The world seems larger when you're tiny.

The woman gestured to Sofia that she should wait a moment. She walked away, and a few moments later a bed came out of the wall. Compared to the old woman and especially the girl, the bed was huge, compared to her... it fitted perfectly, finally something of normal size.

The woman pointed to the bed. "Lie down," she commanded. The bed creaked dangerously.

"I have to get something ready," she said. "Stay down."

She walked away, and Sofia and the girl were left alone in the room. Sofia looked at the ceiling, which seemed infinitely far away, the roof looked like a tower, and sparkled with the gemstones that seemed to be randomly placed here and there.

What was she doing here? she suddenly wondered. Everything went very fast, and she didn't understand anything anymore. Was it a dream?

She punched herself in the stomach very hard, convinced that she wouldn't feel a thing, but she groaned in pain, and tears welled up in her eyes. All right, it wasn't a dream. But then what was it? Sofia swallowed. She wanted to go to her mother.

She didn't have much time to feel homesick, because there was a rumbling sound and a moment later the head of the old lady appeared in the doorway. She called out to the younger girl, who was now sitting by Sofia's bedside, and she went over to her.

A moment later, the two of them stood before her. The old woman held an enormous machete in one hand, and in the other a hammer that glowed blue. The girl was holding a syringe that was twice the size of her head, and she had trouble holding it. A neon green liquid glistened in the syringe.

The old woman walked up to Sofia, but then saw the fear in her eyes. "What is it?" she asked unintelligibly. When Sofia didn't answer anything, she looked at the weapons she held in her hands. "Oh," she said smiling. "Don't worry about that."

She placed the weapons on a table bolted to the wall and slid a mirror forward.

"I want you to take a look at this," she said, looking at the mirror.

Sofia looked in the mirror, but she couldn't see what was strange about the thing. Did she have something between her teeth? She opened her mouth and pulled her cheek to the side.

"Don't be silly," grumbled the old woman. She picked up the weapons she had just placed on the table and looked up.

The genuine version of this novel can be found on another site. Support the author by reading it there.

She was babbling something unintelligible. It began very softly, but gradually she began to speak louder and louder until at a certain moment she shouted so loudly that the girl began to scream and Sofia put her hands on her ears in irritation. Just when she thought that the windows would shatter, the woman stopped. She looked up for a few seconds, her eyes squeezed shut.

"Keep looking in the mirror," the girl, who was now almost at her wits' end, reminded her. She nodded, even though she didn't know why.

Suddenly the hammer and the machete went up in flames. Sofia was startled but kept looking in the mirror. The old woman plunged the machete into the back of the mirror and she smashed the hammer into it so hard that she wondered how the mirror did not fly off the table. But it remained standing, while the handle of the hammer was still vibrating.

"And now what?" asked Sofia, who had expected something enormous to happen.

The old woman looked at her impatiently. "Keep looking into it," she said. "Don't blink."

Suddenly Sofia felt a stabbing pain in her chest. She gasped for breath. "What's happening?" she groaned, before collapsing forward and falling to the floor.

The old woman picked up the mirror and held it in front of her eyes again. "This is perfect, this means it's working!" she exclaimed.

The pain in her chest was getting worse and spreading. "Make it stop..." moaned Sofia.

The woman nodded to the girl, who returned a moment later with a blanket. She threw it over Sofia, who immediately fell asleep.

A little later she woke up. She looked around and saw that she was in a dormitory. She sighed contentedly. The dormitory may have looked cheerful for a hospital, but it was the normal size she was used to in the human world. It had all been a dream.

She turned over to go back to sleep because the bed was so comfortable, but someone tapped her on the head.

She looked into the eyes of a beautiful woman, who had pointed ears and a pointed red hat on her head. "I saw that you had woken up, are you still bothered by the reduction?"

Sofia looked at her frowning. This could be a joke, but those ears did look very real. "The reduction?" she asked.

"You were the size of a human a moment ago, weren't you? One of the witches has brought you up to our height, so you can also become part of our people," the woman said as if it was the most normal thing in the world to talk about witches or to make people smaller.

"To... which people can I now belong?" asked Sofia doubtfully.

The woman frowned in surprise. "Have they not explained anything to you at all, then? This is the wonderful world of gnomes! And starting today, you will begin the training that will make you one. Humans and gnomes are quite different," she explained. "And not just in size. Don't worry, new people are coming in every day that we are shrinking and reforming. You're not a special case," she said, seeing Sofia's surprised face.

Behind the woman, who was probably a nurse, the door opened. The witch and the girl who had put her in the strange room stood in the doorway. The nurse turned around.

"Come in, please! She has just woken up."