(A/N : Sol has built a drone—one equipped with a camera and a gel-soft bullet shooter. Right now, Sol is testing it.)
Freeeee—
"Damn, what a nice view," Sol muttered, watching the land stretch endlessly beneath him from nearly 150 meters above the ground.
The drone hovered steadily, its camera feed sharp on Sol's handheld display. From this height, buildings looked like scattered toys and roads like thin lines etched into the earth. Sol adjusted the controls, satisfied.
Then the screen flickered.
Static crept in at the edges.
"That's… odd," Sol said.
Rumble.
At first, it sounded distant—like thunder trapped underground. The controller vibrated faintly in his hands as the drone's altitude indicator jittered.
Rumble. Rumble.
The image twisted.
Not tilted—folded.
The horizon bent inward, warping unnaturally as if the air itself had become liquid. Warning symbols flashed across the screen, then vanished entirely.
"Hey—what's happening?" Sol whispered.
The drone camera showed something impossible.
The ground below fractured into overlapping layers, space bending in on itself. For a split second, Sol saw pieces of a structure—walls, beams, entire sections of a house—floating freely, suspended in nothingness.
The world around him fell silent.
No wind. No sound. No sense of up or down.
He was drifting.
Debris floated past him slowly—chunks of wood, shattered planks, fragments of walls—turning lazily as if caught in an invisible current. Time seemed stretched, unreal.
Sol tried to scream, but there was no air to carry his voice.
The last thing he remembered was being pulled toward a rippling void, the floating remains of a ruined house sliding around him like pieces of a broken memory—
And then everything vanished.
He woke up choking on dust.
Pain flared across his ribs as gravity returned all at once. Sol coughed violently, dragging air into his lungs as darkness pressed in from all sides.
He was lying inside a ruined house.
Broken beams loomed overhead, some barely holding, others already collapsed. Rubble pinned his legs, and splintered planks bit into his palms as he tried to move.
"How…?" he muttered hoarsely.
The last thing he remembered wasn't an impact.
There had been no fall.
Only weightlessness. Silence. Floating debris.
"Hello?" Sol shouted, panic rising. "Is anyone here?"
His voice echoed weakly through the wreckage.
As he pushed aside loose stones, something blinked beneath the debris—a faint red light. Slow. Steady.
Blink.
Blink.
Sol's breath caught.
A cold realization settled in.
The house hadn't collapsed recently.
The dust was old. The wood was rotten.
Whatever had happened hadn't just destroyed this place.
It had moved him here—through warped space itself.
And Sol had no idea why.
Suddenly, his vision changed. Layers of color stacked over one another, blurring and overlapping. Some distant figures moved at the edge of his sight, distorted and unclear.
Thud.
Sol dropped to his knees again, clutching his head tightly, his fingers digging into his hair as he squeezed his eyes shut.
"Ahh—damn it, my head," he groaned.
"What… what is this? What am I seeing?"
After a few seconds, and with deliberate effort, he forced his breathing to steady. Slowly, his vision returned to normal, helped by a strange influx of information flooding his brain—unfamiliar, yet instinctively understood.
"What the hell… where am I?" he muttered, already dreading the answer.
Sol staggered to his feet, pushed his way out of the ruined house, and ran along the cracked road outside—toward what looked like an underdeveloped city stretching silently ahead.
"There are carriages… how?"
Sol thought, scanning his surroundings as he reached the place.
"Hey, kid, are you alright?"
The voice came from behind him.
Sol turned. Standing there was a normal-looking man with brown skin and a short mustache. He wore a black suit that looked oddly formal for the setting and held a cane loosely in one hand.
Sol replied a little faster than he meant to, his voice tight with confusion.
"Yes, sir. Thank you for asking—but do you know where this place is? And… what time it is?"
"Good," the man said calmly. He glanced down at a chain watch, flipping its cover open with practiced ease.
"It's 4:25 p.m., and you're in Bayam City, part of the Roasted Archipelago."
The words hit harder than Sol expected.
He stood there, wide-eyed, the words echoing in his head as the weight of the situation finally began to sink in.
After some time, he steadied himself and walked forward, eventually stopping in front of a small shop. He sat down on a wooden bench, his thoughts still in chaos.
How is this even possible? Sol thought, lowering his gaze as he observed himself.
He was wearing a dark, a light-colored shirt, its sleeves neatly folded up to his elbows. The clothes felt real.
"At least… I'm here in my own body," he muttered under his breath.
(A/N : Sol was eighteen years old, with black hair and dark eyes. His face was fairly handsome—not striking, but pleasant—and his lean, athletic build hinted at a life that wasn't entirely sedentary.
His relationship with his parents had been good.
He hadn't read many novels—only three or four in total, including Lord of the Mysteries . He'd never been particularly social either. No close friends. No romantic relationships.)
Yet as he looked around at the unfamiliar streets, the ancient architecture, and the subtle wrongness in the air, a single thought surfaced again and again.
I never thought a world like this was possible.
Sol had imagined other worlds before.
He had daydreamed about them during sleepless nights—vast cities, strange powers, adventure waiting at every corner. But now that he was actually here, the feeling was nothing like he'd imagined.
This doesn't feel good at all, he thought, the lingering grogginess still weighing down his mind.
He pressed his fingers against his temple and exhaled slowly.
What kind of world is this?
Is this even my world anymore?
And… how do I get back?
The questions piled up, each heavier than the last.
On instinct, Sol opened his eyes fully—and something shifted.
The world changed.
Layers of color stacked atop one another, bleeding and overlapping in impossible ways. He could see outlines that weren't physical—vague silhouettes formed of light and mist. A faint, translucent shape mirrored his own body, hovering slightly out of sync.
Spirit body… astral body…
The terms surfaced naturally in his mind, as if he'd always known them.
More impressions followed—shapes without form, meanings without words. It was overwhelming, like staring at too much information at once.
"—Tch."
Sol shut his eyes and staggered back a step, shaking his head hard as if that alone could force reality back into place.
"Okay… enough of that," he muttered.
He stood up straight and began walking, boots tapping against the cracked road as he tried to gather his thoughts.
Panicking won't help. Think.
What can I actually do right now?
Time passed as he wandered aimlessly. Eventually, he found a public water pump near the side of the road. He washed his hands, splashed water on his face, and brushed the dust from his coat, trying to look at least somewhat presentable.
Only then did another sensation make itself known.
Hunger.
Sol paused, hand resting against his stomach.
"…Great," he sighed. "That's just perfect."
His thoughts drifted to food, then immediately to the problem of money. He reached into his pocket and pulled out the only thing he had—a small token of unfamiliar make.
He stared at it for a moment.
"And that," Sol muttered dryly, "is even more trouble."
The strange city stretched out ahead of him, quiet , familiar but unfamiliar, full of unknown rules and hidden dangers.