Olivia's consciousness sank slowly, like something was pulling her toward an unfamiliar place.
Then...
Darkness swallowed everything.
Olivia stood alone in the middle of a vast, a silent space. No floor. No ceiling. Only white mist drifting slowly around her.
Her chest felt heavy.
"Where... am I?"
Then she noticed something , a reflection beneath her feet. She looked down. And stumbled backward.
Because the face staring back at her wasn't the small child's face, but she had grown used to seeing in this world.
It was her. Her real self. Twenty-four years old.
She touched her own face with trembling hands, barely believing what she was seeing.
Olivia looked around the space again. It reminded her of something she had seen in her original world like outer space, vast and endless and cold. But she was certain this place carried its own meaning that she didn't understand yet .
No matter how far she walked, the space seemed to have no end. What even Worse, she felt like she was walking in circles, returning to the same spot over and over again.
Her energy began to drain. Her heartbeat grew faster. The dim, cold atmosphere slowly wrapped itself around her chest until her heart felt unbearably restless.
Finally she gave up.
Olivia sat down where she was, staring up into the emptiness above her.
"Celineee!! Ophliaaa!! Mama... Daddy!!"
Her voice echoed through the hollow space.
Nobody answered.
Then ....something glimmered in the distance. Not far from where she sat.
Threads?
Thousands of thin, delicate threads began to appear in the air, shimmering like starlight. Some were a soft red, warm like living blood. Some were bright gold, like captured sunlight. And some were a deep, absolute black ....like the shadow of midnight itself.
The threads moved slowly, crossing and weaving through each other, as if connecting every life in this world.
Olivia stood. She walked toward the light with slow, careful steps.
Her eyes went wide at the extraordinary sight. Equal parts amazed and uneasy, she opened her mouth.
"This... what is all of this?"
She reached her hand out hesitantly. As her fingers drew close to one of the red threads a faint vision flickered in her mind. A Strangers. Lives she had never seen. A world she didn't recognise.
She flinched and pulled her hand back.
But then, something caught her eye.
Among all those thousands of beautiful threads, there was one knot that looked completely wrong.
Its threads were tangled together
red, black and gold
all bound up like a destiny that had been broken.
"This thread... it's different from the others. What does it mean?" she whispered.
The knotted thread pulsed slowly. Like it was alive.
Olivia's heart began to pound for no reason she could explain.
Slowly she moved toward it.
The closer she got, the tighter the feeling in her chest became.
Why... does this thread feel like it's in pain?
Her hand rose without her realising it.
Her fingers were almost touching the knotted thread
Suddenly a voice rang out through the darkness.
"Don't."
Deep. Heavy. Like it came from somewhere very far away.
Olivia froze.
But before she could ask anything, the threads around her began to shake violently.
The space cracked. Like shattering glass.
Light exploded in every direction.
And in an instant ...
Olivia's eyes snaped open.
__________________________
She was gasping. Sweat soaked her face, as if what she had just experienced was far more than a dream.
The room was silent. The only sound she can heard was her own heartbeat.
Then, Olivia noticed what had made her gasp in the first place. Her body went completely still. Her face drained of colour. The room chill to her spine, felt like cold ice.
Something floating in the air, right in front of her eyes ...
the same delicate threads from her dream.
Olivia, absolutely no idea what was happening, her body began to tremble. She yanked her blanket up over her face immediately.
When I was reading this novel... I never once came across a scene like this...
she thought furiously, internally cursing her terrible luck.
She bit the edge of her blanket in frustration.
Don't tell me... I've landed in a completely different novel?
she thought, crying inside her own head. Disbelief something like this will happen to herself.
After a full hour had passed, Olivia finally gathered enough courage to peek out from under her blanket , just to check whether the threads were still floating there or not.
When she pulled the blanket from her face
The threads were gone.
She exhaled slowly.
Finally.
Olivia decided that she would go back to sleep immediately so she wouldn't have to see any more strange things.
She pulled the blanket up to her chest and tried to find a comfortable position. But when she turned her head, she spotted something on the small table beside her bed.
Food. Fruits. And a small folded piece of paper.
She picked it up and read what was written inside.
[Get well soon —Ophlia & Celine.]
Olivia smiled quietly.
She set the note down and lay back against her pillow. The room that had felt so cold just moments ago slowly began to feel warm again.
Moonlight fell softly through the window, lighting the darkness of her room in silver.
Her eyelids grew heavy. Her vision blurred at the edges.
Olivia's consciousness sank...
slowly ... into a sleep.
The moment Olivia fell completely still
A sound drifted from outside the window.
Several small figures hovered in the darkness of the night. Their forms were unclear, like shadows that had somehow been given life. Their eyes glowed dimly in the dark, and something resembling thin, delicate wings moved slowly .
"Is that the girl they talked about?" one of them rasped in a half-whisper, drifting through the air.
"Yes. That's her," a blonde haired replied.
"She belongs to our master. I'm certain of it," one of them said, grinning.
"Then what are we waiting for? Let's.."
Before he words could finish ...
Someone cut them off sharply.
"Not yet. We wait for master's orders. He hasn't given us any instruction," said that one who have pink hair, rare than the rest.
The others nodded in agreement.
Then a long haired female figure spoke quietly.
"But she's the only one who can..."
The others ignored her words and turned instead toward the creature that resembled like clinical creatures, emerging from the shadows.
"How is master right now?" the woman asked.
"For now, he is alright," it answered with a nod.
"Good... Then lets go back ," one of the small creatures said and vanished.
One by one they followed. Some dissolved back into the shadows on the wall as if they had never existed. Others stepped through black portals that opened and swallowed whole them.
Before the last one disappeared, who wearing a long skarf ,paused. Turned back toward the window. And said quietly
"We will meet again... when the time comes."
Then, disappeared from the night. No trace left as they never comes.