"...?"
Halt.
A sense of unease made me stop my hurried steps.
I blinked blankly at the unbelievable sight before my eyes.
"Where... is this?"
Just once.
Only a single blink.
Or was it a single step?
I don’t know. My mind was too confused to make a proper judgment.
In the span of a single moment, the place I had been walking through was no longer in front of me.
As if the world itself had flipped in an instant.
[Hello!]
"...?"
Even after standing there dazed and scanning my surroundings for a long time, nothing changed. The scene that had been swapped in an instant remained spread out before me.
Just what in the world was going on? It was utterly confusing.
And then, out of nowhere, someone’s greeting reached my ears.
I frantically looked around, but all I saw was still the empty back alley.
A place completely different from the roadside I had been walking along.
There wasn’t a single person there to greet me.
A voice coming from a place where no one existed.
Hearing that, I made my judgment.
"What, is this a dream...?"
[It’s not a dream!]
"A lucid dream... maybe? This is pretty amazing."
[I said it’s not a dream!]
Whenever I dreamed, my mind always felt hazy, like it was clouded over.
But this was the first time I’d ever had a dream where I was fully aware it was a dream.
Even though a little girl’s voice kept shouting in my head that it wasn’t a dream...
But the location had changed in an instant. If this wasn’t a dream, then what was it?
"...This is incredible."
I could still clearly remember everything I’d done today, yet all of this was supposedly a dream.
Just looking at the dark back alley filled me with joy.
My phone was gone too, but I didn’t care.
It was fascinating.
Did people who had lucid dreams always feel this kind of joy?
I’d heard you had to practice a lot to have lucid dreams.
...Maybe I should try practicing too.
I was lost in those thoughts as I looked around, when—
The girl in my head shouted loudly.
[Aah...! I told you it’s not a dream! How do I even explain this...!]
"...Ugh, this is annoying. She’s loud."
Where the hell was this coming from?
I wished in my mind for the owner of this voice to disappear, but it had no effect.
I thought that since it was a lucid dream, I could control everything. Guess it wasn’t perfect.
"Oh, what the hell. She’s got a decent face."
"What are you doing here? You wanna play with us?"
"As if. You’re an idiot."
"Yeah? Heh heh."
...What now?
As I tried my best to ignore the voice in my head and admire the scenery, two thugs had appeared out of nowhere, laughing and jeering.
Their crude voices sounded like they were harassing a woman.
Was my imagination really this vivid?
The scene was so realistic it made me frown. I turned away and started walking to leave the area.
"What, are you ignoring us?"
"You look as feisty as you appear… So that’s how you’re gonna play it, huh?"
I felt a flicker of pity for the unnamed woman tangled up with these annoying thugs, but I had no intention of helping her.
After all, she was just a figment of a dream.
She’d probably vanish as soon as I walked away…
"…?"
"You shouldn’t ignore us like that."
"When someone talks to you, you’re supposed to respond, right?"
What the hell are these guys?
Why are they coming toward me?
I wasn’t planning on interfering.
Just do your thing. Why are you suddenly in my face?
Not wanting to get dragged into their nonsense, I tried to change direction and leave.
"…Ugh, seriously. Pissing me off."
My body lurched violently, and my vision swayed.
As if something had grabbed me.
I turned my head to look behind me, and sure enough, one of the thugs had snatched my wrist.
Ah, that’s why my arm was pulled.
Was it because he’d yanked me so suddenly? A dull pain shot through my arm.
…Wait, pain?
"We let you waltz in here, but ignoring us? That’s not gonna fly."
"We thought you might be some kind of superhuman, but… guess you’re just a pretty-faced idiot."
"If a normal person wanders into an alley like this, they shouldn’t expect to walk out in one piece, right?"
The thugs kept yapping, but I just stared blankly at my arm, where the pain lingered.
"…This isn’t a dream?"
How could it hurt if it was just a dream?
Maybe they heard me muttering.
The thugs gave me a slightly concerned look.
"Hey, is this chick okay?"
"No idea. She seems a little out of it. But her face is pretty, so she’d probably sell for a good price."
"Hmm, true."
…A chick?
Now that I thought about it, these guys had been talking to a woman the whole time.
Realizing that, I frantically looked around.
All I saw was the desolate alleyway—and my own slender arm, still gripped by the thugs.
"W-wha…?"
That was when I finally noticed the strangeness in my body.
All the little inconsistencies I’d dismissed as part of the dream rushed in at once, slamming into me as undeniable reality.
Delicate arms.
A heavy chest and a lower-than-usual line of sight.
A voice that was soft and refined, unmistakably feminine, even if it was a little deep for a woman.
A shifted center of gravity, among other things.
Changes so obvious I couldn’t believe I hadn’t noticed them sooner.
And there was only one truth they all pointed to.
The woman those thugs had been talking to… was me.
"Th-this can’t be…"
"This bitch still doesn’t get it, huh?"
"Works out for us, though. And damn… she’s actually pretty hot. …Yo."
While I was still lost in confusion, I saw the way the thug was leering at me, sizing me up.
And that was when it hit me.
I was in serious danger.
"Calm down. Sure, it’s a high-grade item, but… if it gets damaged, the price will drop a lot."
"…Tch. Really?"
"Just hold on a little longer. Once we sell this girl, we’ll have so many women we won’t know what to do with them."
I don’t know the details.
But one thing’s for sure…
If I keep going like this, I have no idea what they’ll do to me.
Realizing that, I desperately tried to wrench my hand free and run, but—
This wasn’t my original body. This frail, weak frame couldn’t break free from the men’s grip.
"Let go, let go…!"
"Huh? What?"
"Looks like she’s coming to."
"…Tch. This is getting annoying."
What the hell was going on?
If this wasn’t a dream, had I really been transported to this bizarre place in the blink of an eye?
No, wait—why the hell was my body like *this* in the first place?
I pushed those thoughts aside for now and focused on escaping, but—
My struggles only earned me violence in return.
"Gah, c-cough…!"
"Stop, being, so, damn, annoying. Just stay still like before!"
It wasn’t enough to injure me—just light hits.
But even that little bit of force was too much for me, unused to pain. I flinched and curled up instantly.
…It hurt.
It hurt *so much*.
[Hmm… Getting beaten up by some random extras like this is a bit…]
Why was I being treated like this?
What the hell was happening?
Just as tears of frustration were about to spill—
A hallucination in my head spoke to me.
[Reader. We need to get out of this situation, fast!]
"E-escape…? How…?"
"Escape my ass! Shut up and stay still!"
"A-ahhh—!"
I’d unthinkingly muttered the hallucination’s words aloud, and the thug, hearing them, started kicking me even harder.
All I could do was shrink back and endure the malice and lust directed at me.
[Hmm… How do I explain this…? There’s something called mana… Do you get it?]
Something inside my body? Mana?
It was a pathetic explanation, but I had no choice but to listen. If it meant getting out of this.
Desperate, I clung to any hope and tried to find that "something" inside me, just like the voice said.
Th-this…?
[Found it? Then try to—*pop!*—burst it. Like you’re making it explode with force!]
*Pop* and burst it?
Still vague as hell.
How was I supposed to *burst* it?
But I obeyed the voice anyway—and the result was shocking.
"GAAAAAAAAH! My, my arm—!"
"W-what?! You okay?!"
"Gaaaaah…! Sh-shit…!"
*Swish.*
Something thin and faint zipped past in an instant.
"…Thread?"
I stared blankly at the silvery thread drifting down in front of me.
A single, delicate thread had just grazed past my vision.
But where the thread had passed, a long, thin gash remained.
As if something sharp had sliced through.
Perhaps it was only natural.
The man’s hand, which had been striking me, had been cleanly severed in an instant.
"W-what the fuck?! Are you some kind of superhuman?! Goddamn it! Why the hell were you just standing there?!"
"A-are you okay?!"
"Okay my ass! We don’t have time for that shit! Kill that bitch, now!"
"H-hiiik?!"
I was paralyzed with fear from the sudden chain of events.
An unknown location, unfamiliar voices, my transformed body…
So my next action was simple.
Just as the thugs moved to finish me off—
I tried that method again, the one the voice had told me before.
This time, with even more force.
Something deep inside me—strongly.
Pop.
The result was horrifying.
"…Huh?"
Thud. Thud.
Blood and shattered bodies rained down onto the floor.
A few of the man’s fingers, which had been swinging at me, lightly tapped my cheek before falling away.
"U-ugh…!"
Witnessing that grotesque scene, I spent a long time vomiting my guts out.
I didn’t fully understand how I’d done it, but one thing was certain.
I had killed them.
[Hmm, was the shock worse than I expected…?]
As I remained in shock, retching repeatedly, the voice in my head muttered.
[Pfft… It’s a little tough, but… Ta-da! Reader? Look ahead! You’re fine now, right?]
"Ugh… A-ahead…?"
I lifted my head at the voice’s words—and immediately regretted it.
The corpses were gone.
Completely. As if they had never existed in the first place.
[Hello, Reader!]
"…"
Only then did I realize it.
This wasn’t just some auditory hallucination.
It was something far more dangerous.
"T-this… what the hell…"
[Hehe, you used a little power! You shouldn’t be so shaken just from killing a few puppets like that!]
"…Puppets?"
[Yep, puppets! Useless extras who never even made it onto the stage!]
After that, the voice in my head kept rambling on about things I hadn’t even asked.
How it had brought me here, how it wanted to make the world more interesting…
Most of it, I couldn’t make sense of.
But there was one thing—
One thing I absolutely had to know.
"…What should I… call you?"
[Hmm… Well! How about “Author-nim”?]
"Author-nim…?"
[Yes!]
I looked around once more.
The blood-soaked scene from just moments ago had vanished, as if I’d hallucinated the whole thing.
That was the first meeting between me and Author-nim.