White Dream

Feathers...

Feathers falling from the sky...

Feathers suspended within bubbles, falling from the sky...

Covered and shrouded in a white halo, feathers suspended within bubbles, falling from the sky...

This was the scene before the boy's eyes...

And this scene was also the first image to enter the mind of the boy—who looked only eleven or twelve, yet had truly just been born—after he opened his eyes and gained his own will and consciousness...

Everything before him was white...

The feathers radiating halos and floating inside one bubble after another were even purer white...

This was a world with nothing in it...

There was only a whiteness bright enough to sting the eyes, along with pristine feathers drifting back and forth through this white world atop floating bubbles...

Watching this incredible sight, the boy seemed dazed. His neat black hair fluttered in the wind as his deep, star-like dark eyes gazed at the feathers falling from the sky. He felt as though he were floating in amniotic fluid, cradled in his mother's embrace, his heart filled with warmth and peace.

But that feeling did not last long. The next scene that appeared before him suddenly made his heart tremble.

They were still feathers suspended in bubbles, falling from the sky...

This time, however, those feathers falling from the sky and floating in bubbles had not only lost their brilliant white halos, but seemed to have been deliberately snapped apart, becoming scattered fragments, so dim and lifeless...

As he watched those shattered feathers, stripped of their dazzling halos, slowly drift down from the sky of this white world, a complicated flood of emotions rose within the boy.

Loss?...

Anger?...

Sorrow?...

Unwillingness?...

Perhaps all of them.

But the strongest emotion was only one—heartache.

Following the emotions in his heart, the boy almost instantly gained a faint feeling.

It seemed that his birth had been for the sake of restoring these shattered, dim feathers that pained him so deeply to their original form and radiance...

So, without realizing it, the boy reached out his hand toward the nearest fragment of feather drifting down from the sky, about to reach him...

The White Dream... ended here...

"—!"

As if waking from a nightmare, the boy abruptly opened his eyes and shot upright like a tightly coiled spring suddenly released.

"Pant... pant..."

Breathing a little rapidly, the boy clutched his head with one hand. The light in his deep black eyes flickered constantly. There was still some absentmindedness from being immersed in that White Dream, but even more bewilderment.

With an expression of wistful loss, the boy, who looked around eleven or twelve, lifted his head. His confused eyes looked ahead, then swept across his surroundings.

This was a forest clearing in some unknown place.

All the boy could see were medium-sized trees filling his vision and an open patch of ground carpeted with fallen leaves.

At that moment, green and yellow leaves continued to drift down from the trees. Some scattered over the ground, while others rode the wind toward the boy sitting on the earth with only a piece of cloth wrapped around him. For a moment, they made him feel as if he were seeing those feathers falling from the sky again, and he nearly sank into that White Dream once more.

Yet compared to dreams, reality was undoubtedly crueler.

Unlike the beautiful, unbelievable White Dream, this ordinary forest clearing gave the boy's newborn mind a violent shock when he turned his gaze toward the grass some distance away, leaving it utterly blank.

"Growl..."

Suppressed growls echoed one after another through the leaf-covered clearing.

"Rustle... rustle..."

Deliberately slowed footsteps, as though something were scraping against the ground, began to sound as well.

Before long, huge shadows emerged from the grass surrounding the clearing where the boy sat, then slowly appeared before his eyes.

They were terrifying creatures over two meters tall, moving on all fours, their eyes gleaming green and their faces twisted with savagery.

If the boy had possessed ordinary common sense, he would have known that these terrifying creatures over two meters tall were abnormally grown wolves.

"Growl..."

With low growls suppressed in their throats, pitch-black, terrifying wolves emerged from the forest. Their ghastly green beast eyes fixed tightly on the boy sitting in the clearing as they closed in step by step.

"—!" The boy sitting on the ground, with only a piece of cloth around his body, felt his pupils continually widen. His head buzzed, his heart hammered wildly, and every muscle in his body tensed in an instant. Even his throat felt scorching hot.

Even though he did not know what these creatures were, the savagery and ferocity in their eyes told the boy that they were dangerous.

His buzzing mind told him—run!

His pounding heart told him—run!

His dry throat told him—run!

It even seemed as though voices only the boy could hear were coming from every direction, constantly shouting at him—run!

Run! Run! Run!

But although the boy clearly knew he had to flee, his limbs seemed to defy him. As those huge, terrifying creatures drew closer, the thing called strength gradually drained from him instead.

Though he looked eleven or twelve, aside from the White Dream, everything before him was all he had in his memories.

In other words, the boy did not know why he was here, why only a piece of cloth was wrapped around him, or even—if his true age really was eleven or twelve—where the years and memories of his past eleven or twelve years had gone.

This was a boy who was truly like a newborn!

Unfortunately, at this newborn moment, the boy experienced the first emotion this world had given him.

Its name was—fear!

"Growl—!"

At last, the terrifying creatures slowly encircling him seemed to think the boy had given up struggling to survive. No longer suppressing the thing called appetite in their hearts, nor the roars lingering deep in their throats, they all howled and leaped forward like bullets from a barrel. Like arrows released from bowstrings, they became streaks of black shadow and pounced at the boy.

"—!"

At that instant, the fear in the boy's heart erupted as well.

His scorching throat could not make a sound.

His powerless limbs could not support his body.

The boy could only stare with his dilated eyes. His buzzing mind froze completely in that moment, his heart turning cold as he watched the savage black shadows draw closer and grow larger in his vision, allowing the emotion called fear to surge through his body.

In the instant before the boy was about to die beneath the wolves' jaws, the fear surging through his body suddenly gave rise to an unusual warm current.

"Buzz—!"

A blinding light abruptly burst from the boy's body just as savage black shadows were about to engulf him. Like a white sun, it released a brilliant light without a trace of warmth, enveloping every corner of the scene.

Then, the dazzling light transformed into a tangible shockwave and suddenly spread outward from the boy's body.

"Bang—!"

"Growl—!"

As a unified dull impact sounded, the black wolves that had been roaring with death and lunging at the boy only a moment before let out painful howls. Their huge bodies were flung back from the brilliant light faster than they had pounced forward. Some crashed to the ground, while others slammed into the surrounding trees. With a whimper, they fell and did not rise, their fates unknown.

Only then did the brilliant light gradually fade, exposing the panic-stricken boy to the air once more.

Only at this point did the boy's mind, frozen by fear, begin working again. Looking at the huge, terrifying creatures lying unconscious all around him, his face held both alarm and confusion.

Clearly, with a mind like that of a newborn, the boy could not understand what had happened.

Of course, the boy's inability to understand did not mean others could not.

"What powerful magic..."

This was the first complete sentence the boy had heard since arriving in this world, since gaining memories.

Yet to the boy, that complete sentence sounded little different from the roars of those enormous black wolves, bringing him only alarm and fear.

"Don't be afraid... child..."

Perhaps seeing the alarm and fear on the boy's face, the owner of the voice softened it, filling it with peace and affection. Then, the instant the voice fell silent, its owner appeared before the boy.

The boy only saw a blur before a figure entered his sight.

It was an extremely elderly man, at least seventy years old, yet only as tall as a child, wearing an ornate white coat.

The short old man turned his wrinkled eyes toward the boy sitting on the ground, his face full of alarm and confusion. He examined him once, then smiled kindly.

"Child, what is your name?"

A name?...

That utterly unfamiliar word entered the boy's ears, yet he understood it unbelievably.

So, the boy slowly spoke the one name that had likewise existed inexplicably in the depths of his soul ever since he had gained memories, his voice hoarse, young, and unnatural.

"No... ah..."