The night had hardly lifted when Sunny left the city behind. The tavern's silence still clung to him, and the sting of the mark on his hand pulsed like a second heartbeat. Every few steps, it burned hotter, guiding him forward. He didn't know where, and he didn't ask. Something deep inside whispered: follow.
The road led him to a place that shouldn't exist.
No trees. No stones. No mountains. Only an endless carpet of grass swaying under a pale, washed-out sky. It felt wrong — as if the world had been stripped bare of all its weight, leaving nothing but a stage.
Sunny stopped.
At the very center sat a figure. Cross-legged, his hair falling down in a wild curtain nearly to his waist, his frame so small he could have been sixteen, maybe seventeen. His palms struck the ground in a slow rhythm — thud, thud, thud — as though he were knocking on the bones of the world itself.
Sunny narrowed his eyes.
"…The hell are you doing?"
The boy did not look up. His voice came calm, flat.
"Listening. The ground hums, if you know how to hear it."
Sunny's jaw tightened. He had seen strange things since stepping into the Dream Realm, but this… this was different.
"And you are?"
The boy lifted his head. His eyes were sharp, too sharp for someone so young.
"Zayeron," he said simply. Then, after a pause: "And you must be the outsider."
Sunny stiffened. His left hand instinctively brushed the fresh symbol cut into his skin.
"So what if I am?"
A faint smile tugged at Zayeron's lips — not kind, not cruel, but knowing.
"Relax. I'm not your enemy. Not yet. In fact… I could even help you. But answers here come with a price."
Sunny frowned. "What price?"
"You'll know when it matters," Zayeron said. He leaned forward, his voice lowering. "For now… you wanted truth, didn't you? About this world?"
Sunny hesitated, then nodded.
Zayeron's smile thinned.
"Then listen. This realm stands on four towers — ancient, immovable. People call them gods, though they're not. Not really. Once, long ago, there were more. Ten great pillars raised by the one we call the Creator of Matter."
Sunny blinked. The words landed heavy, like stones dropped into deep water.
"Creator of Matter?"
"The first," Zayeron replied. His tone was almost reverent. "He forged this realm. Gave it shape. Breathed into it substance. Ten pillars he built, but in the end he destroyed them himself, reducing them to nothing. From their ashes he raised the four towers. Why he did it… no one knows."
Sunny's brow furrowed. "Why would a creator destroy his own creation?"
Zayeron's eyes flicked toward the horizon. "Maybe he feared it. Maybe he despised it. Or maybe he saw something coming — something even he couldn't stop."
The grass whispered in the wind. Sunny's throat felt dry, but he forced his voice steady.
"And the towers? How did they survive?"
"When the Creator lay dying, he called forth… something." Zayeron's hand curled into the dirt. "An insect. Small, yet vast. It carried power equal to his own. Where it came from, no one knows. Even I can't say. But he gave it to the towers as inheritance. Since then, they've ruled. As gods. As rulers."
Sunny's mark pulsed harder, searing hot. He clenched his fist, trying not to show it.
"…Why would the Creator need an insect equal to himself, if he already had all the power?"
Zayeron chuckled under his breath, low and humorless.
"Exactly. That is the question no one dares to ask. If he was the master of matter… what did he fear so much that he needed something else to guard against it?"
For a long moment, silence stretched between them. Only the endless grass moved.
Sunny swallowed, his voice a whisper.
"…And this insect? Where is it now?"
Zayeron's smile returned — thin, sharp, unsettling.
"Still here. Watching. Waiting. And perhaps…" His gaze flicked to Sunny's left hand. "…choosing."
Sunny froze. His mark throbbed like fire under his skin.
Zayeron leaned back, letting the rhythm of his palms return against the ground.
"You wanted truth, outsider. That's the beginning. The deeper you dig… the more you'll wish you hadn't."