Prologue

New Years Eve || 11:58 P.M.

The exact amount of people crowding around the Shrine was far too much to count. Even though it is the dead of night, loud cheers and the hustle-bustle of people is evident in the air. The sea of people is making it hard to breathe, and yet I found myself gulping in the exciting atmosphere in a greedy fashion.

I felt light as if I was floating.

Perhaps because I've already made my prayers, or because I know that the year would end in two minutes, the entirety of this situation feels almost unrealistic. As if I am here but not here at the same time.

Thinking about my life so far, since it was time for the end of yet another year, I suddenly remembered the wish I had made earlier in front of God's altar. It was a pretty stupid wish. Yet, one that I desperately desired.

"... To change."

I wanted to change.

I wanted to be...

A more successful person. A more independent person. A more fun person.

I wanted to be...

Someone who didn't have to skip club meetings or outings with friends, because my father won't give me permission or because I am too poor. Someone who was good at the things I did — or at least, someone who had the chance to try and fail.

I wanted to be given opportunities.

I wanted to be happy.

I desperately wanted to change.

But to ask that from God?

I scoffed, thinking about how pathetic I have been my entire life, and how I had only fallen lower by asking the impossible from an entity that I didn't even know existed or not.

It was impossible from the start. God couldn't grant my wish. After all, I was born this way. My inflexibility and lack of spontaneity were probably ingrained in my DNA since birth. And the low income of my family or my lack of accomplishment — other than studying day and night to get into a good university — was also probably because of something out of my bounds, like luck and lineage.

It's not like I could fix a fluke or edit my genetic makeup to make me more perfect. It was impossible to restore a ruined life.

I shake my head, to stop these pessimistic thoughts. It was dumb, but I hoped that this night never ended. I didn't feel like going home tonight. It was much more peaceful here — in this crowd of people, where I could hear laughter and civil conversation — rather than at my own house, where the only sound was of screams and crashes.

I sighed.

I was suddenly so tired. Reminiscing about my pathetic life was probably a mistake. It only brought about a headache.

I sighed again.

My eyes were beginning to feel heavy. After all, I hadn't been sleeping for two days because of Father. He had always been a violent man, but it had been even more painful the past two nights.

A flash of memory made me remember the bloody scene. The roar of anger and the forceful thrust of his entire being. I felt like I would retch.

I took a heavy breath, trying to calm myself.

Haa... haa... argh...

I shut my eyes tightly, to ward off the bad memories. I shut them so tightly so that no tears could form and flow out of my eyes. If I cried anymore, He would realise. And then He would call me an ungrateful wench, and... do more scary things.

You never know when Father would explode. He was unpredictable, so I needed to be cautious on every step. One wrong word, one wrong move, and he would —

'Shhh!' I quieted the monster in my head, which preyed on my misery. 'Be quiet. Don't bring me there. Shut up. Go away.'

I waited. I waited till the whispers were gone, and I was alone. As alone as I could be in a crowd of jolly people. I am scared. I am angry. I am miserable. I don't want to go home.

The worries of my head eventually go away, as I told them to. Instead, they're replaced with an unusual silence. A foreign feeling. This quietness...

Inside the darkness of my closed eyes, I find a strange comfort in this quiet. I can hear the slight noises, but it's like I have been blocked by a wall. They sound muffled. A remote peace surrounds me.

A thought appears: would death feel so peaceful?

But death wouldn't have been so uncomfortable. Even with the momentary peace, I can not ignore the exhaustion in my bones. My muscles ached, and the bruises on my arms stung with the slightest movement.

I am covered with injuries, and covered in clothes to hide those injuries.

I'm hiding that I'm hurting, and that hurts me more.

And yet, I feel calmer than ever before. By myself. In my thoughts.

'That's right...' I try to coax myself.

'I have nothing to be tired about. What I feel today was the same as yesterday, and the day before yesterday, and the day before that...'

It had always been a never-ending cycle. I tell myself to get used to it by now.

'... so, why do my hands shake so much?'

I clutched my trembling fingers together. I'm shaking like some helpless puppy. Just by the thought of returning to that hellish place, I can feel myself panic. Perhaps due to fear or anger or some other emotion, I can't bear the thought of returning.

I really wished that I wouldn't have to go back...

As I think so, I feel something touch me. It was cold and brief, disappearing the moment it came in contact with me.

'Has it started to snow?'

I ask myself, but I kept my eyes closed. I felt like the moment I opened my eyes, this illusionary calm would disappear, thrusting me back to my reality.

Suddenly a question pops into my head.

'Aren't two minutes over yet? Why can't I hear the New Year Bells?'

My eyebrow twitched. The silence was oddly eerie now.

'Wait... silence? Why can't I hear the countdown starting?'

As the darkness in my closed eyelids became even more vivid, I suddenly feel an ominous chill at my back.

'What the... what is going on?'

But before I could open my eyes, I felt my entire body collapsing — no, falling. The space beneath my feet had opened and it felt like I was being swallowed by the ground.

"Ahh!" I gasped, as I felt myself being pulled by gravity.

I was sinking — sinking in some sort of black hole, without an end. Or perhaps a deep, deep tunnel, like the kind from the famous novel by Lewis Carrol.

Terrifying.

It was truly terrifying.

I screamed for help in the vast darkness — not because I was falling into an endless abyss, but because all I could see was pitch black even with my eyes now wide open.

It was strange.

I was more afraid of blindness than facing the unknown. And the only reason for it, was because unlike something you've never known, being blind did only one thing — take away your ability to recognize anything, even yourself.

To not know even yourself.

To be blind to the truth.

That — more than anything — was perhaps my greatest fear.

The last thing I remembered, before passing out, was the feeling of dread as I felt my skin ripping and my bones melting, along with the blind shrieking of my own voice.