In an apartment, Kyel stood in the corner of a dark room, watching a child sleeping on the bed. This was the son of the Neelsroy family, named Desmond. He looked a bit thin, frequently tossing and turning in his sleep, muttering things as though he were dreaming.
"Please, I won't tell anyone... forgive me..."
"Don't kill me, please. I'm scared... Noooooo!"
Desmond awoke in terror from the nightmare that haunted him every night. His bed was often wet by morning. The cries of the demon and his pleas for mercy from Redderen echoed in his mind. He regretted that night and wished he'd never left home.
Desmond was just a young boy, inexperienced and sheltered, even though the Neelsroy family had provided him with everything. He was still very much a pampered child, clinging to his mother and father.
He didn't understand why, but he felt a strange pity for the demons. Even though they were supposed to die, the demon's desperate pleas that night before it met its end stirred something deep within him. For the first time, he comprehended the horror of death, the awful pain it brought. That horrific death became a nightmare that haunted his dreams.
Every night, he begged for the nightmare to stay away. He couldn't bear it anymore, and his weight had noticeably dropped, leaving him even thinner. He wanted to return home, yet he felt ashamed to admit his fear to his family.
Now, in his dimly lit room, he sipped some water, his forehead damp with sweat. Each time he looked into the dark corners of his room, a feeling crept over him, telling him he was being watched—that a monster lurked there.
He pulled back a bit on his bed, swallowing nervously. Desmond covered his entire body with the blanket, breathing heavily, his eyes squeezed tightly shut. He was hoping that whatever evil lurked in the corner of his room would leave, as it always did.
Now and then, he'd lift the blanket a little to let in some air, occasionally peeking toward that dark corner. He didn't have the courage to turn on the light or to stare for long. Deep inside, he was petrified, imagining countless terrifying scenarios.
After a long while, Desmond managed to summon his courage. He knew he was just imagining things, that there was nothing really there. Yet, there was something oddly thrilling about feeling afraid—especially that sensation after gathering the courage to confront it.
Summoning his bravery meant pulling the blanket off his upper half, feeling the cold air, and breathing deeply. Desmond found a strange enjoyment in this terrible fear, a thrill he couldn't quite explain.
But this time was different. It wasn't like all the other times when he'd peek out from under the blanket, let his fear slowly fade, and gradually drift back to sleep. This time, something felt off.
He sensed fear everywhere in his body, a terrible dread filling the entire room. Every sign pointed to something sinister lurking in the corner of his room. His heart raced, and he felt the urge to cover himself again, to live out the experience once more. But he knew that there was something there, in the corner.
With quick, shaky hands, he reached for a mana-filled light stone and switched it on, flooding the room with light. To his relief, the corner was empty; there was nothing there. His heart eased, and he almost wet himself from the release of tension.
Taking a deep breath, he thought of turning off the light to try and sleep one last time before morning. But every time he turned, something dark seemed to flicker in the corner of his vision. Fear jolted through him, his heartbeat soaring to its peak. He screamed so loudly it nearly tore his vocal cords, "Aaaaaah! Help meeeeee!"
He closed his eyes for a moment, his screams continuing in the hope that someone would hear him and come to his rescue. For several minutes, he screamed, breathing heavily, uncertain of what he was doing. Yet somehow, the shouting helped stabilize his panicked mind.
When he finally stopped yelling, he opened his eyes—and to his horror, there was someone standing beside his bed. A figure with black hair and dark eyes. He squeezed his eyes shut again, fear overwhelming him as he prepared to scream once more.
But he felt a sharp, excruciating pain across his face as he was thrown back, crashing into the wall. He couldn't scream now; all he could feel was the pain—the pain that dragged him back to reality, the pain that made him realize that fear was only part of what was happening.
When he opened his eyes, he saw a young man, tall, staring at him with lifeless eyes, empty of any fear. Desmond was horrified and terrified, the pain in his lower jaw throbbing, sending a headache through his skull.
The pain kept pulling him back to the grim truth every time he wanted to convince himself that all of this was just a nightmare, a dream. In a split second, Desmond's mind raised the danger level to the highest alert, triggering one last desperate scream for survival.
In a dark, nightmarish scene, he was running, stumbling, eyes wide in terror, drenched in sweat. His body trembled, his senses on high alert, as he screamed in a trembling voice, "Please! No! Don't kill me!" He begged with every ounce of strength he had, his desperate cries echoing around him, pleading for help. His eyes were filled with tears, his voice drenched in pain and despair, as if he were saying his final goodbyes, clinging to any hope of survival.
Desmond was now fully in the grip of that nightmare chasing him. His hair was yanked violently, his head lifted only to be slammed against the mirror in the dark bathroom. His face was smeared with blood, shards of glass embedding deep cuts into his skin. His body shivered from pain and an overwhelming, boundless fear. With each strike, his voice faded, as if he were vanishing into the depths of this nightmare that was devouring him.
In that grim moment, he looked into the mirror with heavy eyes, barely open, as if surrendering to a fate that had become unmistakably clear and inescapable.
In the pitch-black darkness, his reflection was no mere shadowy image—it had transformed into a living nightmare, a scene of his own lifeless eyes, the darkness in them expanding, consuming everything, an endless abyss swallowing him slowly, seeking meaning in this deadly chaos.
This was how Desmond saw the reflection of his nightmare in the mirror.