Leia Harvey was happy when her brother returned nearly a month ago.

But more than happy, she'd been afraid.

Five years ago, when she was pregnant, they'd moved to Zavier for a better future for Lena, her daughter.

But on that journey—which they had to do on a carriage for some unforeseen circumstances she definitely wasn't comfortable talking about—they had lost Aidan.

They'd thought, no, they had believed that he was dead. They had mourned. They had performed a ceremony. But years later, he had returned safe and sound. Her brother, her precious little brother, had returned—with a daughter no less.

She hadn't asked him about what had happened or how he'd survived, and neither had their mother. She understood that many things had changed, her little brother had changed, he wasn't so little anymore, and he could handle himself pretty well.

Then, after just a short while, he had left again—though it was she, who had offered a 'job' to him and to obtain the 'job', he had to complete a mission.

Life had more or less started to get back to how it was—how it was supposed to be, she believed. But there had always been a lingering fear at the back of her mind.

What if Aidan hated her?

What if he hated her because—intentionally, or not—it was her fault that he'd been away from them for so long in the first place.

So, she'd blamed herself. She blamed herself for a long time. She hated herself. And that hate had only increased when he stiffened and skidded away from the hug she'd tried to give him.

He was afraid of her, wasn't he?

She knew, no, she believed he hated her and was afraid of her. Why wouldn't he? He had every reason and justification to hate her, or be afraid of her—she had stolen precious five years of his childhood, after all.

So it was nothing less than a high voltage shock for her when he'd hugged her, saying that he didn't blame her.

Ah, he had grown so much, she'd thought. But more than anything, she was relieved; a burden on her shoulders had been lifted, after all.

But that shock was nothing compared to when her brother, her cute little brother, had walked out with a box in hand and opened it, only to show a ring.

The ring was circular and hollow, the ring itself was made of a silver-colored unknown material.

Intricate and beautiful hexagonal shapes were carved on its surface, adorned atop which, lay an otherworldly small crimson ornament—it looked like Dor, with flacks akin to the stars on a midnight sky. Clear and elegant, having an otherworldly beauty—capable of enticing anyone to just gaze at it for unknown times.

Leia was shocked at the implication—no, she was shocked at her guess—but her mother? She had a different reaction.

First, her eyes widened; then her mouth dropped open. The look on her face could have only been described as extreme shock.

"I got engaged." Aidan, her little brother, said in a whisper.

She gasped and then turned towards the thud that resounded just after her gasp. Her mother was on the ground, unconscious—she had fainted; not that she, herself, was any better. As she, too, walked and sat on the couch before closing her eyes.

Yes, this was nothing but a dream. A dream. Nothing. But. A. Dream.

How could her lil' brother be engaged already?

***

I sighed, staring at the mother and daughter duo in nothing but pure bewilderment.

I didn't know of any other—better—solution for how the situation could have been handled. And their reaction was nothing but understandable.

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I mean, just imagine: your son/brother returned home after five years—and you 'believed' that he was dead—and then, suddenly announces that he is engaged. Yeah?

I let out a hollow chuckle. Of course, this was the last thing I needed.

My sarcastic remarks aside, It took them just a few minutes to wake up, and though I hoped that they'd forget, it was just my wishful thinking.

Because, as soon as Leia woke up, her eyes glittered—god, why was she so . . . excited?

"You need to tell me everything!" she said, a serious facade on her face.

I groaned.

"Not now, not yet." I refused, and before she could protest, I raised my hand. "Sis, please," I sighed, my mind was jumbled up pretty bad and this was a conversation I did not want to have right now.

In truth, I wanted to delay It as much as possible.

She stopped at once, looking worried.

"You alright?"

"Yeah, yeah, I'm fine, totally fine. Just . . . Just need a breather."

I wasn't fine, but she didn't need to know.

"Okay . . . " She said slowly, sounding as if she didn't believe me at all. "I'm here if you need someone to talk to, you know."

"Yeah . . . I know."

I whispered, getting out of my house with a slow and tired gait.

It was a decent house, nothing too luxurious, and nothing too shabby. I was a noble, and so were my family members, but we'd been stripped of our nobility, and now, we were being suppressed too, so that we couldn't rise again.

I hit the road towards a certain place, a place I liked to visit occasionally.

The sun was drowning down the horizon, painting a canvas in gold, yellow, and orange.

The vendors on the sidewalk were closing their stalls and preparing to leave for their houses. A few wagons strode down the path, the beasts pulling them giving me a sense of disgust and hate, which I pushed deep down.

The place we loved didn't have any high-tech transportation—most of the technologically advanced stuff was near the Obelisk.

The obelisk was the center attraction for the people, after all—other than the Venturers, of course.

A gust of cold wind blew, and my white hair swayed a little along with it. As the sun drowned, the temperature cooled down.

'It's gonna snow again,' I thought, groaning slightly, but not caring in the slightest.

As I walked, my mind wandered uselessly. It wandered off onto Helen, the place I was living in and I knew it would one way or another spiral away toward what I wanted to avoid thinking about, but I let it wander anyway.

Helen was decided into five parts; five kingdoms, nations, or countries—whatever you would like to call them.

Sehra, the land of Dwarves. Elvon, the land of Elves. Ephesus, the land of Humans. Draconica, the land of Dragons. And finally, Zavier; a free, neutral, and the safest of them all, in which, all the races reside.

Though all the regions had their beautiful sceneries, there was one undeniable fact: Zavier was the most flourishing, technologically advanced region of them all.

It was at the forefront connecting to the Pandemonium, and thus, required the highest defense as well.

Other than that, I disliked only one particular thing about this place and the people residing in here . . . actually, not just Zavier, but the whole of Helen as well—it resounded too much on resource hunting and was oriented around war, so was the society residing in it.

I hated that.

I hated that just like the people despised anyone who wasn't beneficial for Helen as a whole.

Even the Obelisk was better than that. Excluding that it provided entertainment, there were many jobs and other important stuff relating to it.

I sighed, my mind drifting away toward the recent happenings.

The world was a fake, so was I, and so were the creatures living inside it—actually, the so-called 'creatures' should be called AIs, programs, or code, no?

When I had come to know the fact that this world was a simulation, there was one theory that dominated everything in my mind; I was curious.

Were the supposed 'people' nothing but artificial programs working on set paths, conditions, and rules? If so, was the outline of 'good' and 'bad' stamped on everyone? Was our centuries-long conflict with the Edians nothing but the byproduct of that said 'good' or 'bad' outline?

If that was the case, then what was even the point of it all?

If everyone had been randomly assigned a generic 'good' or 'bad' outline, then what was the point of it all?

If everyone was supposed to follow a certain 'path', then what was the point of resisting and doing what we weren't even supposed to do?

Was it just to prove that we weren't those said generic 'good' or 'bad' outlined characters and were 'free' in our own choices?'

If that was the case, was I 'good' or 'bad'? What was my purpose in all this? Was I truly free?

Now that I thought about it, I was never really free—just like the people around me.

Just like the children who were brainwashed from childhood into believing that Edians were some sort of 'demons' and 'monsters'.

This had been made clear to me nearly a decade ago; the Edians were not 'demons' and 'monsters' the council portrayed them to be.

Just like we, the Helians, were portrayed as 'demons' and 'monsters' to Edians.

That was something I came to terms with more than a decade ago, and now, I realized something important after meeting Kismet and knowing the truth of the world.

The war was nothing but a play, a big entertainment show orchestrated for Kismet.

I chuckled.

And now, I was his—what did Mark call me? Ah, a pet monkey, right, a pet monkey. Someone who was going to provide him his 'entertainment'.

Again, I was not free.

As my destination came into my vision, there was just a single thought lingering inside, doing nothing but increasing the burdens weighing down on my mind.

'Then . . . what am I supposed to do?'