The sturdy chair in the middle of the bunker, illuminated by unknown light and surrounded by shadows, awaited a new partner. It looked metallic yet also stone-like, so Celeste wondered which was more true. She was about to get it either way, as it was looking uncomfortable and very threatening. There was no other choice, like a lovely sofa or a rock. Yeah.

  She walked out of the tunnel, her features innocent, and her dress was still nice enough, even if it wasn't the main wonder-dress. It had less of a style, one meant to be broken and tossed away, unlike her formal uniform. She was restless on her feet and wore weird shoes. She also had a Hound in her grasp, but that was not the problem for anyone, including the guard who stole her wooden token. He was a bit rude for that, though.

  She wasn't alone for the first time in this event, as Dreadus followed her behind, wearing a nicer uniform than usual, and tried to push her hesitant steps forward. It was time to get into a proper golden path, and as the highest-ranked guardian so far, he held certain perks like coming alongside her and seeing it with his own darn eyes.

  There was no smile on Celeste's face. She looked worried, sniffing the air, and taking this place and faces second by second, and confronting the big shiny mirror for an incredibly nerve-wracking show.

  And that machine? chair?! Her long, black hair shuddered like herself, and her tanned skin sweated like never before. She noticed that aside, and felt the freakest room in the whole freaking world breathing on her neck.

  Then she just walked into the jaws of monsters and hardly felt alone. Dreadus assured her that everything was fine. He wouldn't lie to her about it, right? He kept whispering to keep her head straight and breathe short, but she couldn't help doing everything backwards and hum in wonder.

  She knew there was nothing fine about this at all. She got more and more worked up and recalled her conversation with William. It eased her nerves a little just as she stepped onto the wrong path of light. For the first time in a while, Hound didn't help her, for he was out of his wits and shrank down like never before.

  Overall, it was a shitty time for most unfit guests at this bunker, like for anyone who reached that chair.

  Celeste hesitated for a single step, her Emblem shone and trembled under her sleeve, and the presence of Dreadus didn't help as much as it should have. It was no wonder. As usual, the youth was relative, and things went and moved on instinct, and some of that might come back.

  It did, but didn't at the same time. Celeste felt conflicted like no Walker beforehand. They had the to skip these years, offering their Emblems such a haughty power! It was preposterous and dangerous, yet humans couldn't help themselves but watch out and seek the abyss. For the abyss to look back was no surprise. It was given.

  Youths without awareness were put into a difficult situation that was beyond the realm of science. It shouldn't have been, yet they still pushed this boundary, and it was a wonder why they got so nervous the moment they entered the bunker.

  Dreadus heard rumors about very strong, foreboding feelings about this room and these steps, but he never guessed Celeste would be like this. He saw this Forced Awakening only once before, and even that was a relatively quick glimpse because he didn't care about it.

  Now, he had no other choice because Celeste was different, or could it be related to a very common issue of all Emblems? They were feisty, egoistical, yet still young, and not even that, or each, or nothing.

  “Hey, I am with you. Don't be afraid. You said you'd give this a try, and if it doesn't work in your favor, don't try to bash it. It isn't as if it can be wasted. It can wait.” Dreadus said, trying to appease her trembling hands.

  “I was... Was... Am.” She lost her voice and couldn't even remember what she said all those weeks ago. Dreadus told her that there was something good in this place, and Ellie taught many valuable lessons to Celeste, who wanted to fight and kill monsters. This was as big a help as that, or bigger.

  Allegedly, of course. There weren't monsters here.

  There was only she.

  Watching a room that had thousands of Awakenings in the past, and gods know how many experiments and deviant offenses, or faces, Celeste felt small like in the clouds and mountains. She felt as if she had gone into darkness, walked into it, and met an army of shadows dragging her every step.

  It was her self-entitled goal and promise to fight those off. They were a joke, hindering things that should be easy. She didn't want to forget that. Dreadus didn't mind that desire, or anything else, because, once more, he would accept her decisions and any choice because it was easier that way. Like her, he was still learning.

  Ellie said that Walkers were killers anyway, so that put many ideas into Celeste's mind over the course of those weeks. Every week was different from the last, so her voice adjusted, her mind relaxed, and her body took on new forms.

  Celeste discovered a brand-new world in this land filled with people like her, yet not quite like her. That was fine. Nobody was like that. Nobody felt what she did. None saw what she did. Even William didn't, but that was like asking dogs to bark in different kinds of tones. His case was different, yet cool, and she didn't live his life to feel bad or good about it.

  She felt different, discovered people who were good and like a family, and those who were not. They weren't so different and normal, because normal was bad. Being normal was dead. Another world was right before her eyes, looking like a giant cage with a machine and darkness.

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  For a while, she took Forced Awakenings for a simple test where monsters would come to her. That ended up as a fleeting joke. Contrary to such expectation, the truth was much closer. She regretted it more than coming with Dreadus out of her cave, or giving him that skull with that magic water-thing, or elixir-thing that Ellie implied.

  That chair wasn't inviting in the slightest, and there was a weird intensity within her that wanted to force her out of this room. She tried to run, hide, and not do it. It sounded contradictory to her physical feelings, evoking lies and hesitations, while something within her did enjoy this contradiction and wished to uproot it. It was fear right there—a pure, unadulterated fear.

  That was the first.

  Dreadus clutched her shoulders from behind. “I told you this is your choice, didn't I? You can wait for another half year or a whole year if you want. It is up to you. You have time. I can take care of you, show you around the world, and teach you how to contact Rank 0. You are still young and--”

  Halfway through, Celeste hardly even listened.

  He spoke pieces of truth, albeit in reality, he wanted her to Awaken because he knew it was a good choice all around. Whatever was within her, wailing, waiting, or latching from the past, she could change it and not devote that past into her chained heart. She had to get it done. Finished. Free.

  The Second Head recommended it, which came through Dreadus and his appeal to Celeste to do it. On her own, she wouldn't do it, as evidenced by her current state of efforts and the dispute she couldn't understand.

  Within her was a series of several dubious feelings as well as urges. Dreadus couldn't stop or start anything, since nature was calling, and so was that spark.

  Celeste did it by gritting her teeth, shaking his arms off, jumping forward, and before Dreadus caught her, she tossed whimpering Hound at him and ran at the chair. She made a rash decision, moving quicker than her fear, and left Dreadus behind. The choice to sit down was heavy, and to her shock, the brief departing, fleeing fear and steps and shakes still returned.

  So she ran with it, from it, but nope. The fears were still there, and hiding was impossible in this shitty cave.

  Instincts told her to swallow all pride. Her inner voice and words from Ellie and William clarified her choice, and perhaps one was stronger than the last because Ellie couldn't her. She just couldn't, but it wasn't a problem. She was different. Normal, that is. Dead. Friend. Wrong. Right...

  Gripping the oversized, cold chair handles, she bit her lips and waited. She was quick. Too quick. It wasn't ready, and her anxiety gripped her heart the moment she judged this big chair like a cage, and her heart thundered in response.

  Dreadus caught Hound, who gnawed at his finger, thinking that Celeste would run away. She didn't, so he let go of this nasty thing and sat to the ground, waiting, because there was no way he was about to approach that chair in a million years, or threats of cosmos or heavens alike.

  Any agent or guide either stayed out of view, the whole bunker, or watched from a safe, special space. He didn't do any of that and took a new kind of spot where everything was much more personal. He reasoned that Celeste was good to go. She wasn't, but did he know? Was the grunting and shaking of the rat-sized Hound beside him the same?

  Celeste breathed roughly, and right across from her were massive, shining mirrors, revealing most of this room for her eyes. She saw herself sitting there, feeling more it rather than the faces behind the mirror, which laughed, pointed at her, taunted her, and made the whole thing crazy.

  She wished to close her eyes, but couldn't.

  A soft voice called, whispering to her mind.

  “Shh...” Celeste whispered back. It wasn't that time, right?

  She might, because words were cheap and actions were better. They were costly too...

  

  At that point, Celeste was far from calm, and her mirror self stood up, got out of that chair, looked calmly around, and left her fearful because she looked foreign, as if she couldn't recognize herself. It was true. She saw a mirror very few times in her life. It was like freaking sorcery, but the voice was familiar, calling to her, and this vision was like a dream.

  She saw less inside the moment those faces dimmed, and taunting stopped, and the voice called her to act and be good. There were people in the shadows around her as well, waiting for something wrong. She disregarded those. Dreadus also disappeared when the entrance dimmed, leaving the chair bright.

  The light was poor, making her expression that much more visible and off; she no longer cared for anything further as she reconciled with her sight and stared daggers at that taunting, smiling girl. At her! She was here for herself! She wouldn't fare that badly in this.

  

  Her mirror self smiled, gesturing with her hand forward and pointing it to her own head. There was no Emblem ahead, but the arm cut inside the head anyway, and it went deep... far deeper than it should.

  Nodding, Celeste clutched the handles even more and remembered Australia, a land of no name for her, but, hey, at least the name was cool as hell, and this other should know it too, right? Celeste attempted to talk to , but that mere idea felt wrong.

  It might be a bit better than anything before her, yet she would survive it all the same. She believed in that; she survived tougher and more sick times before, so what was a chair, or weird thuds echoing in her chest? Or more herself? Wasn't that cool, albeit a little worrisome?

  While the sight in front of her was straightforward, the surroundings weren't. She saw people, their shadowy figures, and Emblems. They surrounded her, looking like shadows of people, clothed in black attire, and those fuckers observed her as if she were an evil, dooming demon. They didn't discuss it, but she felt they did and wondered when they would move to kill her. It was devious. Bastards! They didn't know what the fuck they were doing.

  Then, things shifted when an inconceivable thing happened. She calmed the hell down when an old man with almost no hair left on his head came to her side, shocking her from her mind with a simple knock on the pages. He appeared like a ghost: out of nowhere and entirely out of Celeste's vision.

  Strictly speaking, there was nothing on his face. Nothing. Then, something happened: a broad smile broke the nothing, his eyes opened to her, and his averted gaze became intense yet old, almost too broken. They were deep, unblinking. Such a fierce face and demeanor conveyed the vast experience of the First Head she had heard about, and he indeed looked like a demon of a man. For a regular man, he was weird.

  Thanks to his disheveled appearance and white coat that had seen better days, he was the leader of the Emblem Association. He was the primary director, barring the Association Pillar, Rey, who addressed various other issues as a powerful Walker and part of the Pillars. In short, Rey was in control of Walker protocols while First Head was the mastermind and the one in true control of this entire section of the Federation.

  And he disregarded Celeste for yet another blooming flower that was soon to wither. Good. Work. Work. More work.