Rain's sleep was no longer rest—It was a passage.
That night, he found himself in the academy's nocturnal training yard, alone, surrounded by pillars of light that danced like watchful eyes. A new voice echoed—more human than his shadow's, closer to a muffled laugh.
"Wake up… The guest of honor has arrived."
His legs moved without his will, as if his body no longer belonged to him.
⸻
At the edge of the yard stood a professor from the Nora Continent named Kraiv—a man with silver hair tied high, sipping cocoa-flavored tea and looking like he came from a masquerade, not a magic class.
He waved dramatically and said:
"Raaaain! Star of the inverted shadows! Step forth—you've got a date with… yourself, and maybe a little death."
Rain, flatly: "Is this a scheduled night training? It wasn't announced."
Kraiv, sipping then suddenly spitting his drink: "Oh no, I just invented it! We call it in Nora: The Creative Collision between Being and Fear… but I like to shorten it to (Stage Six of Madness)."
Then he clapped.
From one of the glowing circles emerged a strange entity—A hybrid creature with no shadow, its form shifting endlessly: a bird, a man, then a bundle of eyes.
Kraiv grinned: "Let's test what a shadow becomes… when it has nothing left to fall upon."
⸻
The fight began.
At first, Rain held his ground—He used his shadow like a coiling spear, dodging strikes with precision.
But then, as Kraiv hummed an eerie tune, he raised his hand.
The arena lit up, and the light became thick—almost material.
Kraiv's magic was a rare kind: Light Manipulation.
• He could redirect it, saturate it, compress it.
• He could "erase" shadows from any space.
• He turned light into a weapon… and darkness into impossibility.
As the brightness grew…Rain's shadow vanished.
Rain gasped: "I can't feel it… It's like… it was stolen!"
Kraiv laughed and mocked:
"Your little shadow buddy went on vacation. Now let's see how you fight with no darkness to hide in."
⸻
The creature advanced. Rain began to retreat.
Each hit didn't wound him physically—But mentally, it unraveled him.He heard echoes of memories that weren't his, saw scenes from lives he'd never lived.
A familiar voice whispered in his ear:
"Let me take over, just this once."
It was the voice of "The Mirror"—the other shadow.
But Rain replied, voice cracked:
"No… Not like this."
He dropped to his knees.The creature opened its mouth, revealing… a void that devoured everything.
⸻
Everything froze.
Sound stopped.Light paused.Even the air seemed to wait.
The headmaster, Malik, appeared.
Utterly calm, face unreadable, he walked across the arena as if on a written line.
He pulled out a leather notebook and wrote a single sentence:
"The creature forgets why it exists."
The entity trembled.
It looked around, confused… then screamed—not in death, but in forgetting.
It shattered into particles of light.
Malik wrote again:
"The shadow returns to its bearer, unharmed."
From the edge of the arena, Rain's shadow slipped back like a child returning from a weary journey, embracing his body.
Rain collapsed, gasping for air.
⸻
Malik didn't approach.
He said while closing his notebook:
"My power doesn't fight, Rain… it writes the outcome of the fight."
Then he looked at Rain with eyes holding ancient sorrow:
"But… every word I write steals a line from me."
Rain asked from the ground:
"Did you… write me?"
Malik smiled, for the first time in what felt like ages:
"If I had…You wouldn't dare ask that question."
And then he vanished—As if the page had turned.
⸻
Rain returned to his room.
He looked in the mirror.
But it didn't reflect him.
Instead, it showed a scene:A child running—then falling into a bottomless well.
Behind him…The same creature he'd just fought, this time laughing.
He heard the Mirror's voice—But now with a more human tone, soft… even tender:
"You didn't write yourself, Rain… but now, you can be rewritten."
And in his heart…
Something cracked open.
Not fear.
But the beginning of a questionHe hadn't known he was looking for.