Kôra awoke in this barren land below the dreary sky, lifeless and dry as his perceived impression. Colors of muted yellow shaded him in its overlay, while he laid down on the ashy ground. A black bird soared over him. It has been there since he arrived and kept circling the scene. The animal was the only point of his fixation until it dove and vanished. Only clouds of dust surrounded him now. The boy was dressed in a broken white traditional hemp tunic and brown trousers; his daily attire back then in the village. There were no wounds over his body, or the aching pain that weighed him down, or the tubes he never wanted them to be inserted. It was however, not as quite the feel of detachment of sense in a dream. In fact all of his senses did not feel quite dead. It was vivid, alive; a strange lucid dream.

His contemplation was put to a stop when a small horde of monstrous beings approached from afar. It was easier to distinguish bigger ones, if  the distance was not rendering them shapeless. They were grotesque. Some of them were completely incomprehensible bizarre beings, some were completely unthinkable mash of known shapes. A tentacle mouthed being, bipedal crocodile, headless hippocampus, and a ten-limbed blob to name a few, the total was perhaps less than or around twenty. They were getting closer. Faster and hostile, as if demanding a piece of him. Kôra gazed at them without moving from his torpid state. He convinced himself that he would awaken as soon as the grotesques reached his body. Dreams and nightmares will ease away, unlike reality. It was nothing more than an unpleasant dream; he breathed the dust of the land; he heard their rushing sound, shaking his ears. The boy was shaking as the ground he laid on trembled by their steps, and their very body. . .

Kôra felt a gripping sensation from the tentacle mouthed dark thing two meters away in front of him, trying to drag the limp body to its sharp central beaks. Before the monster could completely seize him, other monsters which tried to steal its prey pushed it. They threw Kôra four meters far by the skirmish of predators, some of them even started turning to each other. He got up to the horde approaching from his front and rear, outnumbered him.

He closed his eyes, escaping from the bloodthirsty side of his dream. Even though it was surely one, anxiety still set in. I will wake up, right? Is God still giving me a chance?

It was not until one big black monster came into view, sturdy and burly in the shape of a gargantuan five meters otherworldly buffalo. It dashed through all the monsters with immense strength, overpowering all the smaller creatures in its way. It changed shape in seconds to a much bigger ungulate with branched antler, stomping and ramming the falling victims to ensure their death.

The largest monster in a horde—the bear-like creature—charged towards it. It was no match of the towering eight meter beast now in an ape shape, the bear beast was thrown hitting the ground. As a finishing move, the ape repeatedly slammed the bear into the ground, creating a small crater. It finished all the monsters with little effort.

The monster was not, its form melts and evaporates in seconds into a rising black smoke. Such a view captivated Kôra, who is watching the smoke spins and reform into a shape. It was so fast that Kôra’s mind could not catch what it was actually all about. It formed a shape of a fairly muscular masculine humanoid, much taller than the kid. The creature wore a sleeveless black jacket, exposing the matching pitch black skin of arms. Those eyes of his were like glowing lamps on his face, right blue and left green. His silvery short hair framed his sturdy face, with an aquiline nose and stern expression. His nature is contrasting those previous animalistic beasts. He is an entirely different being of sentience and sapience; he is a person.

Kôra could not take his eyes off from how stray smokes were integrating to his body, as he walked towards the awe stricken boy with steady strides. Magnificent creature of drea—

Wham!

That being punched Kôra’s cheek. Hard it was, the pain burns. The small kid was even thrown by the sheer force of that creature. This pressure and pain, the extremely lucid sensation dumbfounded Kôra.

“What the fuck were you thinking, stupid bastard?!” a male voice barked. His raspy voice was piercing, though his mouth seemed unmoving. He looked at Kôra’s garb and made a squinting face. “If you want to kill yourself, do it somewhere else where I don’t give a shit.”

Kôra stared emptily at him. In his view this person seemed quite angry for no reason. Was his imagination this fierce?

“Hey, ugly! Midget! Are you listening?! Xha nwaiexata?!” the irritated being even tried to ask in a foreign language. It was magnificent what a dream could create.

Kôra looked at that creature in the eyes, shining in quite an intensity without any white. Such some odd eyes those are; in Sandur human heterochromia is chiefly a characteristic indicating a certain species of sapient creature. This being is indisputably inhuman as in his spectacular change of guise. The boy thought this was real and was strange for real.

“Why cannot I die here?” Kôra asked with a weak voice.

“It’s unsightly and disturbs my job.”

“Why are you angry and rude? You are just my imagination,” the boy complained, still in that tired monotone.

The creature’s eyes squinted. “I’m realer than your fucking brain.”

Kôra never jolted up to stand as quickly as that before.

“You are lying! You are my imagination, obey me,” the boy commanded. “Disappear!”

The shape shifter clicked his tongue.

“Wake up! Wake up!” Kôra pinched and slapped himself.

That being walked away to a stack of melting carcasses, not wanting to deal with the lunacy of the stranger. In the background, Kôra was still continuously rolling and slapping himself in a distraught attempt to wake himself up. The shape shifter did not bother and snacked on the remaining bodies that have not yet evaporated; before Kôra’s tomfoolery occurred long enough to corrode his appetite. That being revealed a small green glowing orb on his palm. Its light scanned every minuscule part of evaporating dead monsters’ essence, it changed the orb into purple color in response. The shape shifter showed a pleased look to that outlandish object, before he continued his business to the perplexed boy in front of him.

“I’m Izky, Xhicaite astral hunter, Silver Guild,” the creature introduced himself to Kôra, still having some bits of food in his mouth. That boy discerned the name of a well-known being and ethnicity. “In case you’re a moron or an amnesiac, this is still the Solar part of the Astral realm.”

“How am I here? How to return?”

“Why the hell should I know?” Izky blurted out. “Just return.”

“I can not,” Kôra debunked. If that is true he would have returned earlier. “I need to return, I have to return! If can not I will cause trouble! I cannot cause more problems. . . Please! Please!” the boy implored in a burst of panic. “Or are you going to kidnap me? You give answers!”

Izky’s mind could not take anymore, the absolute mess of how Kôra weaved his thoughts was unbearable. He clenched his fist, holding back from punching the person once more. “Stop bitching! Use your ability like any other creature who isn't a failure!”

“I am a human!”

That took Izky by surprise. “Huh?! You smell funny for a human.” The person approached Kôra in a few steps with a perplexed expression, to gain a clearer image. “Well, you look somewhat human, but not your smell, and you have no silver chord.”

“I do not smell anything,” Kôra said while sniffing himself. “What is silver chord?”

“A fucking human, then,” the creature remarked.

“Yes, I am exactly a human!” he reiterated. It got annoying for what should be obvious. “Please help me go back, I do not think I belong here.”

Izky examined the nagging person to find an answer. Maybe he would stop being annoying if helped. Nothing struck his mind at the moment. Kôra seemed and behaved human-like at the most, discounted by his unusual smell. An odor will not be hidden by adding layers of more odor. That was what he thought about it that made him sure the kid was different.

“You don’t have the silver cord or it’s very weak that it’s invisible, humans who get lost here usually have it,” Izky pointed at his nape. “It connects your material body to your projection here. If it’s severed, your body won’t gain consciousness.”

“What does that mean?”

“You can’t go back—”

It struck Kôra freezing in shock. Eyes widened, he fell weak to his knees. “Impossible. . .”

“Unless you use a portal, dumbfuck,” Izky emphasized the last part, annoyed by the kid’s dramatic premature response.

Kôra sighed hard with relief. He has caused troubles to Uncle and Keane, they need to worry no more. He would return soon.

“So, human,” Izky said. “Tell me about yourself.”

“My name is Kôra, I am thirteen.”

“You’re really a fucking kid? Sorry for punching you, I thought you’re a midget,” he sounded genuinely surprised and regretful for something that should have been obvious. Due to the concealed nature of this realm, Kôra accepted his apology with two nods. “Where do you come from?”

“I’m a Tôryaemaen, from Grahein,” the kid answered. “I was hurt and ran to hospital, then I fell asleep and got here.”

“You don’t look Tôryaemaen; those eyes are strange for a human,” he analyzed Kôra’s features. "You look more like us in our human form."

Kôra rubbed his left eyelid, his green eye must be visible again at this point. He concluded that seals which affect his physical body were void here. The kid was used to being told that; dark brown hair is rare within the Tôryaemaen, even in the northern parts where medium brown hair is common. It is even rarer in southern parts like Aylar and Kragehn where the majority of them have saffron-hued hair. Moreover, his skin tone is darker than most of them.

“Grahein, huh? Now that you mentioned it, you look familiar. Were you visiting Thierna week ago? “Izky asked again.

“Yes,” Kôra remembered the cafe Delven brought him to. “How do Izky knows?”

“Not to make you shit your pants, creatures like me can see what humans can’t,” he gave a disclaimer. “I was there, and there’s someone else following you besides your friends.”

“Who?!” Kôra’s nerves got tense. He thought he knew where this will point to.

“A guy, not from your realm,” Izky continued. “He’s around my height, long hair, wears white, has similar eyes and skin like you.”

Kôra froze in a piercing thrill. Everything matched that it was unmistakable. That was him, The Hanged Man.

“For whatever fucking reason he kept staring at you like a hungry dog until he realized I could see him. What a strange-looking thing. You know him?”

“Why did not. . . Tell me?”

“Why would I? Motherfucker quickly vanished, anyway,” Izky reasoned. In his recalling was the unsettling, mischievous grin of that apparition, while he slowly faded to obscurity. “Who is he?"

“I do not know. . . He harms, he deceives. . . Claiming I am the same. . . He forces me. . . “ Kôra’s voice was shaking. “He. . . Made me. . . Stab myself! He. . . The Aylar earthquake. . . He. . . Did. . ."

The creature’s gaze strayed away from the distressed kid with discomfort. He was unprepared for this powerful reaction, or the fact that the stalker was evidently more sinister than he thought. The kid’s frantic behaviors earlier now made more sense.

“Sorry for bringing into this! Izky please do not involve with him!” Kôra begged in dread. With two hands he clasped the shape shifter’s right hand and raised it to the chest level; a blessing gesture. “Is he still here? If so, please leave for safety! He can kill! Izky can die!”

Izky’s eyes widened at the last sentences Kôra uttered.

“That bastard isn’t here. Calm down,” the creature assured with an apathetic tone. Yet ensuring himself to let the anxious boy’s hand go, gently.

“Praise Lord Kâmun. . .” Kôra said in relief.

“For now,” the creature continued. “He’s probably the reason why you’re here.”

“How?! Do not make false scare!” Kôra’s sense of safety was once again shattered.

“Maybe spirits; they can do that,” Izky said. “But spirits rarely fuck with us unless they have very strong intents.”

“Spirits? He is a spirit? How?! Why?!” Kôra deluged Izky again with questions. The creature scowled with his hands on hips. “Do Izky knows what do they want? What do they want?”

“Figure it yourself, you lazy fuck!” berated the irritated Izky. “Pray to Kâmun you don’t have a powerful one tethered to you.”

A brisk gust of wind blew inside Kôra’s chest, it affirmed to the deepest fear he had in mind. The teen wondered about what the hanged man wanted. For his tender age he could be sure he has done none of the grave sins condemned by god and mortals alike. He knew well almost all the thirteen years he had gone through, he never once saw anyone like that person. Unless there was a stack of unknown things about himself he had yet to learn, or had forgotten. He had to find out for sure, and that only if he could return.

“You’ll return,” those soothing words rendered Kôra speechless. Tired of seeing an ugly, pitiful kid stare at him; Izky nodded again. He signaled the boy to follow him. In reply, Kôra smiled then hurried his steps.