. I was suspended. Without an anchor. Without a name. But the moment you looked at me without fear, I became someone again. Not just something.
Kaelya observed her carefully, but her smile softened.
— Are you connected to the Entity?
— I was created by it, but I am not it. I am the echo of a choice the Entity refused to make. That's why... I became the dream itself. The question. But now... I'm just me.
Albert stopped. The wind whispered through the branches of an ancient tree, and in the distance, a white mound appeared — a sign they were approaching familiar lands again.
— Then choose a name. One that is truly yours.
The young woman paused and looked up at the sky.
— "Enira," she said after a moment. — It means "quiet beginning" in the language of an old dream. If it fits...
— It's yours, Kaelya said. And that's all that matters.
— Welcome, Enira, added Leon, raising two fingers in greeting. And I hope you don't have any spy habits. If you do, we'll catch you fast.
She bowed her head slightly.
— If you're the ones who faced reality itself just to understand me... I will never be against you.
Albert said nothing. But in his eyes, it was clear: another thread had been woven into the fabric of fate. And this time... it was a gentle one.
They walked on again in silence, with the sun slowly descending toward the horizon. The road ended in a deep valley, where the first settlement beyond the dream awaited. A real world. A world where answers no longer came through symbols, but through people.
"Those Who Watch from Outside"
At the edge of a storm-swallowed continent, near the ruins of a fallen Academy in the Dark South, a solitary entity descended from the air without leaving any trace. His cloak was woven from strands of melted reality, and his eyes — fully covered — held a glow that pulsed with the heartbeat of the world.
— The dream is over, he murmured. The third probing has closed without the dreamer being destroyed. Interesting...
From behind the ruins, a sharp, ice-like female voice responded:
— You say that as if you're disappointed. Didn't you hope they'd sever their own threads of fate?
— No. I feared they would sever mine.
The woman emerged, wearing a mask bearing the symbol of the Eternal Council — though she was not a member. She was a Watcher of the Watchers, an entity dispatched only when reality itself risked contamination by... the impossible.
— That girl. She wasn't listed in any prophetic fragment.
— Precisely why she's dangerous, the man replied. And precisely why she'll become a point of inflection.
— What do we do?
He raised his hand to the sky, and in his palm appeared a map of light — a floating continent unknown to any common chart.
— We watch. We send our shadow into the next breach. Perhaps even... into the Sanctuary of the Open Eon. If Albert heads there, we cannot risk blindness.
The woman nodded slowly.
— And if that girl — Enira — proves to be more than she seems?
— Then even the Council's silence will be forced to speak.
At the peak of the ruins, a white bird landed. In its eye reflected the face of Albert — gazing toward a real horizon. The dream had ended.
But the world's gaze had only just begun.
On the road between two lands forgotten by maps, Albert's group walked in silence. The wind carried the scent of old stones and dried flowers, and the sky seemed to hold within it the echo of a recently shattered dream. No one spoke. Their footsteps echoed on the dry path, and the silence was a continuation of what they had felt in the dream — a silence too deep for words.
Albert walked in front. From the side, Kaelya glanced at him furtively. His eyes seemed normal, but in the light falling through scattered branches, his right eye shimmered intermittently — a deep blue with a shade of black in the core of the iris.
In that silence, only he could hear.
"The third test is complete... and the dreamer has not been destroyed."
The voice came from far away, yet clear. A voice he had never heard before, but understood effortlessly. Albert said nothing.
"That girl... she appears in none of the prophecies."
An image of a masked woman, bearing the symbol of the Eternal Council, flashed through his mind like an implanted memory.
"If Albert reaches the Temple of the Open Eon... we will be blind."
His eye blinked once.
Then he looked up at the sky.
It was clear, but within that clarity hid a subtle vibration, a pressure only he could feel. He looked at the clouds, then turned his head toward his group. No one had noticed anything.
Only he had seen.
Only he had understood.
— I was seen... and I saw them, he murmured, not addressing anyone in particular.
Leon raised an eyebrow. — What did you say?
— Nothing. Just that our path has just doubled. One we walk... and one they watch.
Kaelya closed her eyes for a moment. — We're starting to feel the weight of those who await us.
Albert nodded slightly, and his right eye lost its glow for a moment. But the memory of that blue-black shimmer remained, hidden in the air.
No one could steal their path. But all could try.
The valley unfolded beneath their steps like a promise. Leaves fluttered like wings in the wind, and the path snaked between moss-covered rocks and exposed roots. No trace of the dream lingered in the air — but it had stayed within them. In the way they walked. In the way they remained silent.
Enira walked beside Kaelya, watching her surroundings with the kind of attention reserved for those who see the world for the first time — not with their eyes, but with their entire being.
— Everything you touch now is real, Kaelya said softly. Even if reality is just another mask, it hurts. But it also heals.
— I feel it, Enira replied. Not with fear. But with gratitude.
Albert didn't turn his head, but he was attentive to every word. His eyes glimmered faintly. In his right eye, the blue hue deepened into an almost black inner ring — a rare sign that only appeared when future events were already in motion, even if time refused to show it.
— Your eye's working again, Leon muttered. What do you see?
Albert paused for a moment. He looked up at the sky.
— Silent conversations. Beyond the horizon, someone is already speaking of us. Entities without names. But with agendas.
— Are they watching us?
— Not yet. They're just wondering… if we're a threat or a solution.
Enira clasped her hands. — I'll fight for you, if it comes to that.
— You won't be alone, Kaelya replied. But now is not the time for battles.
They descended into the valley, and in the distance, the first settlement came into view. It wasn't large: a few white stone houses, a watchtower, a fountain that shimmered in the setting sun. It was a beginning.
A child spotted them and ran toward the village, shouting something in the local tongue. There was no panic in his voice. Only wonder.
— Looks like we've been seen, said Leon. We're becoming real here, too.
— It's time, Albert agreed. A new world, but not a dream. Here, every step matters.
— And what will we say we are?
Albert turned to the group. — We tell the truth. We are those who came from the dream... but chose to stay.
The sun was slowly setting, and their shadows stretched across the new earth like a line between worlds. But for the first time, no one looked back.