The forest whispered again.

  But this time, it wasn’t the trees.

  Arata stumbled forward, feet unsure on the moss-covered ground. The air shimmered faintly, as if threads of light and shadow tugged at something unseen. A voice echoed in his mind—soft, distant, like a memory not yet remembered.

  > “You were not meant to awaken yet.”

  He spun around. No one. Only the gentle creak of silverleaf branches above and the quiet hum of wind curling between them.

  The author's narrative has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.

  Then he saw her.

  A flicker of motion—barely more than a wisp of light—hovered near a broken tree stump. Tiny, glowing, winged. A presence too delicate to be real.

  “Yume,” she said, her voice like the chime of distant bells. “That’s my name.”

  He didn’t speak. Couldn’t. Not because he didn’t want to—but because something about her made his breath catch.

  Yume floated closer, her glow dimming slightly as she examined him.

  > “You're fractured… like a thread pulled too tight. That shouldn’t be possible.”

  “What… am I?” Arata finally whispered.

  She hesitated. “I was hoping you’d tell me.”

  ---

  Across the realm, a knight stirred in his sleep, gasping awake. His hand clutched a pendant scorched with time—a name etched into the metal:

  Akira.

  Sir Billion rose to his feet, haunted. For the first time in twenty years, he had dreamed of his son.

  And the boy in that dream…

  Had Arata’s face.

  --