He woke with a start—

  and found himself in the elevator hall again, the one with the deep-crimson floor.

  The long corridor from yesterday was gone, skipped over entirely.

  In game terms,

  the story had advanced, and the save point had updated.

  Crys looked down at what he was wearing.

  The game-collab hoodie from today.

  Yesterday’s clothes didn’t become some “dream default.”

  Here, it was always the same:

  as if the day just kept going—always in today’s outfit.

  Once could be coincidence.

  But if it kept happening, that was different.

  Unlike other dreams—those chaotic, lawless ones—

  this place alone felt… strangely real.

  You could wake up and call it a dream.

  But the moment you came here, reality slanted.

  As if this side was pulling closer.

  Another “reality”… yeah.

  I get it.

  The shape of this “dream” sharpened—just a little—

  and for the first time, Crys stepped into the elevator without hesitation.

  Muted golden vines slid out with a soft shrrk, sealing the entrance.

  Then—clunk.

  And it began to descend.

  He watched the arrow crawl downward and thought.

  If the theory held, she’d be there again when it stopped, and the conversation would continue.

  But if he let her set the pace—

  it would end the same way it always did.

  Like an NPC, cutting him off at the scripted point.

  So this time, he’d ask first.

  The old red arrow stopped, pointing up.

  The golden vines parted into an exit—

  and there, in front of it, stood a girl.

  Translucent blond hair.

  A white dress.

  She smiled, lips parting—

  and Crys cut in before she could speak.

  “Hey. Is this a dream?”

  Up close, she looked a few years younger than him.

  Blond hair to her neck.

  White arms and legs slipping from her sleeves and hem—thin enough to snap if you gripped them.

  And her eyes.

  In that deep blue, red and yellow, green and violet flickered—

  glittering with colors, like iolite sunstone.

  The girl didn’t look bothered at all.

  Still smiling, she shook her head.

  With a face that perfect—like a doll—

  she looked even more like a game character.

  “So it’s not a dream?”

  When Crys corrected himself, she nodded happily.

  “Your body is asleep, but your awareness is here.

  What you’re seeing right now, talking to me, meeting me yesterday—none of it is a dream.

  And meeting in the library at noon wasn’t a dream either.”

  “That was you?!”

  His voice rose before he could stop it.

  “Don’t show up in the middle of the day!

  You scared the hell out of me—

  I got stared at!”

  The girl giggled, almost apologetic.

  “I’m sorry.

  But I wanted you to know.

  That I exist—in reality.”

  A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.

  “In reality?”

  She nodded.

  “Yes. In reality.”

  Crys had torn through dozens of books about dreams and still come up empty,

  but he couldn’t even be properly shocked.

  If his senses were this clear—

  being told it wasn’t a dream almost made more sense.

  If it was neither dream nor reality—

  Then wasn’t the answer obvious?

  This “dream” was a metaverse.

  Maybe he thought he’d fallen asleep,

  but he’d triggered something without noticing—

  accessed a virtual space.

  That would explain everything.

  And thinking that, his shoulders loosened—just a little.

  It was like a game.

  There were rules. Rules you could understand.

  So he pressed on.

  “Is this Arix? Villa?”

  “What is that?”

  “You don’t know?”

  Crys blinked, caught off guard.

  He’d assumed she was some guide, or at least some curious visitor.

  “Arix and Villa are major metaverse platforms.

  I’m saying this is a virtual space.

  You and me—this is just our avatars.

  That’s why it feels so real, isn’t it?”

  His words sped up.

  He was desperate to shove it into something that sounded like a normal explanation.

  The girl watched him and laughed softly.

  “This era really is overflowing with magic.”

  “It’s science.”

  Even when Crys snapped it out, she didn’t mind.

  “This isn’t a virtual space. And neither of us is an avatar.

  We truly exist—here.”

  Crys stared at her, bluntly, from head to toe.

  He’d never even used a metaverse platform before,

  but could it really be this vivid?

  No.

  The movement. The pauses. The voice.

  This wasn’t graphics.

  And because of that, his confusion only sank deeper.

  “If it’s not a dream—and not some metaverse—then what are you?”

  “Secret.

  Until the day you’re meant to know.”

  The girl pressed a finger to her lips, as if it mattered.

  Crys blinked.

  If she were a guide, she’d just play her programmed role—flat, simple.

  She wouldn’t go out of her way to irritate him like this.

  “If I’m going to know someday, then I can know now.”

  “Games have an order too, don’t they?”

  Bringing up games almost made it sound reasonable.

  A character who can’t reveal who they are at the start—

  either a last-minute savior, or a boss.

  …Which is it?

  Watching her smile like she was enjoying this,

  neither one felt quite right.

  “Are you human?

  Or… like…”

  He swallowed the bad feeling and forced it out.

  “Something imaginary… or whatever?”

  “Sorry.

  I can’t tell you that yet, either.”

  —Of course.

  So she’s not normal.

  Crys looked away and let out an exaggerated breath.

  Not an avatar.

  Not human.

  Then honestly, he’d rather this just be a dream.

  If the alternative was getting dragged into something weird,

  he wanted to wake up and erase it all.

  “…You can at least tell me your name, right?”

  “Tsitsi.”

  “Tsitsi…”

  When he repeated it, Tsitsi brought her fingertips together,

  and smiled like a flower in bloom.

  “Tsitsi.

  Why am I seeing dreams like this?”

  “You’ll learn that with your own strength, too.”

  “Then why are you here?”

  His voice came out with irritation in it.

  If she wasn’t going to tell him anything,

  it was the same as her not being here at all.

  But Tsitsi never lost her smile.

  She clasped her hands behind her back.

  “Think of a game.

  What’s the first thing you ask?”

  “……Where am I?”

  Apparently that was right.

  Tsitsi lifted one hand, the way you would

  when welcoming someone into your house for the first time.

  Only then did Crys actually look around.

  The room was a little bigger than his living room.

  A calm brightness filled it—yet there were no shadows anywhere.

  The floor was carpeted in the same deep crimson as the elevator.

  Three doors—left, right, and straight ahead.

  And in the center—

  a glass case.

  Crys moved closer, as if pulled after Tsitsi,

  and the moment he glanced inside, his breath caught.

  They were lined up like museum pieces.

  The cape Cillian had made.

  His favorite staff—the one he’d made himself.

  A novel he’d read until the pages wore thin.

  A tiny bottle he’d tried to use to catch fairies.

  Magic circles he’d drawn for practice.

  —Junk, from when he still believed in magic.

  …Things he never wanted anyone to know about.

  “What is this?!”

  “You know better than anyone, don’t you?”

  “That’s not what I mean!”

  He asked again, anger rising,

  as Tsitsi kept answering him in the most literal way.

  “Why are these here?”

  “What is this?”

  Tsitsi asked back, as if testing him.

  “You know, don’t you.”

  Crys turned away with a sharp motion.

  Not worth looking at.

  Stupid.

  Childish.

  …And still, it made him so uncomfortable he wanted to avert his eyes.

  “This is the room of the heart.

  Not many people can reach it.

  But everyone has the same kind of room.”

  Tsitsi laid a hand on the glass case,

  gazing at the contents like they were her own treasures.

  “This case holds what symbolizes someone.

  Their nature.

  Their gifts.

  Their life.”

  “What the hell?!”

  Crys spun back to her and slapped the glass—BAM.

  The thick pane absorbed the impact.

  Only his fingertips throbbed.

  But it didn’t cool his anger.

  “You’re saying what symbolizes me is this kind of pathetic crap?”

  “It isn’t pathetic.

  It’s wonderful magic.”

  “Don’t use that word in front of me!”

  Crys shouted, clapping his hands over his ears.

  Dreams.

  Magic.

  Enough.

  He wanted to go back to his room, like always. Now.

  But even when he shut his eyes,

  that familiar tug at the back of his head didn’t come.

  No sense of sinking into bed, either.

  Not getting what he wanted only made him angrier.

  He paced the room, refusing to look at the case.

  Three doors.

  Was one of them an exit?

  But he was done being shown displays like that.

  Half-hoping his bad attitude would get him kicked out,

  he spat it out on purpose, blunt and rough.

  “…I want to go home.”

  “You can. Any time you truly want to go home.”

  The way she said it

  made it sound like he didn’t actually want to.

  Crys let out a long breath,

  and looked around the room again.

  …It pissed him off—to be seen that cleanly.

  But she wasn’t wrong.

  This room.

  The doors.

  Tsitsi.

  He cared.

  If he couldn’t leave, that was why.

  Not because he was “interested.”

  Just—

  because he wanted to know how to get back to his own room.

  “So what’s behind the doors?”

  “The right door leads to the you beside you.

  The door in front leads to your world.

  The left door leads to the you beside you.”

  A riddle.

  The you beside you.

  The you beside you.

  He didn’t get the difference.

  No—

  he didn’t want to.

  If he took it literally,

  it sounded like there were two—or more—of him.

  A chill ran up his spine.

  He shuddered.

  “…Can’t I go back through that elevator?”

  “Of course.

  If that’s what you want, then yes.”

  Tsitsi said it,

  then left a short pause.

  “But I don’t think you can. Not yet.”

  “Why.”

  “Because you don’t believe it’ll go the way you want.”

  “Here we go again.”

  Crys threw his hands out—dramatic on purpose.

  This whole “magic” thing started because of that glass case.

  Dragged back into the past.

  Like she was shoving his face in it.

  He was sick of it.

  He glared at Tsitsi

  and pointed at the glass case.

  “Does what’s in there ever change?”

  “Of course it can.

  They’re important things—things that shape you.”

  “Then isn’t that weird?”

  A sentence he didn’t want to say

  climbed up his throat.

  Crys bit his lip once.

  Still, he forced it out.

  “I… don’t think magic is worth anything.”

  “Crys…”

  Tsitsi’s expression softened into something complicated.

  She clasped her hands at her chest,

  and when she spoke again,

  her voice was gentler than before.

  “If Amelia were still alive…

  if your magic had saved her…

  do you think you’d still be saying that?”

  —Hearing her name,

  strangely,

  didn’t make anger rise.

  It was like a wound opening—

  but nothing came out.

  Instead,

  something he’d kept sealed for years

  began to loosen, quietly.

  “…I don’t know.”

  Even if he hated magic.

  If it meant he could still see Mom smile—

  he couldn’t say:

  I still wouldn’t believe.

  As he thought,

  something hard at the bottom of his chest

  started to melt.

  —Back then.

  He’d believed in magic, completely.

  He’d truly thought

  he could bring her back.

  What he’d been pushing away

  wasn’t magic itself.

  It was the version of him

  who couldn’t use it.

  Who couldn’t save her.

  The letdown.

  The disappointment.

  The helplessness.

  It wasn’t that magic failed to save Mom.

  It was that by shutting magic out—

  he’d been protecting himself.

  He wanted to save her.

  Any way he could.

  …The truth was, he wanted it to be magic.

  A thin sheen of tears formed behind his eyes,

  and the world wavered.

  Now he understood,

  even if he didn’t want to.

  Why the glass case held what it held.

  “So I… still believed it.

  Something that stupid…”

  Tsitsi watched him

  with eyes the color of deep space.

  “You might not be able to believe it yet.

  But you’ll never truly let go of magic.”

  And then,

  sleep took him all at once.

  Unlike last time,

  he didn’t feel like fighting it.

  In that short span,

  too much inside him had moved.

  A place that felt real

  without being a metaverse.

  A glass case that “symbolized” someone.

  And the fact that when she asked if he could believe in magic,

  he hadn’t been able to deny it right away.

  None of it felt like him.

  All of it,

  he wanted to forget.

  Crys closed his eyes, slowly.

  “You were born a magician.”

  His awareness sank.

  Only Tsitsi’s voice

  kept echoing,

  far away.