Although Luke was now fully convinced he had been taken to another realm, one thing he still couldn't fully grasp was the concept of gods and goddesses.
He dared not ask Lilith—if she truly was a god, then questioning her so bluntly might be considered rude… or dangerous.
With a quiet sigh, he reached into his pocket and pulled out the coin once more, studying the strange markings etched into its surface.
So this could change my fate, huh?
He flipped it between his fingers, a nervous excitement rising in his chest.
"Let's see how lucky I become," he murmured.
The dizziness hit Luke like a sledgehammer.
One moment he was standing in the quiet room, the next his world twisted violently, as if invisible hands had seized the floor and yanked it out from under him. His stomach lurched. A sharp ringing filled his ears. His vision smeared into streaks of light and shadow.
"What… the hell…?" Luke whispered, but the words dissolved on his tongue.
A searing ache spread through his muscles—slow at first, then blooming all at once like fire beneath his skin. His joints screamed. His bones felt as if they were grinding against each other. Every breath stabbed at his lungs.
What is this? Panic tightened his chest. Did something go wrong? Is this because I crossed space… and time?
His thoughts came in broken fragments, slipping away as quickly as they formed. His heart hammered wildly, each beat echoing in his skull like a war drum.
The room around him swayed, the walls bending unnaturally, almost alive. The ceiling spiraled in nauseating circles. It felt less like dizziness and more like the entire world was rejecting him—spitting him out like a foreign object that didn't belong.
Sweat beaded across his forehead. His legs shuddered beneath him, refusing to obey. He reached out instinctively, grasping for the edge of his futon, for anything solid, anything real.
But his fingertips brushed only empty air.
"Hah… haaah…" Luke gasped, voice trembling. His knees buckled. The strength drained from his body as if an unseen force was sucking everything out of him—his stamina, his balance, his very consciousness.
His vision tunneled. The edges darkened.
Get it together… just a little more… He fought to remain upright, teeth clenched, refusing to fall.
But the world tilted sharply, and suddenly he wasn't standing anymore.
He hit the floor hard, the impact barely registering through the overwhelming haze consuming his senses. His limbs went numb. His eyelids grew impossibly heavy.
The spinning stopped.
Everything stopped.
As the darkness closed in around him, swallowing the last flicker of awareness, one final thought floated through his mind—fragile, uncertain, and filled with dread:
Something is wrong with my body… This isn't normal…
And then Luke sank into a deep, heavy sleep—one so profound it felt less like rest and more like drifting into another world entirely.
Hours went by…
Luke surfaced from sleep as though rising through layers of warm, dark water.
For a moment he didn't move. His mind floated in a pleasant haze, caught between one world and the next. The only sound was the soft ticking of the old clock on his wall—a steady rhythm that felt almost foreign after the depth of rest he'd fallen into.
Then sensation returned.
The weight of his blanket.
The faint chill of morning air brushing his face.
A shaft of pale light cutting across the wooden floorboards.
Luke blinked his eyes open.
The ceiling above him looked exactly the same as always—slightly uneven, a faint crack running diagonally like a pale scar—but something about it felt… different. Clearer. As if the long sleep had sharpened everything, or peeled away some invisible layer he'd grown used to seeing through.
He exhaled slowly, letting his body stretch into the mattress. His muscles protested with a dull ache, like he hadn't moved in days.
"How long was I out…?"
His voice sounded rough, unused.
He pushed himself upright, blankets sliding off his torso. The room greeted him in quiet familiarity: the cluttered desk with unfinished notes, the open window letting in the faint smell of the slums.
But the air still felt… charged. As if something had shifted while he slept.
A shiver ran down his spine—anchored in instinct rather than fear.
Lule swung his legs over the side of the bed. His feet touched the floor, and a soft thrum vibrated through the wooden boards, subtle but unmistakable. He froze, brows knitting.
That wasn't normal.
He waited, held his breath, listening.
Tick.
Tock.
Tick.
Then—
A faint pulse. Like a heartbeat. Not his.
He rose to his feet, heart quickening despite himself. The room looked ordinary, unchanged.
But he had changed. He could feel it.
Dragging a hand through his sleep-mussed hair, Luke whispered under his breath:
"…What happened to me while I was asleep?"
And the room, as though holding its breath, offered no answer.
The first thing he noticed was the mirror.
Or rather, himself in the mirror. He blinked once, twice, certain that sleep-deprivation or some cruel trick of fate had painted him in a dreamlike haze. But no—what stared back was undeniably real.
Broad shoulders that seemed carved from marble, a chest that expanded with effortless grace, and a jawline so sharp it could have cut glass. His hair fell in perfect disarray, as though each strand had been meticulously positioned by an invisible artist. Even his eyes—once mundane, forgettable—now burned with a vivid, almost magnetic intensity, framed by lashes that could make hearts skip a beat.
He flexed his fingers, watching veins ripple along his forearms like a road map of power. Each movement sent an almost intoxicating thrill through his body. He couldn't remember ever feeling this alive.
A slow, uneven laugh escaped his lips—part disbelief, part awe. "Is… this really me?
He glanced back in the mirror, now aware of the subtle way people would turn to look, the way the air seemed to shift around him. Every angle, every line of his body radiated a kind of magnetic perfection that didn't feel entirely human.
"Not sure," he said, voice low but carrying a new resonance, as if the sound of it alone could command attention. "But… I think I like it."
And with that, he took a step forward—and for the first time in his life, the world seemed to step aside.