Chapter Five: The First Encounter
The next morning, Noor didn't feel as though the night had truly ended.
Everything around her was gray, lifeless. Even the sunlight slipping through the window looked faded, stripped of warmth.
She tried to act as if things were normal, but she knew something had changed…
The mirror was no longer just a piece of glass.
It had become an open door—one that allowed whatever was inside to slowly cross over.
She stepped out of her apartment to breathe, hoping the air would ease the heaviness in her head.
The street was quiet, damp after the rain, the scent of wet earth filling the space.
But she wasn't alone.
A man stood across the street, wearing a long black coat, his gray eyes fixed on her in silence.
She froze.
The air around her turned cold.
She didn't need to ask who he was—she knew immediately.
"Niyar."
He didn't move; he simply gave a faint smile, a smile with no warmth and no threat… just an indescribable mystery.
He approached her slowly, his deep voice slicing through the stillness:
— "We finally meet outside the glass."
Noor stepped back, her breaths quickening.
— "How do you know my name?"
— "I've been watching you."
— "Who… who are you?"
— "I'm the one you saw in the mirror. But I'm not your reflection. I'm the shadow of the truth the world hid from you."
His words struck her mind like cold blades.
Was she imagining this? Or was he real?
His voice wasn't a hallucination, his footsteps were clear on the wet asphalt, and even the smell of rain blended with a strange scent of old smoke that came from him.
— "Why me?" she asked, trying to steady her trembling voice.
Niyar gave a small smile, as if he already knew the answer she feared the most:
— "Because you are not only you."
He moved closer, so close she could feel his breath on her skin.
— "There is someone living inside you, Noor. And the mirror only showed you half the truth."
She stepped back, breathing unevenly, the ground seeming to shift beneath her feet.
The sounds around her vanished, the street turning empty—no cars, no people.
It was as if the world had frozen for this moment.
He reached out his hand toward her, his voice dropping to a whisper:
— "If you want to know who you truly are, come tonight to the abandoned room. There, we'll break the glass… together."
Before she could respond—he was gone.
No footsteps, no shadow, no trace.
Only the remnants of rain…
and a small mirror placed on the ground in front of her, reflecting her face.
But in the reflection, she wasn't smiling—
she was crying.