The first thing Hana noticed was the silence.
It wasn't the kind of silence that meant peace. It was the suffocating, bone-deep kind, like the world itself had stopped breathing.
She opened her eyes. Darkness stretched on every side, thick as ink, swallowing the edges of whatever floor she was lying on. Her breath came out in short, uneven gasps, white in the freezing air.
Where… am I?
The last thing she remembered was falling asleep at her desk, textbooks still open, a doodle of a cat half-finished in the corner of her notes. She had definitely not signed up for—this.
A whisper crawled through the dark.
Not a voice. A hundred voices. Layered, broken, some sobbing, some laughing, some hissing words in languages Hana didn't know. The sound wrapped around her skull until her ears ached.
"Hello?" she called, her voice sharper than she intended. "Okay, whoever dragged me into a horror movie set, you win. Ha-ha. Very funny. Now let me out."
Silence answered. Then—movement.
The shadows rippled, bending unnaturally, like liquid stirred by invisible hands. A shape rose from the floor, tall and faceless, its body written over with glowing letters. The words shifted as if alive, forming contracts, oaths, debts.
Hana froze. Her instinct screamed at her to run, but her legs felt like lead.
The figure extended a hand. In its palm lay a book bound in black leather, heavy chains laced across it. The chains twitched, as though they were breathing.
"The Ledger accepts you," the voices whispered all at once. "A name has been written."
Hana stumbled backward. "Ledger? Accepts me? Sorry, wrong girl. I'm barely passing geometry, I don't even return my library books on time!"
The chains snapped open. The book fell to the ground with a sound like thunder. Pages flew open, blank at first, then filling with a single word written in blood-red ink:
Hana Park.
Her knees buckled. She pressed her hands to her mouth, but the scream still tore out.
The voices only laughed.
Around her, the floor cracked open. Pale hands clawed up from the darkness, reaching, grasping. The shadows pulled at her ankles, dragging her closer to the Ledger.
"Stop!" she shouted, kicking wildly, tears stinging her eyes. "I didn't sign anything! I didn't—"
The book's pages turned on their own, faster and faster, wind howling from nowhere. And then the chains snapped shut again with a final, ringing clink.
The figure leaned close. Though it had no face, Hana felt the weight of its stare.
"Your debt begins now."
The ground gave way beneath her. She fell, the darkness swallowing her whole.