A thick silence hung in the air, clinging to Gu Qien's skin like humidity before a storm. He stood before the mirror, unmoving, his breath shallow, as if even exhaling might shatter the fragile equilibrium that barely held his world together.
The sight before him wasn't just jarring, it was profoundly disorienting.
The reflection staring back was not his own, and yet, it was.
Silver hair.
Crimson-red eyes.
A linen shirt, its fabric strangely crisp and foreign.
Thin build. Average face. And yet… the deep outline of his features bore something different. Alien, yet oddly familiar.
He raised his hand slowly, cautiously, as though reaching toward a skittish animal. The reflection mirrored him exactly, same movement, same pace, every gesture a synchronized dance.
It wasn't an illusion. It wasn't a trick of the light.
This was real.
"This… this isn't me," he muttered aloud, his voice dry and cracked.
"This can't be me."
But the mirror offered no comfort. Only truth.
Time seemed to stretch, seconds dripping like thick syrup as his mind struggled to keep up with the reality his senses had already accepted.
A cold sensation crept down his spine, not from the chilly air, no, the room was warm, but from something deeper, more primal. A visceral dread coiled in his gut.
He staggered back a step, then another, until the backs of his legs struck the edge of a wooden table he hadn't even realized was there. It jostled slightly under his weight, and he grabbed the edge for support.
The surface felt real. Solid. The grain of the wood pressed into his palms, grounding him.
And yet the unease refused to dissipate.
"Okay," he whispered to himself, squeezing his eyes shut.
"Okay, just… slow down. Breathe. Let's think this through."
He inhaled deeply.
The air carried a faint scent of aged paper and candle wax. Not his usual environment. Not his cramped apartment, not the reek of dust and cheap ramen from the kitchenette. This place was different. Strange.
Opening his eyes again, he scanned the room, truly this time.
The furnishings were sparse but ornate. The mirror with its antique frame. The oak walls. The lantern casting that eerie crimson glow.
A heavy-looking desk in the corner. Velvet curtains drawn halfway across the window, unable to block the haunting hue of the sky outside.
And that moon.
His stomach turned.
"Where the hell am I?"
It came out louder than expected, the words echoing slightly against the wooden walls. He waited, as if the room might answer back. But silence was his only reply.
He pressed his palms into his eyes, rubbing hard. The pain from earlier had dulled into a manageable throb, though the memory of it lingered like smoke after a fire.
He remembered that disorienting agony, the feeling of something drilling into his skull, the sense of consciousness slipping like sand through fingers.
And now this.
This new body. This unfamiliar room. This wrong moon.
A thought emerged, uninvited, unwelcome, but undeniable.
"I've been… transmigrated."
He said it aloud again, slower this time, as if repeating it might help him believe it.
"Transmigrated."
The word tasted foreign in his mouth. He'd joked about it before. With friends. On forums. In the late-night rabbit holes of speculative fiction and manhwa discussion threads.
He remembered laughing about it, about waking up in another world, gaining magic powers, starting over. It had always seemed so… distant. So fictional.
Now?
It felt terrifyingly close.
He looked back at the mirror, at the unfamiliar features that mirrored every blink, every twitch of uncertainty. The silver hair caught the lantern's light in an ethereal shimmer, almost translucent at the edges.
The red eyes, God, those eyes, looked like polished garnet, gleaming faintly even in low light.
Definitely not his.
Gu Qien, his real self, had black hair. Dark brown eyes. A more rounded face. This? This was like a character model from a fantasy game. Stylized. Striking. Unnatural.
"I need answers," he murmured, voice steadier now.
He pushed away from the table, his legs trembling slightly beneath him. He moved toward the door slowly, his limbs still unfamiliar. Each step felt like a calculated effort.
The rhythm was wrong. His balance was off. His feet made barely a sound on the wooden floor, as though even the house itself was unsure of his presence.
He reached the door and hesitated. What lay beyond it? A hallway? A forest? A different realm entirely?
He placed a hand on the cool metal handle.
Then stopped.
'Wait. What if… I'm not alone here?'
The thought rooted him in place. If this wasn't a dream, if this was some kind of transmigration, then he needed to proceed with caution. Who knew what rules governed this world? Who he was now? What status or reputation his new identity held?
'Think, Qien. Don't be an idiot. Use your head.'
He pulled his hand away and turned back toward the desk. If this was a fantasy world, then the desk might hold answers. A journal. Letters. Something.
He approached it and gently pulled out the top drawer.
It slid open with a smooth click.
Inside: parchment, a quill, a vial of dried ink. A folded piece of paper, sealed with wax.
He stared at it for a moment, heart thudding.
The seal was unfamiliar. A sigil carved into the wax, an eagle with its wings spread wide over a crescent moon.
Cautiously, he broke it open.
The parchment crackled as he unfolded it, revealing lines of elegant, flowing script.
To the Vessel of Crimson Moonlight,
If you are reading this, then the veil has parted, and the fragments of your old self begin to resurface. Do not fear the pain. It is the toll for remembrance.
Your arrival here was not an accident. It is a design, older than you can imagine. In time, you will understand.
For now, stay inside until the third chime. The Crimson Moon sees all.
…E
He reread the note. Then again.
'The hell does this mean?' he whispered.
Vessel? Toll for remembrance? What did any of this mean? Who was E? Why was he told to stay inside?
Gu Qien swallowed dryly, lowering the note.
His heart beat faster.
He glanced back toward the window, where the Crimson Moon still hung in the sky, motionless, glaring. Watching.
Something about it stirred unease deep within him, beyond the rational. A primal sense of being seen, truly seen, by something he couldn't understand.
Something ancient. Intelligent. Hungry.
'Stay inside until the third chime…' he murmured again, repeating the instruction.
He checked the room. No clock. No chime to measure. What time was it? What was the third chime? An hour? A signal?
Then, distantly, faint, like a bell underwater, a gong echoed across the air.
He froze.
The first chime.
He rushed to the curtains and yanked them shut, the heavy velvet muffling the light immediately. Darkness swallowed the room, save for the soft pulse of the crimson lantern.
Gu Qien sat down hard on the wooden bed against the wall, mind racing.
He wasn't dreaming.
He wasn't hallucinating.
He had died.
Somehow.
And he had awoken here, in a body that wasn't his, in a world ruled by a red moon that watched from the heavens like a god.
The second chime rang out, closer this time.
Gu Qien curled his hands into fists, trying to will away the panic. But he couldn't ignore the truth anymore.
This was real.
This was happening.
He was someone else now, somewhere else. And whatever rules applied in this world, he had yet to understand them.
His eyes lingered on the letter one last time, mind racing with the implications.
He had questions. A thousand of them.
But no answers.
Only the third chime remained.