Can a dream be this vivid?

Fire...

"Please stop this...!"

...an element that represented passion, compassion, and youth energy.

"Mother!!"

However... it had always been closer as a symbol of hatred and anger.

Thus, the more one felt hatred, the more one felt anger; the fire inside would burn fiercely.

The fiercer the fire, the stronger its power.

A little girl screamed for help, yet people around her only watched as the flame consumed her. Each time the scorching fire peeled off her skin, it regrew to repair itself. And each time her face melted, it would heal, returning it to the soft, rounded face.

The gruesome process was repeated again and again until the little girl no longer maintained her consciousness.

The fire was extinguished.

People who watched disappeared.

Only the little girl remained.

She looked in the mirror and saw a familiar figure lying on the floor.

Their eyes were hollow like a blood moon, staring back at her. A second later, it changed.

From red moons, they slowly transformed into flames.

Then, the flame began to spread, quickly devouring everything.

Started from the figure in the mirror, the mirror itself, the white curtains in the backdrop, and finally, the little girl herself.

"Set... everything... ablaze..."

Gasp!

Eliana's eyes snapped open, heart pounding as she recalled the vivid scene in her dream. Then she examined herself, cold sweat flooding her entire body and the bed beneath.

"Not again..."

She took a moment to calm herself, steadying her breath as she sat in meditation pose. Fire flickered from the tip of her fingers, the edge of her eyes, and the root of hairs.

After a few minutes, she took a deep breath, ending her meditation. At the same time, the flickering flames were disappearing altogether.

"Huff..."

Eliana pressed her thumb on her temples, rubbing them gently. Her mind drifted to the resurfaced memory she had forgotten. A fragment that had been burned by her flame.

She didn't know what caused it to haunt her in the dream. All she wanted was to bury it in the deepest corner of her mind.

But she could not.

It still lingered, no matter how hard she tried.

"Even though it was easy before..." Eliana mumbled, her fingers shaking intensely.

Giving up, Eliana helped herself to get off the bed and examined her room. A calming hue of blue filtered through the window, bringing with it a cold night air and a solitary ambient.

She stretched her hand toward the beaming sphere that hung in the dark sky, imagining it was held in her palm and closing her hands.

"I can't..."

Staring at her hands, Eliana rubbed her face, then clasped her cheeks to shock herself.

Eliana was standing near the window, her eyes swept over the lush garden bathed in bluish light. The scene felt like she was viewing a beautiful underwater garden in the aquarium back in her homeland.

Suddenly, she felt nostalgia. But this time she wanted to relish it.

The only good memory in her life, there was no way she would let it go.

"Hmm?"

Eliana caught a movement in the corner of her eyes. When she shifted her gaze, she found a familiar figure walking in the garden.

"Niveus..."

Her heart suddenly beat faster. Her cheeks warmed. Her soft lips parted. All... Every part of her body showed a reaction upon sighting Niveus.

"It's happening again... whenever I see him..."

It was an unfamiliar feeling that Eliana had only been discovered a few months ago. The time when she first met Niveus. The time when she was curious about her enigmatic would-be friend. The time when...

"I saw his face..."

A face that could charm even a girl, who was alien to the term 'love.'

"Is this feeling really love? Is this how people feel when they fall in love with someone, like in the books?" Eliana mused. "So ticklish, so foolish, making me unable to think clearly."

While her mind was occupied with foolish thoughts, her body had moved autonomously. When she realized, she was already in the garden, looking around like the lost child she was.

"Huh, when am I?" Eliana mumbled.

"Can't sleep, Eli?"

A voice so calm and distant yet so warm streamed through her ears.

With a quick, almost instantaneous turn, her head motioned around, looking for the voice's owner.

Nothing was seen on the ground or below, so she raised her gaze and immediately spotted Niveus.

He was sitting on the tree branch, his long hair gently swaying against the calm breeze. Two gleaming golden eyes stared back at her droopingly. His soft lip was sealed tightly.

Wait.

'Soft lip?'

Eliana blinked a few times, still processing what she had just seen. A second later, she rubbed her eyes and looked upward again, finding that she really was not hallucinating.

'So pretty...'

Enchanted by Niveus's otherworldly appearance, Eliana fell into a trance, her body wobbling as she slowly stepped forward.

Suddenly, a flash of light assaulted her eyes, waking her up from cataleptic condition. But it did not stop there, the light expanded and consumed her entirely, turning everything into a blank slate of white.

"No...!"

When Eliana snapped open her eyes again, she was in her bed.

"Huh? A dream?"

That was a very weird dream she had experienced. Not to mention, she dreamed within her dream, how was that possible?

"Can a dream be that vivid?"

Moreover, it was so vivid like she was not dreaming at all.

"I must be really tired."

Eliana got off from the bed, yawning and stretching her body. A few cracking bones here and there. Satisfying.

The first rays of sunlight streamed through the window, flooding the room with a warm ambiance. It was morning, which meant everything she experienced earlier was indeed a dream.

Eliana changed into a flowing white gown adorned with intricate gold embroidery along the sleeves and neckline.

The fitted bodice with a high waistline fell into a skirt that trailed behind her, but not so much as to hinder her movements.

After transforming herself into a young lady once again, Eliana stood in front of the mirror with a full smile plastered on her face.

"It will be the first time Niveus sees me like this... I wonder what he will say about me... fufu."

With the odd motivation in mind, Eliana left her room.

And as if Lady Yulia blessed her life, she immediately stumbled upon Niveus as soon as she arrived at the main stairways connecting the second floor with the hall on the first floor.

"Niveus!"