When Ren woke again, the forest hadn't changed — it still felt wrong.
It was the wrongness that got him; the way the light refused to penetrate the canopy, the cold that wasn't just temperature but a sense of profound absence. It was the antithesis of the stuffy, boring classroom that had screamed itself out of existence.
The mist didn't just cling to the damp dirt; it breathed, curling low across the ground with the rhythm of something immense and alive. Every sound — a solitary drip, a dry rustle, a suppressed cough — seemed to travel in distorted loops, repeating like echoes that refused to die, creating a maddening, swirling hum.
He pushed himself upright, his muscles aching with unfamiliar stiffness. The slick soil clung to his palms; his uniform shirt was torn near the elbow, dusted with a fine, glittering gold powder — the same strange residue that had consumed the classroom floor before everything vanished.
Ayla was beside him, pushing herself up slowly, a soft, ragged cough escaping her. Her face was bloodless, her eyes flicking across the treeline as if searching for the seam where this nightmare began.
"This isn't a dream," she whispered, her voice barely scratching the silence. "I tried pinching myself. I tried telling myself it was a hallucination. It's too real."
Ren swallowed, his throat raw. "Yeah," he murmured, the word catching. "Dreams don't smell like wet metal and ozone."
All around them, roughly a dozen other students were beginning to stir. The chaos was muted, held back by disbelief and terror. Some were quietly weeping, others frozen in postures of silent dread, and a few whispered nonsense — desperate words to talk reality back into place.
A boy with perpetually messy black hair stumbled to his feet, clutching his temples. His eyes were wide but focused — the look of someone who had seen fear before and learned to hide it.
Then there was the tall, broad-shouldered one — the kind who'd never been scared of anything in his life — trying to take charge.
"Everyone—! Everyone, just breathe! Stay calm! Don't move too far!"
No one listened. Fear was too heavy, too immediate.
The mist thickened, coiling around them like smoke from a dying fire, pressing in on the small, shivering group.
Then Ren felt it — a shift, deep in his perception.
A faint, brilliant pulse — light, warmth, and impossible color — flashed across his vision, so close it seared his retinas. He blinked hard, and there it was: something shimmering faintly before his eyes.
Not a reflection. Not a projection. Something else. Light arranged into form — incorporeal, but undeniably real.
Lines of luminous script began to write themselves into existence, rearranging and flowing like strands of ink dropped into clear water.
Initializing Soul Resonance…
Connection established.
Welcome, Mortal.
Ren froze, his heart slamming against his ribs. The cold, metallic scent in the air seemed to sharpen.
"Ayla," he said, voice low and strained, his gaze locked on the glowing text. "Please tell me you see this."
A beat of silence. Then softly, like a confession: "Yeah. It's right here. Like… a filter over my eyesight."
Ren let out a shaky breath that fogged the cold air. "Okay. Good. For a second I thought the gold dust had finally made me psychotic."
The luminous writing twisted, reforming deliberately, as if carved by an unseen, patient hand.
Trait Detected.
Analyzing Soul Pattern…
Result: Incomplete.
A cold dread slid down his spine. Incomplete?
Then, as if the script had heard his thought, it snapped into new, terrible words:
Trait: The Celestial's Eye
"You are seen, always. The gaze of the heavens lingers where you tread. No shadow will ever fully hide you."
Trait: Joker's Favorite
"A jester smiles upon you. Fortune and ruin will walk in step at your side. Predictability abandons you."
Ren stared, his breath stuck in his throat.
Joker's Favorite.
The name of their captor — now etched into his soul.
"What the hell does that even mean?" he muttered. "Am I cursed?"
Ayla's voice came from beside him, quiet and trembling. Her light display pulsed faintly blue, tracing patterns across her skin like starlight caught in glass.
Trait: Starborne Mind
"Your thoughts hum in tune with the cosmos. Understanding flows where others falter."
Trait: Dusk's Endurance
"The night is kind to you. Fear dulls, pain fades."
Trait: Celestial Harmony
"You are faintly aligned with the heavens' rhythm. Luck will not follow you — it will wait for you."
Ren blinked, dumbfounded. "Ayla, that sounds… genuinely incredible."
She gave a weak, desperate laugh. "Then why," she whispered, voice cracking, "does the word Celestial terrify me so much?"
Before he could answer, a high-pitched shriek tore through the mist.
A younger boy nearby collapsed, clawing at the air in front of his face. "There's writing! There's writing in the air! Get it off me!"
Panic erupted.
"Mine says 'Synchronization incomplete!' What does that mean?!" one shouted.
"Mine—mine says 'Fragment detected!'" another cried, stumbling backward as if the words might bite.
The air pulsed with collective fear, and the forest seemed to tremble in response.
Ren's thoughts spun in wild circles. "Okay," he muttered, rubbing a shaky hand through his hair. "We're in a forest that shouldn't exist, with ghost words that call us mortals. And the Jester—he's not just some crazy guy. He's part of this… thing."
Then he saw it.
At the very bottom of his vision, underneath the glowing traits, something smaller appeared — like a cruel afterthought, carved out of laughter itself.
P.S. — Do well, my little mortals! The Divine loves a good punchline ♥
— Joker
The message flickered once. The heart symbol winked — and then everything vanished.
The traits, the greetings, the signature — gone, leaving Ren's vision clear again but his reality permanently stained.
Ayla turned to him, eyes wide and hollow. "What now, Ren?"
He stared into the fog-drenched trees, where faint golden motes danced like malicious fireflies in the dark. The silence pressed heavy and expectant, the air charged with something unseen.
And somewhere in that endless forest, Ren could feel it — the shift, the weight of their first test waiting to begin.
"…I think," he said quietly, gripping Ayla's arm, "we stop trying to wake up… and start trying to win."