Chương 1: Prologue

The crying always came first. Soft at first. Then desperate. I could never see who it was. Every time I tried to look, the dream slipped away from me like water through my fingers. Ahead floated a perfect circle of light. It hung above the ground, reached only by a short flight of stone steps that stopped just before the gate itself, as though the final step had never been built. Two pale beams met at its center. Where they collided, reality rippled like the surface of a lake disturbed by a single drop of rain.

Perfect circles spread endlessly across the doorway before fading into its edge. Beyond it... A forest. Nothing unusual. Trees. Grass. Morning mist drifting between the trunks. Someone climbed the stairs and disappeared through the gate. Just another silhouette. Then another. And another. None of them stopped, none of them looked back. Some carried bundles, some held children and some helped the elderly. No one spoke. Only crying.

"Dear..." The voice came from somewhere behind me.

"You can't..." It broke into sobs.

"Please..." This novel is published on a different platform. Support the original author by finding the official source. Another figure disappeared into the rippling light.

"... you can't..." Then... Silence. I woke with the sound of crying still echoing in my ears.

"... Again." I stared at the ceiling for a long moment before checking the time. 2: 43 a. m. Same dream, same ending. Every. Single. Time. At this point, it had become part of my routine. Wake up, stare at the ceiling. And wonder why my subconscious was obsessed with a mysterious forest and a crying woman. Eventually, get up and get on with my day. Or rather... My night. I threw the blanket aside and stretched before heading to the bathroom.

A hot shower always helped wash away the last fragments of the dream, though never completely. They always lingered somewhere in the back of my mind, out of reach. A few minutes later, with my towel still draped over my shoulder, I stepped back into the living room. As usual, three monitors lit up the otherwise dark room. The messaging app, a dozen browser tabs and my moderation dashboard. Replies waiting to be approved. Reports waiting to be reviewed.

Being a community manager meant other people's evenings were usually my busiest hours. I dropped into my chair, slipped on my headset, took a sip of yesterday's now-lukewarm coffee.

"I really need to get outside more often." I wasn't even joking. I couldn't remember the last time I'd left the house for anything other than groceries. The days blurred together. Work. Sleep. Repeat. Mom used to say I worked too much. She was probably right. The irony wasn't lost on me. I spent my days helping thousands of people socialize while barely seeing another human being myself. I clicked the messaging app. No new messages. I frowned. That was... odd.

Usually there'd already be a dozen people arguing about the latest anime trend by this hour. I refreshed. Nothing. Maybe the servers were having issues. It happened from time to time. I shrugged and looked at my moderation dashboard instead. No new reports. No pending appeals. No spam. Again, nothing. Now that was impossible. The internet never slept. Especially not communities this large. A strange feeling settled in my stomach. I refreshed everything. Again. And again. Still, nothing. The house creaked. Old wood.

Probably the temperature changing. Or so I thought. I leaned back in my chair and reached for my coffee. The room trembled. The coffee rippled. Something outside crashed. A tree? Impossible. There weren't any trees that large near my house. I walked to the window and pulled the curtain aside.

"... What?" Where the street should have been... There was only forest.