I see without opening my eyes.
I wasn't always like this—only after reaching a certain age was I forced into it.
I perceive the shape of the world through an unseen web, not through light.
For me, the web is everywhere: a luminous fabric of silver threads, wrapping every being with varying density.
This is my TRAITUM, inherited from my father.
But my father was different—his eyes were normal, and he could see like anyone else. Yet he knew how to see as I do.
In short, he chose to look at the web; he wasn't forced like me.
My father warned me about that thing—the voice that comes from behind my eyes.
He warned me never to open them.
It always tried to pull me in, whispering many things, constantly urging me to draw closer… to open my eyes.
My father spent years teaching me to ignore it, because it never cared about me.
All it wanted was destruction.
It was pure evil.
Despite everything, I never saw myself as anything more than an ordinary village girl.
Before he left, my father told me:
"You'll receive a message—accept it, my dear Zofia."
And so, years passed… until one day—
An envelope arrived, carrying an invitation…
An invitation to join the greatest academy on the continent.
Atre—the dream of every teenager on the continent.
I didn't understand why, but I'd been offered something special: a full scholarship.
I believed this was the message my father had told me to accept.
So I bid farewell to my mother and set off toward the capital of Neoland Kingdom: Entdeckt.
After a long journey, here I am—in the Jugesp Forest, traveling with a caravan I'd joined after passing through Little New Viaco town.
The forest was quiet—exactly how I liked it.
Here, the web was light and clean, with no tangled congestion of threads.
Only the delicate strands of ancient trees and the faint flickers of distant small beasts.
But for some reason, it grew unusually active—urging me to walk toward something.
I clenched my fists and looked away instead.
I would not listen to it.
We reached a lake—calmer than the forest, filled with fresh, crisp air.
The caravan members scattered to attend to their duties, while the three guards—Tamer with his small pointed ears, Anton with his horns, and Jon with his beard—moved off to scout the surrounding area.
The web showed me their forms clearly.
Then—
Chaos erupted before me. Wolves appeared.
No—not just wolves. Bloody Wolves.
The web around them pulsed denser, their bodies larger, their howls louder.
They lunged from between the trees, moving as one body.
Everyone fought. Little Sofia screamed—I pulled her into my arms as the threads trembled violently around us.
Suddenly—*it* shrieked behind my eyes:
*Look! Open your eyes! Look! Now!*
I ignored it.
I always ignore it.
Ahead of me, six wolves fell dead—
Mere severed pieces. I couldn't catch the one who did it…
Only their heads, cleanly sliced off with impossible precision.
Then I saw him—
A black void moving through the web, utterly dark—like the darkness I see when I hold my hand before my closed eyes.
But more than that, the web around him was dense—
Denser than anyone I'd ever encountered, by far.
He landed on a branch.
Silence fell upon the world—yet—
It kept screaming inside me, demanding that I reach out… that I draw closer.
I ignored it.
Like always.
Ignored it.
Ignored it.
Ignored it!
Finally… it went quiet.
I focused on that black void. His eyes—
Visible silver eyes…
Clear and pure silver.
Through the web, I could see them—visible within an impossible darkness.
They met mine for a fraction of a second… and my closed eyes burned.
But it didn't speak.
He was a boy—perhaps my age.
He stood… and smiled.
He didn't show himself to me, yet I felt it—felt his smile.
I even thought I saw it in the darkness: a perfect, gentle curve of his lips…
The battle ended.
I stood frozen, watching the boy before me—the one it had so desperately wanted me to follow.
I found someone…
My eyes burned, yearning to follow him.
His name was…
Boris.
And I—despite my hatred for it—
Found myself, over time, drawing closer and closer to him.
I kept circling toward him, step by step,
For no reason I could understand—
As though a fate had already begun in that very moment…
Beneath the tree, while it remained silent.