Time bent inside the walls of BIGHIT's trainee dorms.
It didn't pass—it sprinted. Laughed in your face. Stole hours and spit out exhaustion.
I'd been in Seoul for sixty-four days. I knew because my voice coach, Jiwoo-sunbae, made me journal every night for "vocal clarity and emotional memory." Some nights I wrote poems. Others, I just scribbled the word tired until the ink bled through the page.
But somewhere in the chaos—between early dawn rehearsals and midnight vocal runs—we became TITAN.
Not just a group. Not just a project.
A unit.
A force.
A story waiting to be told.
Week OneMy limbs ached constantly. Every day felt like someone had replaced my bones with molten lead and expected me to dance on broken glass.
Aya's technique was terrifyingly sharp. She never missed a step. Camille glided across the floor like music lived in her spine. Nevaeh turned every movement into poetry, and Yuna? Yuna was precision incarnate. A blade wrapped in elegance.
I kept up. Barely.
The choreographer watched me from behind his clipboard with unreadable eyes. "Raw," he said on the third day. "But there's a storm in your center. That's your weapon. Find it."
I didn't know what that meant then.
By week four, I did.
Week TwoWe recorded our first harmonization drills.
Aya's alto layered under Rhea's clear soprano with surgical grace. Lulu's voice was surprisingly smoky. Nevaeh couldn't stay on tempo if her life depended on it—but when she hit, she hit.
Camille hummed like a siren in a dream.
And me?
When I sang, Jiwoo stared like she was trying to solve me.
"Not trained," she said once. "But you bend the air when you sing. Like it wants to follow."
That night, I wrote:
"Dawn stirred again today.She whispered, 'You are more than your voice.'What does that mean?"
I didn't know yet.
But I felt it.
Week ThreePublic relations training. Cameras. Walks. Eye contact. Breath control while smiling.
I hated every second.
Yuna was flawless. Rhea was warm and impossible not to love. Camille flirted with every lens. Aya stared down interviewers like they were prey. Lulu could charm a ghost.
And I?
I still felt like a girl who didn't belong in mirrors.
But when our pre-debut teaser dropped online—just ten seconds of silhouettes, the shadow of my braids swinging in slow motion, a single note hanging in the air—I woke up to 400K followers.
Somehow, people saw something in me I hadn't claimed for myself yet.
That week, my wolf—Dawn—started humming again. Not in fear.
In readiness.
Week FourThey gave us the name: TITAN.
"Unmovable. Unbreakable. Seven girls, one sound."
We screamed.
There were hugs and tears and mock-stage bows in our cramped dorm hallway. Nevaeh nearly dropped her protein shake on the PR manager. Lulu screamed, "WE'RE GONNA RULE THE WORLD" into a plastic spoon.
It felt real, finally. Like we weren't just surviving.
We were becoming.
Week FiveFirst performance review.
The stage was just the training hall with LED panels and two execs watching behind clipboards, but my hands shook anyway.
I wasn't Dwyn from the forest pack.
I wasn't the half-siren misfit people used to whisper about.
I was the center vocal of TITAN.
And when the beat dropped, Dawn rose.
She didn't take over. Didn't snap or claw or try to protect me.
She stood beside me.
Shoulder to shoulder.
A power beneath my voice I'd never tapped before.
Later that night, the producer said, "She sings like war and forgiveness."
And I finally understood what Jiwoo meant by storm.
Week Six to EightWe bled for each other.
Camille sprained her ankle. Yuna caught her. Rhea fought with a stylist over culturally insensitive wardrobe. Aya stood her ground during a line distribution meeting. Lulu cried for hours when we had to re-record vocals at 3AM and her voice cracked.
Nevaeh got sick.
I made soup. She wrote a rap about it.
We learned each other's rhythms. Our silence codes. Our crash signs. The way Camille needed to hum before bed or how Lulu curled up like a cat when overwhelmed. Rhea's protective glances. Aya's quiet nods of solidarity.
We weren't just groupmates.
We were a unit.
And in the middle of it all, I finally began to see myself not as the girl who was left behind...
But as the woman stepping into the light.
Now
TITAN debuts in four weeks.
The posters are going up.
Our names are beginning to hum through social media.
We're not idols yet.
But we're close.
Too close to break.
Too far to run.
I stare at myself in the mirror backstage—sweat-streaked, eyes bright, heart loud.
And I say softly,
"Dawn?"
"Still here."
"Good."
The others call for me from the hall.
I grab my mic.
Straighten my spine.
And walk out to meet my future.
The lights dimmed.
And the world held its breath.
I stood in the middle of the stage, heart thundering against my ribs like it wanted to escape. My fingers gripped the mic like a lifeline. My breath—steady, rehearsed—still caught in the back of my throat.
All around me, Seoul buzzed outside this studio. But in here? In this darkened space filled with cameras, stage lights, and the low hum of adrenaline-fueled silence?
It felt like standing on the edge of something sacred.
Our formation snapped into place.
Aya stood statue-still to my right. Yuna, ever graceful, tucked a strand of hair behind her ear as the pre-roll counted down. Lulu shifted her glitter-lined eyes toward the audience, grinning like a fox before a performance. Rhea cracked her neck. Camille exhaled like she was slipping into battle. Nevaeh bounced once on her toes—always fire, always fierce.
And me?
I was the eye of this storm.
The calm center where the sound would rise.
The countdown flashed.
3... 2... 1.
The bass dropped, and TITAN was born.
[INTRO – LULU & CAMILLE]
🎵We were stars before the sky knew our namesBorn in silence, carved through flameFrom ashes, we breathe againWatch us rise—untamed.🎵
They hit their lines flawlessly. The camera panned, sweeping across the stage.
Our choreography was sharp—clean but dangerous. We didn't move like rookies. We moved like we were already legends.
[RAP – NEVAEH]
🎵Built from pressure / made to bend /Broke the mold / now we ascend /Titan-blooded, rhythm-fed /We rise where others end.🎵
I could feel the way the audience shifted, pulled closer. I could hear the scream of fans, muffled through the music.
Then it was my turn.
My mark.Center.The silence before the storm.
[CHORUS – DWYN (LEAD VOCAL)]
🎵Call our names into the stormWe don't break, we transformFrom shadowed ground to starlit skiesWe ascend, we ascend—watch us fly.🎵
The first note left my lips, and everything else disappeared.
I didn't feel the cameras or the crowd. I didn't feel the burn in my legs or the sweat beneath the lights. I didn't feel human.
I felt... right.
Like I had been made for this.
Like every wound, every whisper, every rejection had built this moment.
But just as I lifted into the last line, something hit me.
A flicker.
No—more than that.
Apull.
It ripped through my chest like a thread snapping tight—like I'd been hooked by something ancient and alive. Something I thought I'd buried.
My breath stuttered.
It was the same feeling I'd had the night before Kael rejected me. That unbearable gravity. That soul-deep ache like someone had called my name across lifetimes.
But Kael wasn't here. That bond was dead. Severed. I felt nothing when I thought of him now.
So why was my wolf, Dawn, suddenly alert?
Why did she rise in my blood like a tide breaking the dam?
"He's here."Her voice was a wind through my bones.
"The true one. Ours."
My knees nearly gave out.
But I kept singing.
I kept going.
[BRIDGE – YUNA & AYA]
🎵Wings of thunder, feet of flame /We rise again and againNo cage, no chain / can hold this nameT-I-T-A-N — say it like a claim.🎵
I moved automatically, eyes scanning the dark edges of the studio, like I could find him there.
Whoever he was.
Whoever the bond belonged to.
I didn't see him.
But Ifelthim.
Watching.
And I knew—deep in the marrow of my being—this wasn't just adrenaline. This wasn't performance.
This was fate.
And I wasterrifiedof it.
[FINAL CHORUS – FULL GROUP // DWYN HIGHLIGHT]
🎵Ascend with fire, we burn through doubtNo turning back, we're screaming loudFrom shadows born, we blaze aheadWe are TITAN—rise instead.🎵
I held the final note with everything I had, voice ringing like a bell through glass. Pure. Whole.
The lights flared.
We struck our final pose.
And the world roared.
I barely remembered bowing. Barely remembered the cameras flashing or the MC yelling our names.
All I could feel was the echo of something just out of reach. Something that stirred the wolf in me. Something that made my skin prickle and my throat burn.
Someone had felt me.
And I had felt him.
Whoever he was...He was here.
And Dawn? She was already reaching for him like her soul recognized home.