I was standing somewhere… dark and ethereal. Vast swathes of unknown memories surrounded me from all sides. Inside I could see… or even perceive someone’s memories… from childhood to adulthood.

One such memory depicted a scene when it all began.

Right.

It was Raymond’s eighteenth birthday…

“…ke up! Wake up!”

My eyes abruptly shot open as a sharp pain erupted from my left cheek, which then continued with a bludgeoning pain in my stomach. My body was convulsed by the impact that might as well be the death blow.

“Cough! Agh…”

“Ahahaha! That’s one nice reaction there. Sorry. Did that hurt? I bet you’re awake, though.”

I glared at Lilia, my little sister. Her long navy-blue hair, tied into a long ponytail, swayed, as she was making an annoyingly cheeky smile and holding her stomach.

While rubbing my bleary eyes, I declared in a low voice, “Lilia, get off me! You’re too big.”

I silently covered my head with the blanket, but she just complained some more. “Hey! Don’t just go right back to sleep! C’mon! Wake up, sleepyhead!”

She was still standing on my stomach but soon got off from my bed of her own accord. Was she finally giving up?

“WAKE UP!!” Despite her thin stature, she was able to snatch the blanket off my grip, throwing it away to the floor.

Being woken up by my little sister in the most dreadful way possible was annoying. Seriously annoying!

“Why are you bothering me this early? Good grief.”

How regretful. The once reserved little sister had turned into an annoying, cheeky brat that wouldn’t stop bothering me whenever there was a chance.

“Did you forget what day it is today? It’s your birthday! Daddy is out, and Mom is going to the market to prepare it. So, I was tasked to wake you up!” Lilia scowled at me, crossing her arms.

“Ohh. You’re right.”

“That’s good. I will prepare you a bath as well as breakfast, Big Brother! Consider it my present.” She quickly darted away from my bedroom.

Isn’t that a bit cheap for your brother’s present? I held the grumble deep within my heart; Picking trouble with her should be avoided at all costs.

After laying down on my bed for a few more minutes, I got off and stretched my body. “Okay! I’m awake!”

I was so excited about today that I couldn’t help but muse all night long about the promise I had made to my dad. He promised to take me with him to the outside world… A world that he said to be full of death-dealing events and filled with vicious creatures and endless red fog.

But to me, whose whole world was the village, they took me on exciting adventures.

Once I was done doing my morning routine, I walked outside. There was a sprawling forest to my left and beyond was a white reflective wall like the one in the sky. Every day, the walls surrounding the village would change between dark and light in a gradual twelve-hour cycle.

Except there was one part of the wall there that looked like a giant glass window — the one on the top of the only hill of the village.

“Don’t go into the hill on the outskirts of the village,” they said. “Because there you will find monsters from hell.”

In the past, I and several of my childhood friends didn’t take the warning to heart as young as we were and decided to venture to the top. We stumbled upon the giant glass window, and we saw hell…

Amidst what seemed to be an endless red fog, monsters of horrid shapes peeked in from the window, scaring all of us.

Even now, the memory about that occasionally recurred in my head. Instead of becoming a deterrent for me to go outside, if anything, it became fuel for my passion.

For the whole eighteen years, I never traveled outside the village… wondering what was out there…

The adults never talked about the outside world. Only my dad, one among the few that were brave enough to go outside, spoke about it. They were called “scavengers,” and my dad was the leader of the group.

“Remember, you cannot go outside before you turn eighteen,” was the response I got.

The outside world had practically become my father’s second home. Today was no exception. He had gone to search for materials from the outside world, doing the village a great deed. I just wanted to be like him.

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With my dad going far away, I was left to be the breadwinner of the family. I had to work in the field to feed my family, so I quickly headed there to do just that.

“Yo, Ray. Going off to the field?”

“Be sure not to force yourself.”

The villagers I passed along the way greeted me, to which I returned the greeting to them. As the village only had about one hundred people, we treated each other like one big family.

“I heard that you’re turning eighteen today. You’re an adult now. Isn’t it time for you to pick a wife?” One middle-aged lady proposed, “My daughter, Delia, is not much younger than you. How about taking her as a wife?”

“I’m sorry, but I intend to become a scavenger, so I don’t want to make Delia sad.”

“That’s a shame.” She didn’t push on the matter.

After all, although my dad had done a great deed, he also left the house with just me, my sister, and my mother. My mother always had that lonely and worried look on her face whenever my dad left for weeks to months on end.

Speaking of, other than being a scavenger, my dad was also an engineer.

Because of the things he and his team brought from the outside world, our village was able to learn to use various new things. Strange machines that looked like they worked from the power of magic helped us in our daily lives.

One such thing was a tractor. My job at the field was to use the thing to tilt the field and then plant the seeds according to what we needed. It was a simple and easy job.

When the job was done, I walked toward the outskirts of the forest near my house. It had been my base camp that I often frequented.

While he was in the village, my dad taught me various things: how to hunt; how to fight; how to run and how to hide; how to start a fire; how to use a knife; how to kill creatures. I had gained the basic knowledge to survive out there, at least that was what I thought.

To anticipate this day, I had always honed my abilities every day. An example of it was planting a trap to catch some wild animals in the forest. Today I was quite lucky to find a squirrel caught in the trap I made.

I always brought a dismantling knife with me and quickly finished off the squirrel and dismantled it.

“So here you are.” Unknowingly, my little sister snuck behind me. She was sucking a lollipop, her favorite snack, in her mouth.

“Lilia?” I perked my head, putting the disassembled squirrel into a small bag,

“It’s already late. Mom has prepared your favorite for today. Let’s go back.” She took my arm and dragged it with her.

“Sounds good.” I didn’t resist the pull of her hands.

Usually, the village had no custom of celebrating birthdays every year. But children were turning one year old, five years old, and later eighteen years old as they reached adulthood, there was a custom in the village to celebrate those.

The last one was the one that held the most importance since you would become a fully-grown adult at eighteen here. People in this age group would typically marry and start to make their own families.

Lilia and I made small talk as we made our way home.

But then, the sky suddenly turned red. Into a scary pale red that gave an ominous feeling to the heart with just a glance. Never once in my eighteen years of life had the light in the sky turned other than white or black (when it was turned off).

“What’s going on?” I couldn’t help but blurt out.

“That’s what I was about to ask. Big Brother, has something like this happened before?”

“I am as clueless as you ar—”

A blaring alarm sounded from the surrounding walls as if telling us that the world was ending or something.

“We should get back as soon as possible! Grab any weapon we can while notifying the other villagers along the way!”

“Mhm! I will, Brother.” Lilia bobbed her head intensely. She seemed calm despite the sudden change of situation.

My father always said that whenever an emergency like this arose, we should stay at our house and barricaded ourselves inside until he and his crew came back. Furthermore, there were things there that could be used for this kind of situation.

We fastened our pace while cautioning other people to stay back at their homes. Luckily, the other villagers were also aware of the situation and swiftly headed back.

“Raymond, Lilia, you’re back! Come here quickly!” A black-haired middle-aged woman with freckles on her face beckoned at us as soon as we reached our house. She was my mother, obviously.

Inside the house, my mom didn’t ask about the situation outside and on the contrary, offered me the food that she had prepared for me with a gentle smile.

“Eat first. You must have not eaten since lunch.”

“But…”

“No buts. If you don’t have the strength, then you won’t be able to last for long.”

I didn’t know whether calmly sitting back and eating was the correct thing to do right now but seeing that she wouldn’t budge if I didn’t comply forced me to do her bidding.

“Just do what Mom said.” Lilia had even touched the food on her plate earlier than before I could answer. “Anyway, happy birthday, my dear brother!”

“Fine,” I conceded.

“Good. Now, now, happy eighteenth birthday, my son.” My mother gave me a hug. “You have to eat a lot so you can grow.”

“I’m no longer a child…”

“In my eyes, you’ll always be my little boy,” my mother quickly chided.

“Pfft, Yes, little boy, you should hear what your mom said.” Lilia giggled.

“You…”

At any rate, I acquiesced and ate dinner with them — golden fried chicken, my favorite. Of course, I still occasionally peeked out the windows. I’ll be sure to protect you two.

I held the dismantling knife that my dad had given me and stood up. “Help me barricade the door and the windows! Wait until Dad comes home.”

The two nodded their heads simultaneously and did what I said.

A few hours passed as we installed wooden planks in every place that led to the outside with nothing much going on outside. Even the narrowest crevices didn’t escape from our clutch.

Odd.

It was too silent.

Yes, the people were now back at their homes and our house was located some distance away, but something just felt amiss.

It was when my head was clouded with suspicion that there was a distinct knocking resonating through the silence. Now was midnight, past the time when people would come to another’s house to visit, which prompted me to up my caution. With a gesture, I urged my mother and Lilia to remain silent, their curiosity mirroring my own.

Is it Dad? No, he wouldn’t knock on the door… It didn’t seem like the wind either. So, who’s knocking?

“Open… door…” A muffled voice of someone appeared from the other side.

“A voice…” I mumbled.

I gripped the ax that I’d found while blocking the windows, reaching my hand for the door but decided to stop at the last second. Wait, something wasn’t right.

I held my breath and backed away, sweat emerging from my palms. Looking back, Lilia was holding a large dagger that might very well be a short sword, whereas my mom was clutching a large kitchen knife.

Like a bolt from the blue, the wooden door burst open along the plank holding it in place. Then, a white humanoid monster straight from a nightmare made its way in and swiped me with its large hand, tumbling me away.