"We have t once again..."
I heard the voice, but I paid it no attention.
My mind was scattered, drowned in endless chaos, as I searched frantically for my brother.
"Ryan... where are you?"
I scread his na over and over, my voice’s echo fading around .
I turned my head in every direction, ran, stopped, then ran again, as if my feet were moving on their own. I searched everywhere my eyes could reach... but there was no one.
I finally stopped, my breaths broken, and I felt a suffocating weight settle in my chest.
I lowered my head slowly, and felt tears gather in my eyes before they poured down.
"After I thought I had finally returned to you... here I am, completely alone."
The words left my mouth in a trembling voice, barely audible. I truly believed that everything would turn out fine.
"I thought everything would be okay... that what happened was nothing more than a long nightmare, a bad dream, and that I would wake up from it. But where did you go, Ryan?"
I raised my head slightly, a desperate smile carving its way across my trembling face.
"I must be dreaming... right?"
The mont that thought crossed my mind, I raised my hand and struck my face hard without any hesitation.
My body recoiled backward and I fell to the ground, feeling the taste of blood fill my mouth, but it was not enough.
I clenched my teeth and raised my hand again.
A strike... then another... then another.
I was hitting my face madly, tears pouring down, and my heart sinking every ti as if it were being dragged into a deeper abyss.
"Wake up... wake up!"
I scread as I continued hitting myself, but nothing changed.
.
Suddenly...
A calm voice pierced the silence,
"Stop hitting yourself. I don’t like watching people hit themselves... but if I’m the one hitting them, that doesn’t matter."
I raised my head slowly, my heart pounding violently.
"And honestly, I don’t understand what you’re trying to do. After all, I’m the one who summoned you here from the very beginning... after that snake swallowed you."
I finally stopped hitting myself after I heard the voice speak again.
A heavy silence prevailed, and all I could feel was a dull pain in my face and a chest rising and falling violently. I raised my head slowly, as if the words required trendous effort to leave my mouth.
’So... I was the one dreaming that I had returned to my brother, while all this ti I was inside the belly of a snake.’
I paused for a mont, processing what I was thinking, then continued,
’Does that an I was unconscious? And that my return to Ryan was nothing more than a dream my mind created?’
A short, hollow laugh escaped unintentionally.
’Or are you joking with ? Are you trying to say that I actually died... and then reincarnated?’
Then I took a deep breath, as if trying to calm the storm inside .
’Of course... I know the truth. I realized it every ti. But I kept convincing myself that it was just a dream... a dream I could wake up from at any mont.’
My voice trembled.
"That’s why... I had that small hope. That stupid hope... that everything would end with waking up one day."
I lowered my head,
But... after everything... this is real.
The mont I accepted this truth, a strange feeling swept over , a feeling I had never experienced before.
"Ha... hahaha..."
An unstable, loud laugh burst out.
"Hahahaha... it’s real!"
I laughed loudly, nonstop, as if mocking myself and reality at the sa ti.
I was laughing... and at the sa ti I felt heat in my eyes, and tears began to gather and then pour down.
"It’s... real..."
I cried and laughed at the sa ti, like a madman.
I could no longer distinguish between pain and mockery, between collapse and acceptance. I remained in that state for a long ti—hysterical laughter intertwined with bitter crying—until I felt that I was losing my mind...
I could no longer stop.
At that mont... the owner of the voice sighed in a clear tone, carrying impatience.
"Ugh... honestly, I don’t like having people cry near ."
He paused for a mont, then continued as if thinking out loud:
"I shouldn’t have let you reach this state... it seems I need to help you regain so clarity before you completely lose your mind."
He fell silent for a mont,
"Ah... it seems you’ve already lost it."
I felt a slight movent in the air.
Despite the dense fog, I noticed sothing moving. It was a small sphere, red in color, glowing with a faint light, rushing toward . The sphere collided with my head.
And the mont it touched ... everything stopped.
The laughter cut off abruptly. The crying faded away.
And that madness that had been raging within disappeared. A strange calm prevailed.
My facial expression beca still, unnaturally calm. I raised my head slowly... and fixed my gaze in the direction of the source of the voice.
The feeling controlling was strange in a disturbing way.
As if my emotions at that mont had been tightly shut, completely sealed. My mind, unusually, was at the highest level of clarity and calm—a calm I had never known in my life before, not even in my most stable monts.
I raised my gaze slowly and stared at the source of the voice.
Amid the dense fog, a figure sat in complete calm, his crimson eyes fixed on .
And the mont our eyes t...
mories surged into my mind all at once. I rembered him.
I rembered my first eting with him, when I was trying to use the elent for the first ti. The mories I had lost returned as if they had never left .
I looked at him calmly.
"What did you do to ?"
The owner of the crimson eyes watched for a mont,
"I temporarily sealed your emotions. Hmm... you seem calr compared to the last ti we t."
Silence fell between us for a mont.
I lowered my voice slightly and said:
"That bracelet... where did you get it from?"
At that mont, sothing changed in his gaze.
He did not answer imdiately.
He remained silent, his crimson eyes narrowing slightly, before finally speaking:
"What are you talking about? And why are you asking as if I stole it from you?"
He leaned his body slightly forward, his tone becoming sharper:
"Isn’t it mine already? Why ask about sothing so obvious?"
I was about to reply, but I stopped.
I fell silent for a few seconds, gathering my thoughts, then raised my head and spoke in a cold voice, devoid of hesitation:
"Stop lying. You won’t fool . I know very well that it’s not yours. That bracelet... is my bracelet. He gave it to my brother as a gift for , isn’t that right?"
The owner of the crimson eyes narrowed his eyes clearly, and the tone of his voice changed as he replied:
"And what makes you think it belongs to you? You are not a small child... As for , I have lived a long ti. A very long ti. And my will was sealed inside this bracelet a long ti ago. That ans it has been with for far longer than your ancestors’ ancestors were alive. What a pitiful human nature... everything your eyes fall upon, you declare it to be yours. Then you begin inventing stories—this person gave it to , this was mine long ago—just to convince yourselves. Tell ... why should I believe you?"
His voice suddenly dropped, turning into an outright threat:
"If you continue saying illogical things, I will not hesitate to destroy the will that exists here, until you completely lose your mind. Ah... it seems I won’t need to do that. That snake will take care of it—it seems it will digest you soon."
I listened to the words of the owner of the crimson eyes and began to review my thoughts in silence.
What makes certain that it belongs to my brother?
But for the first ti, I was able to rember clearly.
Yes... my brother was the one who gave that bracelet.
And I finally understood the reason for that strange pain I used to feel in my heart whenever I looked at the bracelet. It was not a fleeting feeling, but the trace of a mory my mind had tried to bury.
What a fool I am... how could I not rember that?
At that mont, I wanted to hit myself, but I held back and restrained my impulse. I raised my gaze toward the owner of the crimson eyes,
"I can’t prove it, but I know for certain that this bracelet is the one my brother gave . So I’ll ask my question once again... how did you obtain this bracelet? And don’t tell empty words, I don’t need to hear them."
The owner of the crimson eyes looked at with a complicated gaze, then sighed slowly before speaking:
"Well... honestly, I do not know. I do not have most of the mories of my original body. And as you see, I am just a will. My true body made a pact with soone long ago, and as a result, I left my will here, inside this bracelet. The only thing I rember clearly is the deal. The deal stated that if the first person obtained this bracelet, I must extend a helping hand to them whenever they need—"
He stopped speaking suddenly. At that mont, the place began to shake, before the owner of the crimson eyes said in a serious tone,
"It seems we no longer have ti to talk. I suppose I should start helping you... before you are completely digested."
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