KILL THEM ALL.
Ari woke up gasping, ripped out of the same nightmare that refused to let him go. It was always the same: he found himself in a grand, dim room with a large, diamond-shaped wooden table.
It was made from dark, almost black wood, and every part of it was covered in detailed hand-carved patterns, the kind a craftsman creates after spending years working with a chisel. The table wasn't just furniture; it was art, the carvings running along the sides and even the top, like a story carved into the wood itself.
The people around the table were hard to see. One of them was an old man; Ari could only see the grey hair, not the whole face. Despite the uncertainty surrounding the others, Ari always noticed an empty chair waiting for him, and each time, he felt like... he should be there.
Then the old man would tell him to kill them all in a menacing tone. Ari would then instantly get dragged out of the room, the sensation harsh and sudden, like someone had grabbed the back of his shirt and ripped him backward. The doors would slam shut with a violent force that felt like the impact of hitting the ground.
And that was when he opened his eyes.
Ari woke up, breath catching, the echo of the doors slamming still trapped in his ears. He shook off the sleepiness and forced himself to get ready for the last day of school; it was the final global exam to finish high school.
As usual, he skipped breakfast, a habit formed from countless rushed mornings when sleep felt more important than food. He only ate breakfast if his body woke him naturally after enough rest, never on school mornings. Most days, he barely even managed to get out of bed, waking up at 7:99 when school started at 8. With no mother around to shake him awake, sleep sometimes won. Today though, thankfully, it didn't.
He met up with Rain, and together they headed to school for the last time.
The final bell didn't bring cheers. Just that weird quiet moment where everyone looked around like:
"So... that's it?"
Bags zipped. Chairs pushed back. A few nods. And then they all slipped out of the classroom like ghosts.
Ari, Rain, and a few classmates didn't want to just go home. The beach was right behind the school, a short walk away. So they headed there for one last hangout as a class. Chae and a few of her friends joined them along the way.
The path took them through the oldest part of the city. It wasn't ancient ruins or anything dramatic. Just the original city that existed long before the new districts were built. High walls, narrow streets, tight passages where two people could barely walk side by side. Small shops selling spices, cheap jewelry, knockoff toys, old books, random snacks. The usual chaos... but familiar chaos. The kind that smelled like home.
They weaved through the tight alleys, crossed under the second wall on the opposite side, and once they stepped out...
The beach was right there.
Wide open. Quiet. Blue stretching forever.
The water was cold but clean. The kind of cold that wakes you up.
They swam, joked, splashed each other, even though it was less about swimming and more about enjoying the moment before everything changed. Chae stayed close to the shore with her friends. Rain kept trying to dunk Ari underwater. Ari kept losing, haha.
It was calm, simple, a bit nostalgic.
The kind of moment you only realize was important once it's gone.
After sunset, people started leaving one by one, "bghit n3ss," "3yiit," "my parents are calling," "3ndi maydar," the usual excuses.
Rain got a phone call and dipped early.
That left Ari and Chae walking home together, still damp, still laughing, sand on their shoes. They took the shortcut, the train rails.
They talked about the one thing no one ever fully understood:
The GIFT.
Being "gifted" meant you were marked by the shooting star the night you were born or, in the case of items, the moment they were created. That mark became an ability, an unnatural power that only a small percentage of people, animals, or items ever received.
Ari tried to jump over a rail for fun, because a train was coming. Ari could be smart, sure... but sometimes he made choices that defied basic logic, especially if he didn't sleep well the night before. He just started lacking...
He slipped. His foot hit the ground wrong and landed inside a messy bundle of old fishing rope tangled around the side of the tracks. The knot tightened instantly, wrapping around his ankle like it had been waiting for someone dumb enough to step in it.
The train horn ripped through the air.
Ari tried to yank his leg out, once, twice, again... panic rising so fast his brain could barely keep up. His breaths were short, messy, his fingers slipping as he clawed at the knot.
The vibrations of the train crawled through the rails, into the ground, into his bones. Every instinct screamed move, MOVE, but the rope refused to budge.
Chae reacted on instinct. She dove toward him, grabbing his leg, tugging so hard her hands shook. She didn't even think about running or calling for help. Her mind just spiraled and froze all at once, leave him? pull? scream? what? Her body chose for her: don't let him die.
She didn't want to watch someone who helped her out get crushed in front of her. Not like this. Not for something so stupid.
Chae screamed.
The train beeped.
And then.
For a split second, something reached into Ari's mind.
A pair of eyes.
Old. Cold. Watching him the same way they always did in his dream.
No voice this time, just a presence. Heavy. Suffocating.
It scared him more than the train ever could.
For a heartbeat, fear swallowed everything... worse than pain, worse than death.
It wasn't the fear of dying.
It was the kind of fear that makes you want to disappear before whatever's watching you gets closer.
Like a warning pressed straight into his head: not yet.
The air around them snapped, like pressure collapsing, and suddenly they were no longer on the tracks.
They were meters away from the rails, both shaking, not understanding what just happened.
Chae had unsealed her gift.
A gift only unlocked when the user faced real danger, the "I might actually die right now" type.
For humans and animals, it was always tied to life-or-death instinct.
For objects, it was different: an object unsealed its gift when it was destroyed or broken. A sword shattering in battle, for example, rebuilt itself using the exact power it was marked with.
Human gifts, animal gifts, and weapon gifts weren't the same.
Each type had a different purpose, different rules, but all of them existed for one thing:
To protect the gifted they belonged to.
Most people lived their whole lives without ever unsealing theirs.
Chae didn't get that luxury.
Ari and Chae both froze, staring at each other, at the ground beneath their feet, then back at the distant tracks and the train passing by. It was like they were trying to rewind reality in their heads.
Ari touched his leg. Still there. Still shaking.
Chae kept looking at her hands like they were someone else's.
"Did we... run?" she asked, voice trembling.
"We didn't even move," Ari said, and he was right. There was no way.
Before either of them could process it, Chae suddenly vanished... just blinked out of existence for a heartbeat, and reappeared a few meters away.
They both stared.
Then it happened again, and again, and again. Short, messy, uncontrolled jumps, each one leaving them more terrified and confused.
"What is happening to meeeee?" Chae cried, gripping her head.
Ari didn't even have an answer. He was still half convinced he had died and this was the afterlife glitching.
That's when a man appeared.
No footsteps. No warning. He simply existed where there had been empty air a second before.
Black suit. Black hair. Calm smile.
Like someone who already knew the script they were stuck in.
Before Ari could take a step toward her, the man moved, fast. Too fast.
A single motion and Chae dropped unconscious into his arms, like he'd flipped a switch.
Ari's whole expression hardened. No words. Just raw, silent fury as he stepped forward, ready to rip her back from him.
But the man didn't even look at him.
He simply blinked out of existence. One second there, the next just gone, taking Chae with him like she'd been erased.
Ari's hand closed on empty air. His pulse spiked. His vision stung with disbelief and anger.
She was gone.
And he wasn't going with her.
In a heartbeat, the girl who saved his life vanished from it... and Ari learned the truth every gifted eventually faced:
Being gifted didn't make you special.
It made you property, slave to someone, slave to something...
Ari was also taken away by the gifted military, a force of non-gifted humans trained to deal with the gifted.
And just like that, the night that was supposed to be peaceful...
became the night everything changed.