Creak—
The bedroom’s wooden door eased open. A hand slipped through the gap, groping in the dark, and flicked on the light.
Warm amber light pooled. A girl in simple pale-white sleepwear stepped in, fresh from a bath and haloed in steam. Her wet black hair flowed like seaweed down her back. Her fair face held a porcelain glow, tinged pink by the lamp. Her ink-dark eyes were midsummer stars at the window, bright enough to make a heart skip.
Then her next moves shattered that quiet grace in an instant.
She spotted the computer on the desk, eyes lighting up. The towel flew from her hand. She ignored the crystal beads on her cheeks and rushed in, pulling out the chair.
She slid into the seat, kicked off pink plush slippers with practiced ease, and bared smooth, round toes and a flash of pale calf. Her feet sought the soft mat under the desk. She curled her toes into it, found the perfect posture, and let a gentle smile unfold—cute as a cat tucked under warm covers.
Click, click—
A soft tap woke the sleeping screen. Slender pale fingers double-clicked and opened the new game that had finished downloading today.
She set on her headphones with bright anticipation. In a breath, piano like water and violin like silk washed through her.
“No wonder XB’s famous for ‘selling music with a game attached’—the new title’s soundtrack is perfect.” She nodded along, waiting for the opening scene.
The music swelled. The screen stayed black. White text slowly drifted into view—
[Welcome to the — ? — World.]
Brows lifting, she slid the cursor over the question mark.
A palette of colors bloomed beneath it.
“So… we’re picking a color?”
She scrolled the mouse wheel, a small furrow settling between her brows.
“Red, orange, yellow, green, cyan, blue, purple… too many. Choice paralysis is brutal.” The cursor rolled and rolled. She weighed it carefully, then sighed. “The official info’s so sparse. No clue what the colors mean—”
Her teeth pressed together. “XB does this every time. Outside of the backstory, they leak nothing. And this one keeps saying, ‘Be careful with every choice; each choice alters the progress and ending.’ Ugh, forget it. Random it is!”
Her index finger pressed down. The on-screen [?] began to strobe—
Red, blue, cyan… black— The spin slowed and stopped.
“Eh? So… black? I guess—”
Her words cut off. A voice brushed her ear.
Someone was speaking.
It sounded like a cold star on the horizon—distant, crystal-clear, flickering, hard to approach yet near enough to touch.
“Who?”
Her pulse jumped. She snapped her gaze to the window.
Right then, the night wind whooshed in. It lifted the deep-blue curtain, pushing open a summer-night scroll and unfurling it for her.
She forgot to breathe.
From the eleventh floor, her sight leapt past rooftops and found the whole sky.
Tonight’s stars were unusually bright. The moon hid away, gentle and calm, leaving only a glittering field to echo and braid together. That splendor mirrored in her ink-dark eyes—like someone had poured a handful of Stardust into her gaze.
She sat frozen, heart thudding. Out of nowhere, like a lightning-struck tree, a tremor rose inside.
It felt familiar—embers in memory that hadn’t gone out, flaring anew.
As if, at some Time, on some night, from some high place, above everything, she had lived this exact moment.
Back then, she was small—not only in age, but in mind.
Back then, something bound her whole body, and she couldn’t move.
She couldn’t wear a home-soft smile like the one she’d just shown.
Back then—back then—that—
“Back then, I—” Shattered specks of memory rose like dust in wind. She murmured, “Who was at my side?”
She blinked. The galaxy in her eyes went out.
Wind never blows forever. It fell away.
The curtain dropped, and the sky was gone.
“Hah.”
Like waking from a dream, she pulled free of the drift. Weariness pooled through her, as if her soul had toured the cosmos edge to edge.
She pressed her forehead. “Hallucinations from soaking too long?”
“Forget it. I’ll relax and play.”
She shook her head and looked back at the screen.
“Huh?”
Surprise flickered.
The [?] had stopped on black. She turned back; now it had become—
“White?”
“Was white even there? I don’t remember. A hidden option?”
“White, huh.” She let the worry drop, eyes tracing the letters as she read aloud:
“Welcome to the — [White] — World…?”
The sight of white made her oddly happy. Light rose in her gaze again, bright as the starfield had been.
“White—pretty nice.” She hummed and nodded. “Yeah, not bad.”
“Then—”
“White it is!”
Smiling, Ruan Lin clicked to enter the game.
She entered—
[The White World.]
…
…
