Mira removed her headset slowly, as if pulling it off too fast might shatter what little patience she had left.
Her ears rang.
Eight hours.
Eight hours of other people's anger.
Eight hours of apologizing for things she had never done.
"I will report you," the man had shouted.
"I understand," Mira had answered automatically.
Her voice was calm, trained, empty.
The call ended.
Her screen blinked red.
Call duration exceeded.
Performance: below average.
Again.
She leaned back in her chair and stared at the ceiling lights. They were too bright. Everything was always too bright at the office. Too loud. Too much.
I wasn't meant to live like this, she thought.
But she stood up anyway.
Because rent didn't care about dreams.
Outside, rain fell quietly. Mira didn't open her umbrella. She walked without direction, letting the cold soak into her clothes. At least it was something she could feel.
The pedestrian light turned green.
She stepped forward.
A horn.
Headlights.
Impact.
As the world spun, the last thought in her mind was painfully mundane.
I already asked for tomorrow off.
Mira woke up breathing.
That was the first strange thing.
Her lungs filled easily, deeply, as if nothing had happened. No pain. No burning. No hospital smell.
She opened her eyes.
Dirt.
Real dirt, pressed against her palms. Damp. Cold.
She shot upright, heart racing, hands moving over her body in panic.
Jeans.
Jacket.
Shoes.
Everything was still there.
"Okay," she whispered.
"Either I'm dead… or my brain is doing something very rude."
The forest around her was wrong. Trees were too tall, their leaves too large. The air felt heavy, watching her. There were no birds—only silence layered with distant movement.
A sound.
Footsteps.
Mira froze.
Someone stepped out from between the trees.
A man.
Human—mostly.
His face was sharp, calm, strikingly handsome in a way that felt unfair. But above his hair, slightly twitching, were animal ears. Dark fur. Real. Not a costume.
Mira stared.
"…Yeah," she said quietly. "This is definitely not my imagination."
His eyes narrowed.
"You speak strangely," he said.
She flinched at the sound of another human voice. Relief and fear collided in her chest.
"I'm lost," she said quickly. "Very. Deeply. Professionally lost."
He studied her—her clothes, her posture, the way her hands shook even though she tried to hide it.
No scent of a tribe, he thought.
No markings. No weapon. And those clothes…
"Where are you from?" he asked.
Mira opened her mouth—
—and a translucent blue panel appeared in front of her face.
She yelped.
"—WHAT THE—"
The man's hand went to the dagger at his belt.
"What do you see?" he demanded.
Mira slapped at the air.
"You don't see this?"
She paused. Looked at him.
"…Of course you don't."
Welcome, Mira.
Status: Alive
Body: Original
World Level: Primitive
Mira squinted.
"You're late," she whispered. "I almost died. Again."
The man watched her closely now.
She wasn't looking at him.
She was looking through him—at empty air.
She's speaking to nothing, he realized.
Either she's mad… or something is speaking back.
"Can you hear me?" Mira muttered.
SYSTEM:
Yes.
"Can you send me home?"
She smiled for half a second.
Hope. Small. Fragile.
SYSTEM:
No.
Her shoulders dropped.
"Figures."
Objective: Survive
Task: Reach the nearest settlement
Time Limit: 24 hours
Reward:
Random Modern Item
Mira blinked.
"Modern?"
Her eyes lit up. "Like… electricity-modern?"
SYSTEM:
Possibly.
She clasped her hands together.
"Please be soap."
The man frowned.
"You've been silent," he said. "And then smiling."
Mira looked up at him, startled.
"Oh—sorry. I do that when I'm stressed. And confused. And possibly cursed."
He hesitated.
"You are not from here," he said slowly.
"No," she agreed. "Very much no."
He exhaled through his nose, ears twitching back slightly.
She's either dangerous…
or completely helpless.
"Name," he said.
"Mira."
A pause.
"I'm Kael," he replied. "And if you stay here, something worse than me will find you."
Mira nodded immediately.
"I will follow you anywhere."
Then she glanced back at the invisible panel.
"…Except into a lake. I can't swim."
Kael stared.
Definitely strange, he thought.
But not lying.
"Stay close," he said.
As they walked, Kael glanced at her again.
She was muttering under her breath.
"Okay, system," she whispered. "We're cooperating. But if you give me a toothbrush, I will worship you."
Kael didn't know what a system was.
But he knew one thing.
This girl had fallen into the wrong world—
—and the world had no idea what it just accepted.