A brilliant swirl of violet and indigo consumed the horizon, spinning like a storm of liquid light.
Shin and Ryu tumbled through it, hand locked in hand, knuckles white with desperation.
Neither dared let go—not when the endless portal threatened to tear them apart at any moment.
The colours bled into haze. The edges of the world dissolved. Their vision dimmed, as though they were sinking beneath deep water.
"…Ry…" Shin's voice was faint, her lips barely moving. She could feel her thoughts slipping away, her body no longer obeying her.
"Shin… what's… happening…" Ryu's own voice faltered, his mind drifting into the same dark tide.
Gravity vanished. The spinning stopped.
They were suspended in an infinite black void, nothing beneath, nothing above—only the silence of eternity.
Their bodies began to change.
Skin shimmered and thinned like molten glass. Limbs twisted, stretched, and dissolved into streaks of light, as though unseen hands were rewriting them.
A sudden flare split the darkness. A star bloomed before them, radiant and blinding.
From its heart came a voice—deep, ancient, and impossible to ignore:
"It was not their choice… but it was their fate."
Another voice followed, sharp as a blade:
"Or perhaps… they were the ones who chose it?"
The light surged forward, wrapping around them like a tidal wave. Their forms shattered into a thousand glowing fragments—then were pulled back together in a single, violent flash.
And then…
They were no longer in the void.
The air was warm, and the ground was solid beneath their feet. Before them, the world of Hamel stretched—lands of rolling homesteads and thrones cracked by centuries of war.
I woke up to find a man standing next to me while I was lying in bed.
I didn't recognise his face, but it wasn't the time to argue.
Ryu suddenly woke up…
They exchanged a few words.
The man asked, "Are you telling me you dreamed of dying at the hands of a middle-aged man over a book?"
The stranger explained that he had found Ryu lying unconscious in a forest.
He told him when he woke up in the forest, there was a batch on her jacket with his name on it, 'Ryu ', but when he took a glance at the ring he was wearing in his right hand, a shiver ran through his body, and he fell unconscious again.
'By the way, my name is Junji'
Ryu rose from an antique bed inside a room that looked fit for a prince.
As he walked past a mirror, he froze—staring at a face he didn't recognise.
It must be a dream, he thought.
He slapped his own cheeks again and again, but the pain told him that it was not a dream
overwhelmed; his legs gave out, and he collapsed to the floor, unconscious.
…
…
Far from the edge of cliffs, a beautiful valley of flowers, looking like heaven on earth, a lovely lady in a white gown, dancing on a ground full of white roses.
Blue eyes sparkling, face like a true angel. No mark of tension or fear was on her face.
Suddenly, she saw a bright light in the valley's deepest forest. She thought that someone had invaded. So, she ran into the forest.
When she reached 'the lake of Hamel', there she saw a girl, unconscious, drowned in the lake. She rushed and picked her up. She was so tense. She, panicking, looked for any injuries, but she didn't find even a scratch.
She took her home, laid her on the bed when she was changing her attire, and she found a pendant.
'huh? A pendant?'
'so shiny'. A diamond-shaped pendant with a moon inside it. It was so cold.
After a while, when the girl woke up, she looked around as if she didn't recognise the surroundings.
'Where I am… aah!' she asks Komi.
Komi is cooking rice in the kitchen on an irori.
Aah, you woke up. Don't worry, you're not injured or in danger. There are some clothes on the right side of the bed; change into them if you want. Otherwise, I have already changed your clothes; your original ones were so wet and cold because of the lake's water.
Then she brings rice and soup for her 'Here, eat properly, and if you need anything, just call me…. Miss?'
The girl went to tell her name to Komi, but she didn't because she didn't remember it. The girl tries to recall her name, but nothing helps.
'Who needs a name to live you, dummy? But if you need it that much, how about I give you a name?'
The girl smiles, a tear slips from her right eye, and she hugs Komi 'Yes!'
Komi notices that the girl is about to cry, so she sits beside her cheerfully, telling her more about her and the place she lives in.
'Let's name you Shin, how it sounds,' Komi suggests after thinking for a while.
'Yeah, it sounds good, but I think I've heard it somewhere before.
I hope I will soon find out everything.'