Halo wished for the past.
The precious moments he had overlooked and those he had cared for but never deeply enough.
Even if he could only relive them in dreams, it would have been something, yet he couldn't achieve even a moment's rest.
The sun had barely begun to rise in the east as Halo stood before the mirror on his wall.
His hands trembled as he put on the uniform, which looked identical to the hakama-style uniform he had seen Clever wear the past night.
However, this whole ordeal hardly mattered to him. The day had come, and he desperately needed answers. Where the heck was he?
However, before he could take a step in his trembling boots, his door was thrown open, letting out a stretched sound as Clever's voice followed.
Halo's head snapped toward the sound, his entire confusion written across his face.
"You are late…" Clever's voice remained disinterested as before. "Follow me."
Halo gulped hard as sweat formed on his forehead despite the cozy morning breeze.
Still, he hurried behind Clever, his heart pounding in terror as he feared the unknown.
Outside his room stretched a corridor adorned with lanterns to his left and the same to his right, but at a distance to the right, there was an enormous corridor, and beyond that, he could see a lawned field.
Clever began walking toward the field, and without wasting a moment, Halo followed suit.
He had always been the last to care about things, but now, with the abrupt transition he'd felt not long before, from his room to this mysterious place, fear had consumed every bit of him and he couldn't help but comply.
The moment they stepped out of the corridor, he paused. His expression reflected each of his unspoken thoughts as he stared into the sky.
It was nothing if not ordinary, just the blue sky he was used to, but something was wrong. The sun felt too distant despite its perfect glow.
He might be hallucinating; perhaps his vision was clouded by fear. While Clever took the path to their right, Halo reluctantly began walking into the grassy area beyond the corridor.
After all, there was a roof blocking most of his view, and he needed to see clearly.
There were blocks all built from red bricks with brick roofs, joined together to form a perfect cube with massive corridors that made Halo feel like a toddler in comparison.
The structure had endless streaming corridors covering its edges and four pavements of similar sizes that stretched from each corridor to the middle of the lawned grass.
The moment Halo stepped onto the field, finally getting his desired view, his thoughts began to stutter.
Everything felt right, yet wrong at the same time.
The wind was too cozy and ideal for a welcoming touch; the clouds lay gently against each other in the sky, enough to create any form of imagination at all.
Yet the sun was still too far away, barely the size of a baseball.
'Where am I really?' He thought, and that very moment, Clever's echoed in the distance.
"Hey, don't push it. You're getting too much to handle."
Clever stood before a massive brown door, his hand resting on its handle as he let out a sigh of disappointment and shook his head.
Halo turned to look at Clever, abandoning his concern about how far he'd gone as he began moving quickly toward him.
This wasn't his reality, and despite being unable to prove it through the strange atmosphere alone, he trusted his intuition.
As Halo approached, Clever opened the door onto tiered, semicircular seating. Two rows held students his age in matching uniforms, most wearing the same scowl as Halo, though a few looked different.
Clever walked to a podium before them with a board embedded behind it.
Halo's nervousness escalated, his heart battering his chest wall like a caged animal. His eyes raced around the space, and every seat was filled except the last one on his right, where he'd have to sit beside two people.
"Go take a seat," Clever said.
Halo's panic flared at the announcement, driving him to rush toward the remaining seat.
But as he got closer, he noticed that every face around him reflected his own dread. The pair sitting on the last bench seemed to be in an even worse state.
A girl with cascading dark hair sat compulsively running her fingers through it, her body pressed desperately against the white wall as if seeking escape.
Beside her, a young man with dark hair and striking blue eyes had buried his hands between his legs, his whole frame wracked with such violent tremors that his terror radiated outward for everyone to see.
The sight of these two was enough to fill Halo with relief, his fear slowly drifting away.
'Clever was right, I'm not alone in this.' He thought as he took his seat, staring at Clever from below.
He began playing with his fingers as his palm grew sweaty. 'Is this some kind of simulation test? Did my parents sign up for this before they died?'
Before his mind could drift into further confusion, Clever cleared his throat, seizing the attention in the room.
"Well, I know some of you are terrified, with so many questions still unanswered." Clever said, his eyes glancing in their faces with obvious understanding.
"I was in your shoes not long ago…"
'He was in our shoes?' Halo thought as he glanced through the murmuring crowd, hoping someone would ask a question to clear his confusion.
However, before any of them could voice their concerns, Clever hurried his words.
"You've all been dragged into the Lost World. For the next four weeks, I'll teach you how to live; after that, survival is on you." His words were raw and unfiltered.
Halo's sharp sensation surged through his chest, but before he could dwell on his own emotions, the ground began rumbling. His head instinctively snapped to his left to see the guy beside him drenched in sweat as his body shook even more violently than before.
'We are all scared… but dude, what the fuck?' He gave the guy a disgusted look.
"What do you mean?!" Someone asked, slamming their fists into their desk.
Halo's skin crawled as he turned to it in an instant. That tone, gentle yet aggressive, he couldn't forget it. How could he?
Below and to his left stood a curvy girl around his age, her long white hair cascading behind her like something out of an animation.
Halo swallowed when he saw her. It was Seraphim D'Angelo, the most stunning girl in his class and their representative.
'How did I miss her?' His confusion was etched across his face as he thought. 'I mean, she couldn't possibly have recognized me… but I should have!'
His face began tingling with annoyance. '…weren't all those times she annoyed me with her perfect grades and beating me in sports enough?'
He shook his head, dismissing his thoughts as a soft smile played on his lips. 'Forget that… I know someone in this confusing daze… that's good.'
However, his smile immediately faded the moment Clever responded to Seraphim's question.
"You agreed to come here by accepting the summons," he shrugged as his words left him lazily. "That's the only choice we ever get to make willingly… and even I didn't get that one right."
Halo's fists clenched tightly as they trembled. He knew it; that annoying sensation that had haunted him for almost a month was the reason.
"Summon? That was torture. Who wouldn't give in after being driven insane?" Someone within the crowd said, and following it were annoyed and devastated murmurs from everyone.
Clever scoffed. "Would you shut up?" The moment he spoke, the hall grew silent.
His fury was unmistakable as he began breathing heavily, as though he was trying to keep himself under wraps.
"You have reason to be concerned. It happened to me too, and to nearly all the humans in the Lost World."
Halo could sense the seriousness in Clever; he wasn't kidding around.
"Be quiet and listen. I'll tell you what's going on. Fear doesn't change a thing. Not now, not ever."
Halo adjusted himself on his seat while the boy beside him maintained his terrified demeanor, as though Clever's words were blades to his very soul.
But at this moment, Halo hardly gave him a thought. He was focused on understanding the true situation. Where exactly had they been brought? And what was this Lost World? Every word felt significant, and he refused to miss a detail.
"Everything here might overwhelm you," Clever said, tucking his hands into his pockets. "But I think some things are worth knowing…"
Halo grew more attentive, keeping himself checked up in his terrified heart.
"This is not the world you knew, nor one I would ever wish on anyone. Yet once you've set foot here, escape is impossible.
"Your lives will never return to what they were yesterday. Even if you grasp happiness here, it will never carry the innocence of yesterday."
The room grew grim enough to detect even the lowest breath.
"Those who don't listen die. If you want to survive, you'll listen to me."
His fists closed with determination. Halo knew inevitability when he saw it, and he'd just understood the most important truth of all: only death was truly inescapable, and since he still lived, there had to be an exit. He needed to survive.