Lyra Swift's POV
The moment I stepped into the heart of the fog, everything disappeared.
The ground slipped away.
The trees dissolved.
Even sound shattered into nothing.
I couldn't hear my footsteps. Couldn't feel the weight of my sword. Even the pendant on my chest, where Dan usually hung, felt like it wasn't there at all.
I was suspended in a cloud. Then came the pressure.
What pulled at me wasn't wind or gravity. It was a presence with intent, cold, precise and unyielding.
Something ancient had seen me walk in... and decided I wasn't allowed to leave.
My lungs locked up.
My mana, once flowing steady, suddenly felt like it was trying to sink into the void.
My head spun.
And then something grabbed me.
It reached past flesh, straight into the core of my mind.
Thoughts came undone, peeled apart and twisted into something unrecognizable.
I stumbled forward, but it felt like I was walking through mud.
Each step heavier than the last.
My fingers clenched around my sword.
I reached for more mana. Tried to shield my mind.
The fog pushed harder.
It whispered not in words, but in feelings.
Loneliness.
Hunger.
Resentment.
It had waited centuries for someone to scream at.
My vision blurred.
My legs trembled.
And then I heard him.
Dan.
His voice rang out, clear and calm, drifting through the mist as if the fog couldn't reach him.
But he wasn't calling out to me.
He was talking to someone else.
A woman.
Her voice was soft. Warm. Too gentle for something so wrong.
Dan laughed. Quietly.
Like he remembered something precious.
And my heart wavered.
Something inside me snapped — sharp and sudden, like a string pulled too tight.
My grip faltered. My chest felt tight, breath stuck behind something I couldn't name.
He wasn't fighting the fog.
He was talking to it.
To her.
An old friend. Someone he missed.
I froze, caught between the weight of the fog and something heavier inside me.
I was in danger, and he didn't even look my way.
He just kept talking, completely absorbed, smiling with a warmth I hadn't seen in ages. All while I was being crushed by the very thing he spoke to. Breaking under her grip, the one he seemed so happy to welcome.
I didn't know what I was feeling.
It tore through my chest.
Too raw for fear.
Too sharp for sorrow.
Anger. Twisting. Tangled.
Ugly and unshaped.
The kind that made me want to scream or disappear.
My fingers clenched harder around the hilt.
A voice inside whispered, look at me.
Not her.
Me.
I didn't just want to survive.
I wanted to be the one he reached for.
I wanted him to see me.
Right now.
But he didn't.
Not even a glance.
His voice was still so warm... but not for me.
Like I didn't even exist.
Something twisted in my chest.
I let go.
My fuming rage boiled over. Mana surged. Wild. Hot.
I burned.
And I screamed.
Straight into the mist—
Into the silence between us.
If he wouldn't reach for me, I'd make damn sure he couldn't ignore me.
Dan's POV
The world stayed intact but they began to peel.
Each layer pulled away, revealing not reality, but a memory faded in white and gray.
I stood inside it, aware of every breath, every shift in the air.
My field extended ten meters in every direction.
Nothing blocked it. Trees, soil, the pressure around me.
I felt all of it.
I scanned for Kevin.
Nothing.
He wasn't around.
Then came the fog.
It moved with neither the weight of mana nor the touch of wind. It was intent—wrapped in silence, pressing in, listening. It reached for me again the same way it had before we entered the deeper woods. It was slow and cautious.
Testing my edges.
Not gentle.
Not aggressive.
Just... searching.
But this time, it pulled back...something in the fog recoiling from what it couldn't understand.
It circled once, then again, drifting in a wide arc before changing course.
The weight pressing down on me began to shift, lifting from my body and moving outward.
Toward her.
Toward Lyra.
And I didn't like how aggressive the fog suddenly became.
She stumbled.
Her grip tightened on her sword. Her breath hitched.
And me?
I dangled there. Right against her chest.
Watching.
Powerless.
Every instinct in me urged motion. To ignite. To scatter the fog with flame or force. To carve through the haze and rip the weight straight out of the air.
I reached inward, guided by will alone, sinking into the magic I barely understood, into the pressure swelling behind my core, into whatever the hell I was turning into.
Anything. Please. Give me something.
Then I felt it stir. It began with a pulse, a flicker—small, but unmistakably alive.
And something answered.
An old power stirred, rising from the depths of my being.
Not a burst of mana. Not a force meant to strike.
Not power, exactly—closer to instinct.
Rooted in something I had always carried but never named.
Recognition.
And the fog responded.
With stillness.
Whatever inside me had reached out, and the fog had heard it.
And that's when I heard it too—a voice.
Each word carried the calm weight of something ancient remembering how to speak, as if it had just woken from a deep slumber.
"Is it you?"
The words weren't spoken.
They landed.
I paused.
Because something deep inside me… flinched.
A presence I didn't recognize, but one that seemed to know me.
My thoughts scrambled. A million questions rushed forward, and all I managed to spit out was—
"Who are you?"
No answer came at first.
Not right away.
But something shifted.
The fog remained still. It neither pressed forward nor withdrew—only held its place.
Whatever it had prepared for Lyra drifted into silence.
Had stopped too.
It just lingered. Hung there in the air like a thought that forgot how to leave.
But it was watching, without eyes.
"You feel... familiar," the voice finally replied.
Soft. Slow. Almost… sad.
"But you are not him."
"Cool. Vague and dramatic," I muttered. "You practice that line in a haunted cave or something?"
The fog didn't answer.
It just kept talking, continuing its thoughts without acknowledging mine.
"You are not him," it said again.
"But there is… something. A resemblance."
"Okay, wow," I shot back. "That line might work on other guys, but not me. I'm a dice, alright? Whatever weird ex you're looking for—go haunt someone who actually signed up for this drama, not me."
"What are you?" the fog asked.
At the same time, I flared my awareness again, ten meters out, sweeping the area.
I needed to find Kevin. Fast.
This fog… it wasn't normal.
Something in my gut told me it was dangerous, too dangerous for Lyra or Levin to handle alone.
Levin stood nearby.
He looked like he'd been heading toward us—mid-step, half-aware.
But now he was just... stuck. Somehow paralyzed.
More like... buffering.
He twitched slightly, mouth moving in slow, stuttering fragments.
"Dan... tell me this isn't you," he mumbled. Eyes blank. Voice flat.
Oh, fantastic.
He'd dropped into some kind of fog-induced fever dream... and decided to dream about me.
What, does he have a crush now? I have saved his life a few times.
Kind of flattering. Also extremely weird.
I shifted focus to Lyra. She wasn't saying a word.
But the air around her was... charged.
The air around her held a charge, thick with heat and pressure, building toward a breaking point—the kind that comes just before a storm breaks loose.
I came into realization. I knew what this feeling was.
She was angry.
And somehow... that anger was aimed at me.
"Hell," I muttered. "I didn't even do anything wrong."
Finally, I turned back to the fog.
"I told you, I'm just a dice," I said flatly. "With trust issues."
"Now, same question. What are you?"
"Are you running this whole haunted house experience, or do you just float around spooking people for fun?"
"Either way, could you maybe back off a bit?"
"My friends are kind of melting down over here and I'm the emotionally stable one. That's never a good sign."
"You're not what I expected," it said.
"But something in you... still remembers."
"You carry something strange, heavy. It remembers me, even if you do not."
My sarcasm wavered. Just a little.
"Have we... met?"
"You weren't supposed to come back," it whispered. "Not like this."
That whatever pickup line hit harder than I wanted to admit.
My thoughts jolted—then scattered.
Did this thing really know me?
Or... whatever I used to be before I got reincarnated as a discount RNG generator?
Or was this all just a trick?
Some dream-mist con job designed to wear me down, just like it was doing to the others?
Out of nowhere, Levin's voice cracked through the haze—loud, raw, desperate. The kind of voice that didn't belong in battle, but at a funeral.
"YOU CARED!"
I flinched.
...Seriously?
Was he really out there hallucinating some kind of emotional confession about me?
Great.
Just perfect.
Meanwhile, Lyra was still locked in that eerie silence. Her mana simmering, a storm waiting to break.
Both of them stood at the edge, tension carved into every breath.
And me?
I had no idea how to help them.
No way to snap Levin out of whatever the fog had wrapped around him.
No path to reach Lyra through that burning quiet.
Didn't even know if I could do anything at all.
What if they fell too deep into this dream?
The pressure crept in tighter.
Beneath the worry, something else rose up.
Frustration.
Bitter, edged with the sting of powerlessness.
At the fog.
At the silence.
At the way this whole thing felt rigged from the start.
I clenched back the rising panic and snapped.
"Okay. Seriously."
"Thanks for the vague metaphors and cryptic sad energy—'You're not him, you weren't supposed to come back'—A+ spooky material.
But how about just one clear answer for once?"
"What are you? Who's even talking to me?"
A pause.
The voice returned, softer now. Slower.
Something ancient, like dredging words from the bottom of a memory it never wanted to revisit.
"I'm sorry," it said.
Its voice trembled with strain, the syllables sounding pulled from a wound that hadn't healed.
"For what I did… back then."
It faltered.
A catch in the voice, cracking under its own weight.
"I betrayed him."
"And I never forgave myself."
"That guilt never left me even after all this time asleep."
My brain lit up with question marks.
A dozen theories shouted for attention all at once.
"Uh... okay?" I said cautiously. "Great. Now we're talking? I guess?"
There was something in the voice.
Not polished. Not manipulative.
Just... tired. Regretful.
It didn't feel like a lie.
And I felt it. Or I wanted to. Maybe I was already falling for whatever trap this was.
A part of me wanted to believe it, drawn to the calm in front of me.
Yet something deeper, built for survival, kept whispering from beneath the surface told me to hold back.
Not until I know what it really is.
Then the fog said it—something I didn't know how to digest.
"You're one of us."
"?????"
What even is this thing?
Dropping riddles. Flirting with my trauma. Now tossing out some cryptic 'one of us' nonsense like it's part of a cult flyer?
My brain was officially out of RAM. The question marks were stacked to the ceiling. And yet...
I still asked anyway.
"So... what was I? Or am?"
The word hovered.
I waited for that answer like it was the end of the world.
Something old stirred inside me.
I knew this creepy fog wasn't just guessing. It knew me.
"You were a C—"
"…ka...ro… fate… fall… reon…"
The words came through the air distorted, static torn from a broken dream.
They didn't make sense, but something inside me flinched, as if a memory was on the verge of remembering itself.
The word hovered. Hung on the edge of something massive.
But it never reached me.
Not because it faded.
But because something else crashed in—louder, violent, impossible to ignore, demanding to be felt.
BOOM.
A blinding burst of light exploded—wild, furious, electric.
And then—ripping through it like a war cry dipped in unfiltered murder:
"DAAAAAAAAAAAAAAN, YOU IDIOT—WHY ARE YOU FLIRTING HERE?!"
Her voice crashed through the mist, dripping with betrayal.
ZAP.
Lightning slammed through me.
I convulsed midair, dangling from her neck, a pendant on a warpath, caught in the crossfire of divine fury.
"YOU IDIOT! YOU'RE OUT OF MANA—AND YOU STILL ZAPPED ME?!—AAAAAA STOP IT!!!"
"WHY WERE YOU FLIRTING WITH A GIRL INSTEAD OF HELPING ME?!"
"I—I wasn't flirting!" I sputtered. "What girl?! There's no one here but you! And honestly, you barely count right now—you attack first, scream questions later."
"THE FOG WAS THE GIRL, YOU MORON!!"
ZAP.
Another bolt sliced through me, divine vengeance on wings of static.
"AAAAAGHH—STOP TAZING YOUR PARTY MEMBER! YOU'RE OBVIOUSLY HALLUCINATING—JUST LIKE LEVIN!"
Above us, the fog twitched.
Startled, by the contact it didn't expect. I caught a faint whisper.
"You… that girl…"
"How is this… possible?"
In the next instant—
"NO—NO NO NO—DAN, PLEASE!!"
Levin's voice cut through the mist. It was cracked, panicked, breaking apart.
"NOOOOOOO!!"
Lyra blinked, her fury wavered.
"LYRA! LEVIN'S LOSING IT—WAKE HIM UP!" I shouted, limbs twitching from her leftover voltage.
"HUH?!" She turned, still half-convinced I was bluffing, and half-ready to fry me again.
Without warning, the shift came fast—my field pulsed. Hard.
A tremor. A ripple.
Kevin.
He was returning.
And he wasn't alone.
Five Aether Tusks.
Thundering through the woods like a monster parade.
Twice the usual size. Tusk blades shaped into jagged lances. Their eyes glowed, wild and overcharged.
Clearly fed on raw mana for breakfast.
And Kevin?
Calm. As always.
Expression unreadable, that same smug smile stretching, thinking this was all part of the plan.
He didn't speak.
But his face screamed it.
"Final Test."
And then—he vanished.
Like some mysterious NPC leaving the boss fight to the noobs.
But the monsters didn't vanish.
They just kept charging.
Straight. At. Us.
"KEVIN, WHAT THE ACTUAL HELL!" I shrieked. "Are you trying to speedrun our funeral?! YOUR SON IS ABOUT TO DIE! YOU SADISTIC MANIAC!"
Obviously, he couldn't hear me.
But Lyra did.
She jolted. "Wait—what?! What's going on?!"
"KEVIN'S BACK AND HE BROUGHT FIVE AETHER TUSKS—AND THEY'RE HUGE. TITAN-LEVEL-HUGE!"
"WE'RE DONE FOR—WAKE LEVIN!" I yelled. "HE'S STILL TRAPPED IN THAT FOG'S NIGHTMARE—AND IF WE DON'T PULL HIM OUT NOW, HE'S DEAD! I CAN FEEL IT!"
"How am I supposed to wake him?" Lyra shouted back, panic rising in her voice.
"I DON'T KNOW—TRY KISSING HIM MAYBE! YOU'RE THE ONE WHO BROKE OUT—DO THAT AGAIN!" I snapped.
I swear, this girl is unbelievable. Even with death galloping toward us, she still had time to roll her eyes at me, because of one kiss suggestion.
But before she could even take a step toward Levin, the Aether Tusks were already within five meters.
Charging fast, stomping like siege engines.
Lyra didn't hesitate.
Her sword vanished into the space ring with a flick, and out came a bow.
But no arrows.
She drew it anyway.
Her right hand shimmered with flame, conjuring a burning projectile out of raw will. She pulled back the string and let loose.
SWOOSH.
Then another.
SWOOSH.
And another.
SWOOSH. SWOOSH.
Four fire arrows in rapid succession.
They whistled past the leading Aether Tusk, slamming into the feet of the ones trailing behind, just enough to stagger the pack and isolate the frontmost beast. The blasts weren't direct hits, but heavy tusks fumbled. Dirt flew. Momentum broke.
Lyra surged forward.
Straight at the frontmost Tusk.
And as she moved, her bow vanished again—slipped back into the space ring in a blink. In the same breath, her sword reappeared in hand.
"WAIT—WHAT ABOUT LEVIN?!" I screamed. "YOU CAN'T JUST—"
She didn't answer.
She was already in.
The beast lunged, with scimitar-shaped tusks, ready to skewer her on instinct alone.
She didn't dodge.
She dove clean and slid.
Steel clashed. Sparks flew. Lightning cracked.
She slipped under the creature's belly, blade dragging across its hide. It was shallow, but enough to stagger.
The wounded Tusk let out a shriek, brief, but shrill—then stumbled hard, its massive frame rolling sideways through the dirt, carving a shallow trench before slamming into a tree with a thunderous crack. Not dead, but dazed. Disoriented. That cut didn't bleed much, but it struck something crucial. A tendon? A nerve cluster? Whatever it was, it hit deep enough to scramble its footing and its dignity.
Lyra didn't wait. She kicked off the ground, retreating fast with wind magic flaring from her boots. Landing several meters away in a low crouch, sword raised, breathing hard. Her eyes never left the Tusk.
The rest of the Tusks weren't down. Just delayed.
Their hooves thundered back to rhythm—charging once more, heavier and faster.
And Levin? Unreachable. Still trapped in the dream-fog's clutches.
"LYRA! YOU CAN'T GET TO HIM—WE NEED A PLAN!" I shouted.
We couldn't risk it.
If she ran straight to Levin now, both of them would get trampled. The tusks were barreling through like an avalanche. So close-range was suicide.
"I'M KIND OF—BUSY!!!" she snapped.
"DAN—ANY IDEAS?!" She screamed, not in fear, but in absolute frustration.
That's when it came. The most painful scream I'd ever heard in my life.
"AAAAAARRRRRRRGGGHHHHHHHHHHHH—!"
Levin's voice.
Ripping through the mist, a sound born from something inside him shattered.
It was broken and terrifying.
"I SWEAR IF I DIE WITHOUT WAKING THAT IDIOT—!" Lyra shouted.
"LYRA!" I cut her off. "I'LL STALL THEM! YOU WAKE LEVIN!"
"HOW?! YOU'RE A PENDANT!"
"VERBAL ASSAULT, MOSTLY!" I snapped.
"I'M A DICE! I ROLL BAD DECISIONS FOR A LIVING!"
"THEN THROW ME!"
No time to explain.
She didn't waste a second, just growled and yanked me free.
The necklace unspooled, a thread woven from mana. A trick she picked up a few days ago. She hurled me forward, a yoyo fueled by spite and survival.
I hit the ground.
[5]
Crap. That's gonna hurt, the spell was already charging, demanding a huge mana cost.
And I knew she didn't have enough.
So I yanked it.
Pulled the whole damn toll into me.
…But I'd be lying if I said I wasn't a little excited.
Big number usually means big boom. And if we're lucky? Those Tusk are getting rekt flat.
She took the edge. A flicker of the pain, just enough to anchor the cast.
But the rest?
Mine.
All mine.
Let the dice drink my soul juice instead of hers.
It burned through me—hot, reckless, and definitely illegal in at least three provinces.
But I couldn't afford to be picky. Not now.
My body shimmered, just a little. Faint, but glowing.
The effect clicked. The magic surged.
She pulled me back with the mana tether—whip-fast. I shot through the air, yoyo-style, zipping back into her grip just as she turned toward Levin.
She didn't need to look far. He was right there, eyes glazed, body limp, trapped in a nightmare he couldn't escape.
Her eyes narrowed. Jaw clenched.
Then she raised her hand.
Static building across her arm, crackling, buzzing, a storm coiled into a single breath.
The air shimmered. Her palm glowed white-blue.
I felt it before I saw it—pure, raw intent.
No way, I thought. She wouldn't.
She did.
The bolt snapped from her fingers like every bad decision I ever made came back as electricity.
It lanced through the mist and struck Levin square in the chest.
ZZZZZZZT.
His whole body seized. Arched, flailed, twitching in wild spasms, a puppet set on fire.
His eyes flew open.
Wide. Wet. Blind with panic.
"AAAAAAAAAAGHHHHHHHH—!"
It was his voice.
It wasn't just pain, it was grief weaponized.
A shattering burst of sound too big for one person's lungs.
Every unspoken word, every bottled scream, every moment he thought he'd never get back… finally broke loose.
Levin clutched at the air, still caught in the dream. Grasping for something he hadn't realized was gone.
He didn't just scream, he bled through it.
Did he really love me that much?
Good grief, now he was awake.
And me?
My dice-body shuddered.
Glowing, cracking, pulsing with unstable mana. Frenzied sparks raced across me, building toward something I couldn't hold back.
BOOM.
A surge burst out from me. An explosion, pure, full-force mana unleashed.
Wave of raw energy, white-blue and radiant, thundered forward in a sweeping arc and smashed into the frontmost Aether Tusk. The force of it made the ground shake. Leaves scattered. Trees groaned. Lyra flinched.
The blast didn't explode on impact.
It enveloped.
A brilliant shell of energy swallowed the Tusk whole. Suspending it between ascension or annihilation, while the forest itself held still, awaiting the verdict
The air thickened and gravity no longer pulling straight, but skewed, it was unstable.
Breaths turned heavy, dragging through invisible weight that clung to the lungs.
Light bent at strange angles, colors distorting around the magic, reality misaligned—drawn too close to something collapsing under its own power.
My core buzzed with alarm.
Even the other four Tusks that already mid-charge decided to halt, not from fear, but with a tense, measured caution, only watched with wide eyes and lowered heads.
Because the magic wasn't just big. It was unnatural. Too much. Too ancient.
The light started to thin. Smoke peeled back.
And what stood there wasn't the same beast.
It had grown.
Massively.
Three meters tall, its frame now towering, as if it had swallowed a siege tower and savored every bite.
Shoulders hunched and heavy, thick as fortress gates.
Tusks curled outward, forged solely to harvest giants.
The ground trembled under its new weight.
Its body had widened, nearly six meters across. A living wall of layered muscle, each slab grinding with the weight and menace of forged armor plates against stone.
Steam hissed from its flanks in thick, rising columns. A walking battlefield furnace.
Even the other Aether Tusks came to a halt, their pounding steps faltering as they backed away. Their shoulders lowered, heads tilted just enough to show they weren't running, only conceding ground to something greater.
Just enough to say:
This thing?
Was no longer one of them.
"…What," I said flatly. "What bullshit crap again now."
Did I just—?
No. No way.
"Did I just power up the Tusk?!"
No one answered me.
But screaming did.
"DAAAAAANNNNNNNNN!!!"
Lyra's voice tore through the chaos—shrill, furious, and laced with helplessness and desperation.
I opened my mouth. Nothing came out.
Only the weight of knowing.
I messed up.
"YOU STUPID, STUPID, IDIOT DUMMY DICE!!!"
"WHY DID YOU MAKE THEM STRONGER?!"
"YOU TRAITOROUS DICE-SHAPED TURNCOAT!"
"YOU ABSOLUTE BETRAYAL-CUBE!!!"
"WE'RE GONNA DIE BECAUSE YOU WANTED TO SHOW OFF!!!"
...Yeah.
This time, I couldn't refute her.
Not even a little.
This time... I really screwed up.