Do-Yoon stood completely still for a moment.
His hand was still holding the bully's wrist.
The cafeteria had become strangely quiet. A few seconds earlier, everyone had been talking, eating, and moving around — trays clattering, chairs scraping, voices overlapping into one another. Now almost every student nearby was looking in the same direction.
At Do-Yoon.
His red hair, messy and falling loosely over his forehead, shifted slightly as he tilted his head down to look at what his own hand had just done. A few strands stuck out at odd angles, as if he had rolled out of bed only minutes ago instead of hours.
The bully stared at his own wrist in disbelief.
He had expected Do-Yoon to be frightened.
He had expected him to step back.
He had expected the punch to reach him.
Instead, Do-Yoon had stopped it without even looking nervous. His grip hadn't been desperate or lucky — it had been precise, almost lazy, like swatting away an insect rather than blocking a punch meant to break a nose.
The bully's arm trembled slightly in Do-Yoon's grip before Do-Yoon slowly released his wrist.
The bully took a step backward, cradling his wrist as though it had been crushed, even though it hadn't been.
"What..."
He could not finish his sentence.
Do-Yoon looked at his own hand.
He was confused too.
He had not consciously decided to block the attack.
His body had simply moved.
The movement felt familiar.
It was the same feeling he had experienced inside that strange world.
The same reflexes.
The same speed.
The same instinct that had appeared when Mrantor trained him.
Do-Yoon slowly raised his eyes again.
The bully became angry. Embarrassment curdled into fury fast, the way it always did with boys who had never once been made to look small in front of an audience.
"You think that was luck?" he snapped, more to the students watching than to Do-Yoon himself.
He moved toward Do-Yoon again, faster this time, his shoulder dropping low as he aimed a punch meant to double Do-Yoon over.
This time Do-Yoon was ready.
The moment the attack came, Do-Yoon moved to the side and avoided it — not far, just enough that the fist sailed past his ribs by a few centimeters. He grabbed the bully's arm mid-swing and pushed him away, using the boy's own momentum against him so that he stumbled two extra steps before catching his balance against a table.
Trays rattled. A cup of water tipped over and spilled across the tabletop.
Another student stepped forward — bigger than the first, built like someone who spent his afternoons in a weight room rather than a classroom. His knuckles were already curling into fists.
Do-Yoon turned toward him without any wasted motion.
The second bully tried to attack, throwing a heavier, slower punch aimed at Do-Yoon's jaw.
Do-Yoon avoided the attack too, tilting his head back just enough that the fist cut through empty air where his face had been a heartbeat earlier.
His movements were much faster than they had ever been before. Faster than any of the other students in that cafeteria had ever seen from him — faster, honestly, than Do-Yoon himself had known he was capable of.
He did not have to think about every movement.
His body seemed to understand what to do before his mind could react. It was as if some deeper part of him — some part that had spent countless nights training under Mrantor's brutal discipline — had taken the wheel entirely.
The second student overcommitted on his next swing. Do-Yoon caught his wrist, twisted just enough to redirect the motion, and let the boy's own weight carry him forward. The second student lost his balance after Do-Yoon redirected his movement, crashing shoulder-first into an empty chair, which clattered loudly across the floor.
The first bully became even more frustrated. His face had gone red, sweat already beading at his hairline despite how little he had actually landed.
"You..."
He moved forward again, and this time he wasn't alone — he grabbed a third boy standing nearby, pulling him into the fight with a sharp jerk of his head.
Do-Yoon stepped toward him rather than back.
This time, Do-Yoon struck back — a short, controlled hit to the chest, not enough to seriously injure, but more than enough to make the point.
The hit forced the bully backward, the air driven out of his lungs in a single sharp gasp. He doubled over slightly, one hand pressed to his sternum.
Do-Yoon did not stop there.
The others tried to surround him now — four of them altogether, fanning out around him in a loose, uneven circle, the way people do when they've never actually coordinated an attack before and are relying on numbers alone.
One came from the left, swinging wide.
Another moved from the right, trying to grab Do-Yoon's shoulder from behind.
A third hesitated near the tables, clearly unsure whether to commit.
Do-Yoon turned quickly and defended himself against both of the first two — slipping the wide swing entirely, then twisting his shoulder out of the grasping hand before it could close around him. He used the same motion to drive an elbow lightly into the ribs of the boy who had tried to grab him, just enough to make him wheeze and stagger away, clutching his side.
His movements were controlled, but there was something different about him now. Every strike, every dodge, every subtle shift of his weight carried none of the panic a normal fourteen-year-old should have shown in a four-on-one fight. There was no wasted flailing. No desperate scrambling. Just clean, economical motion, over and over, like water finding the only path through stone.
The lazy student who usually arrived late to class was gone.
The boy standing in front of them looked completely different.
His eyes were calm.
His breathing was steady.
He was not shouting.
He was not trying to show off.
He was simply defending himself — and doing it so thoroughly, so effortlessly, that within moments the four of them looked less like attackers and more like students who had wandered into something far larger than they understood.
One of the bullies stepped backward, glancing nervously at the others.
Another looked at his friends, silently asking whether they should keep going.
They had clearly realized something.
They could not overpower him.
Not one of them. Not even all of them together.
Do-Yoon looked at them, his expression unreadable, red hair still faintly disheveled from the brief exchange.
"Don't come after me again."
His voice was quiet. It wasn't a threat shouted for the crowd's benefit — it was simply a statement, flat and certain, the kind of thing said by someone who had no need to raise his voice to be believed.
The students did not answer.
One by one, they moved away from him, retreating through the gathered crowd, none of them quite meeting each other's eyes. The one who had been struck in the chest was still breathing carefully, one arm wrapped around his ribs.
They left the cafeteria, the doors swinging shut behind the last of them.
Do-Yoon remained standing there, alone in the small cleared space that had formed around him.
The students around him continued staring.
Nobody seemed to know what to say.
Then Min-Jae finally returned, pushing through the crowd near the entrance. His black hair, just as messy as Do-Yoon's but darker, damp slightly at the edges from having run, stuck up in uneven tufts as he scanned the room.
He stopped near the entrance.
His eyes moved across the room.
Several chairs had been pushed aside during the confrontation. Some books and bags were scattered around, one notebook lying open on the floor with its pages bent. The students were still watching Do-Yoon.
Then Min-Jae saw him.
"Bro..."
Do-Yoon turned.
Min-Jae stared at him, eyes flicking from the overturned chairs to the small crowd to Do-Yoon's calm expression, trying to piece together what exactly had happened in the few minutes he'd been gone.
"What happened?"
Do-Yoon looked around at the mess, almost as if seeing it for the first time.
"They tried to take my money."
"And?"
"They attacked me."
Min-Jae looked at the students who were leaving, catching a glimpse of the last one disappearing through the door, still holding his ribs.
Then he looked back at Do-Yoon.
"Bro..."
His voice became serious.
"How did you do that?"
Do-Yoon did not answer immediately.
He looked down at his hands.
"I don't know."
Min-Jae frowned.
"What do you mean you don't know?"
"I mean exactly that."
Do-Yoon slowly closed his hand.
"My body moved before I thought about moving."
Min-Jae became silent.
Do-Yoon looked directly at him.
"Min Jae."
"Yeah?"
"The powers from the dream..."
He paused.
"They work here."
Min-Jae's expression changed.
For several seconds, neither of them spoke.
The words were simple.
But they carried a meaning neither of them wanted to accept.
The dream had not been a dream.
If Do-Yoon's abilities were real, then everything else they had experienced inside that world could also be real.
The monsters.
The strange places.
The systems.
The people.
The academy.
The entrance examination.
Everything.
Min-Jae slowly sat down, lowering himself into one of the chairs that hadn't been knocked over, his black hair falling slightly into his eyes as he did.
"So..."
He looked at Do-Yoon.
"We weren't dreaming."
Do-Yoon shook his head.
"I don't think we were."
The classroom around them had started becoming quieter.
Students were still whispering about what had happened, exchanging glances and half-finished sentences, but Do-Yoon and Min-Jae ignored them.
Their attention was somewhere else.
Their thoughts were inside that mysterious world.
Min-Jae lowered his voice.
"Then when we sleep..."
"We go there."
"And when we wake up..."
"We come back here."
Neither of them liked how easily those words sounded when they said them aloud.
Do-Yoon looked toward the classroom window.
The afternoon light was slowly changing, shifting from the harsh white of midday into something softer and more golden.
"If that's true, then we need to understand what that place actually is."
Min-Jae nodded.
"And we need to know why we're there."
Do-Yoon remained silent.
There were too many questions.
Why had Sir Crantos already known them?
Why had the system appeared?
Why could their abilities work in reality?
Why could they remember everything?
Why had the strange book from the library described events from Do-Yoon's life?
And most importantly...
Why had they been chosen?
Min-Jae looked at him.
"We can't just keep walking around without a plan."
"I know."
"If we go back tonight, we need to be prepared."
Do-Yoon nodded.
"We will."
Min-Jae leaned closer.
"What about the entrance exam?"
Do-Yoon's expression became more serious.
"That's where we need to be careful."
They began discussing what they would do once they returned.
Neither of them spoke loudly.
They did not want anyone else hearing their conversation.
They went over everything they already knew.
The academy.
The different ranks.
The Mirror system.
Their skills.
The monsters.
The dangers.
The strange rules of that world.
But they did not reveal their entire idea aloud.
Their plan was too important.
If someone else heard it, they might interfere.
So they only discussed the parts they needed to.
Eventually, Do-Yoon looked at Min-Jae.
"Do you understand?"
Min-Jae nodded.
"Yes."
"Then don't forget."
"I won't."
They both looked toward the clock.
There was still time before school ended.
But neither of them was thinking about school anymore.
Their minds were already preparing for the night.
The afternoon passed slowly.
Do-Yoon barely spoke.
He sat in class and listened to the lessons, but his thoughts kept returning to the same question.
If the dream was real...
Then what would happen when he returned?
Would everything remain the same?
Would the injuries and abilities from that world affect reality?
Could he die there?
Could he become stronger?
Could he return with something else?
And what about Min-Jae?
Was he also changing?
There were too many unknowns.
When school finally ended, Do-Yoon left the classroom.
Min-Jae walked beside him for part of the way, hands in his pockets, black hair still messy from the day, occasionally glancing sideways at Do-Yoon as if trying to see whether anything about him looked different now.
Neither of them talked much.
They had already said what needed to be said.
Before separating, Min-Jae looked at him.
"Tonight."
Do-Yoon nodded.
"Tonight."
They went in different directions.
Do-Yoon eventually reached home.
He opened the door quietly.
Ji-Eun was inside.
She looked toward him.
"You're home."
"Yeah."
She looked at him for a moment.
"You seem serious."
Do-Yoon did not answer immediately.
He had no intention of telling her what had happened.
There was no way he could explain it.
Even he barely understood it himself.
"I've just had a long day."
Ji-Eun nodded.
"Go rest then."
Do-Yoon walked toward his room.
Before entering, he stopped.
He looked back toward Ji-Eun.
She was doing her own work and did not seem worried.
Do-Yoon quietly entered his room.
He closed the door.
The room became silent.
He looked at his bed.
For some reason, it felt different now.
Before, sleeping had simply meant sleeping.
Now it was a doorway.
A doorway leading somewhere he could not understand.
Do-Yoon changed his clothes and prepared himself.
He checked his belongings.
He made sure everything he needed was nearby.
Then he sat on the edge of his bed.
He looked at his hands again.
The same hands that had stopped a punch earlier.
The same hands that had once used strange abilities inside the dream.
He slowly clenched them.
"So it really wasn't a dream."
His voice was barely above a whisper.
He looked toward the window.
Night was beginning to settle over the city.
Do-Yoon knew that once he closed his eyes, there was a chance he would return to that world.
He also knew that things might be different this time.
He had already made his decision.
He would not enter that world blindly again.
He would follow the plan he and Min-Jae had prepared.
He would become stronger.
He would find answers.
And he would discover why they had been brought there.
Do-Yoon finally lay down.
He pulled the blanket over himself.
His eyes slowly closed.
For a few moments, nothing happened.
The room remained silent.
His breathing became slower.
His thoughts began fading.
Then the darkness around him seemed to become deeper.
Do-Yoon's body became completely still.
His consciousness began sinking away from reality.
The last thing he remembered was the plan he had made with Min-Jae.
He would not forget it.
He would follow it carefully.
Then everything went dark.
And somewhere beyond that darkness...
the other world was waiting.