Prologue – Reason to live
There are countless reasons to keep living.
Life offers infinite reasons to go on.
I keep hearing those voices in mind all the time, each one has a different tone and voice, but what are those voices I keep hearing.
Everything started when he disappeared, the person I trusted the most left without saying anything.
My one and only friend tried to cheer me up. My friend's name is Yvette. Yvette Larkin, my one and only friend.
We've been friends since high school, with a way or another Yvette tried to cheer me up just to fail.
Yvette was not only my friend but also my future sister-in-law, but not anymore, I guess.
My name is Mai Spring. My fiancé was Johan Larkin. He used to say he loved my face, the thing I hated the most about myself and the reason why I don't belong anywhere.
A jagged, dark constellation of ruined skin bloomed across my left cheek—a permanent reminder of a fire that should have taken more than just my confidence.
I learned early that shadows were my best friend. They hid the rough, discolored patch of skin that made strangers look away and made my own reflection feel like a stranger.
My right side was a mirror of my mother's porcelain grace, but the left was a map of charred history, thick and uneven, pulling slightly at the corner of my eye.
Not long after Johan's mysterious departure, I was hospitalized. My once-dark hair had turned white, mirroring Johan's. The doctors told me I had slept for months; my body was overwhelmed by oxidative stress—the same cause, they said, of my sudden loss of color.
Three hours after I woke up, Yvette came to visit.
The room was supposedly silent, a heavy, sterile quiet that made Yvette uncomfortable. But I never felt it. Not for a single second. For me, the air was always crowded with the sound of voices that refused to let me be alone.
I held the bouquet Yvette brought me—bright, yellow blooms that smelled like a hope I no longer possessed.
As I sat there, I caught my reflection in the sterile glass of the hospital window.
The flowers looked vibrant, full of the "Spring" energy that defined my family. But next to them, the left side of my face looked like a scorched earth. The dark, puckered tissue of the burn stretched across my cheek, a jagged map of a day I could never forget. Johan used to kiss the edges of that rough skin, promising it didn't matter. He told me he saw beauty in the ruin.
Now, looking at the deadened, dark tissue of my scar, I realized he was just another person who couldn't handle the heat. He hadn't loved the scars; he was just waiting for the fire to go out.
Yvette Larkin, my only friend and the sister of the man who broke me, watched me from the doorway. She didn't know that the voices in my head were getting louder. She didn't know that for me, the world hadn't just ended—it was being rewritten.
I couldn't accept it. The loss of my most precious person—the one I loved more than anyone; my beloved Johan—was something my mind refused to touch. Neither his family nor mine could understand it; disbelief lingered on both sides. We chased every possibility, called the authority and anyone who would help. They found nothing. Not a trace.
In the end, they all reached the same conclusion: Johan had left at his own will. He didn't want to see anyone anymore. That was all they could offer us.
Only one person refused to accept that answer. One of Johan's friends never gave up on him. His name was Julius Nox.
For days, I refused to speak to anyone. All they wanted to talk about was Johan. I didn't want to remember. The pain of knowing he wouldn't be there when I woke up was more than I could endure. I was too weak to move past it—too weak to survive the weight of those emotions.
A long time passed. Years went by. Johan never returned. Julius continued his search, still trying to uncover what had happened. As for me, I eventually graduated from university. And I suppose I learned a great deal and eventually started working.
On my way home from work, I noticed a book displayed in a bookstore window. I was certain I had seen it before. After a moment, I remembered—it was Johan's favorite. If I recalled correctly, it told the story of a boy who died and was reincarnated in another world.
The moment I arrived home, I went straight to my room, where I kept some of Johan's belongings, and found the book.
For months during my free time, I have been reading that book. I had never really been a reader, but I wanted to understand what Johan loved about it. After all, he had spent countless hours lost in books.
I finally reached the end of the book. But the moment I closed it, something strange happened. A sudden light bursts forth, blinding me, erasing everything around me.
The Voices filled my head, giving me orders, forcing visions upon me—scenes I had never seen, yet somehow understood.
Then I understood. I had seen Johan. He was wearing unfamiliar clothes; his hair had turned black. He looked exactly like a character from the book—or at least, like how I had always imagined them.
You might wonder if I'm going to go look for him. You might wonder if this is a story about a girl chasing a ghost.
It's not. It's the story of what happened when the voices stopped being whispers and started being commands.