There was nothing, the thread named 'White' thought. No light, no voice, no sound. Only darkness everywhere. It didn't understand where here was or what 'here' was anyway. Even comprehending what it was, was impossible. Words just came and went; even the meaning behind everything was nothing more than a blurred void.

Somewhen White heard. It didn't know what, only that it was there. White wanted to know, wanted to learn, but it couldn't move itself. The thread became desperate. It was alone, so so alone in this cruel place. But White had an idea, maybe what caused the hearing could hear and move themselves. But what caused 'hearing'? The thread wouldn't know, would it? It was only a...it didn't know and even asking itself what 'knowing' was in the first place. Gathered information? Experience? Terms White never had in its mind before showed up out of nowhere. It was like it had forgotten something? Forgotten...losing information? Erased. Blank. Who?

A sudden scream echoed through the emptiness. Pain, torment, anguish, grief, sorrow—the birth of a voice, created by those things rippled through White and tore. Tore its core, the string, the thoughts, and in the end, it tore itself. But now the 'hearing' caused 'voice', and White saw Black, the intendant that provoked those effects.

The thread was happy, it wasn't alone, but soon it noticed Black wasn't their own. "Unite, Unite, Unite," was all that it said, in a neverending toneless refrain.

"A new term!", White was happy to learn, but the meaning it couldn't discern.

White and Black were 'there' for a while, waiting for questions to their answers.

It's weird, so thought White, where did Black come from anyways? Then, without a hitch, it knew it could move. It asked itself what moving was, but like earlier, it hadn't had an answer for that. So they moved and moved, shifted through the void in search of the question to 'Unite'.

They never stopped, and yet nothing was to be found. So White tried to find out what it lacked. It asked itself why they couldn't find the place they were looking for. But then it dawned on the thread what it was missing—'looking'.

A term so foreign and yet so familiar. And with it came another.

"Sense!", bellowed White mystified, and a warm feeling spread throughout its core. It was like meeting an old friend after a long time, they became different, but they were still somewhat the same. So the thread tried to gather old information, to...remember? Yes! And how it remembered. Memories? So fantastical, so absurd! The thoughts of taste, touch, sight, smell, and hearing appeared before its mind's eye.

"So hearing was only one part of many?! I need to know more!" screamed White into the blackness, with the innocent curiosity of a toddler. Yet, it was not aware that not only good things will come with it. Nonetheless, it wanted it, yearned for it. And with this, it began really to look at what was around it.

White knew that Black was distinct from the void but couldn't get the gist before how Black differentiated from the darkness around. Step by Step, White managed to see some sort of aura around its companion in the form of particles. They were there and somehow, at the same time, not. But even if 'seeing' was tricky, something else provided it with information that this what existed directly before White was truly real. It could feel it all over itself.

"Touch!" White squeaked happily.

With this recognition, the thread became finally aware of what was around them, and it sensed!

"So many different particles all around us! Red? Blue? Violet! Grey!? So many traces of them! T-They are building a path? Magnificent!"

So they followed the traces' direction in the hope of finding more. Red became eminent, and at one point, they saw the unique-looking thread. But the nearer they came into its vicinity, the more a feeling of pain filled White's outside. So it stopped moving, yet Black seemed to have other plans and yelled, like always, 'Unite, Unite' only that it somehow dragged White with it this time. White tried to fight back but in vain. And the pain, which burned more and more terribly, suddenly began to attack the innermost. It tried to squirm, to tear itself away, but Black remained steadfast. All the curiosity that White felt until now, all the joy, was replaced by hatred and anger. And when they finally reached Red, White understood what had happened. Forgetfulness receded and made way for someone it didn't know but was familiar with more than anything else.

"Something got stolen from me. It got shattered into countless pieces! It...the others, I need to find the other threads! We are one, we are someone, somewhat," it finally realized.

So now, the three of them, all tied together and led by White, were on the way to find the other lost parts. And what they saw next was Icy, a cold blue thread. It was the direct opposite of Red.

This time it was freezing, and everything became colder and colder. Even the burning flame inside of White got slowly extinguished and was replaced by the place they all resided in, void. Still, this void was different, was truly hollow. It felt lonely...horrible lonely, even with the other threads around. And then White saw something, the death of a...close person? What was a person? A loved one? It felt cruel, like getting ripped into pieces while staying whole. And this void, oh this void couldn't be filled with anything. It would be best to die too...die? What was death? What was living? White was...sad? Then it understood that those were 'his' emotions. A person long gone, he was not it, or? More threads were needed...so they moved again.

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It felt like...many burns and sad sensations when they got surrounded by a strange fog. It was denser in some areas and totally see-through in others. The dense ones felt broken, irretrievably lost to everyone forever and ever. Something was wrong.

Then White found Grey, at least a piece of it. Even Black stopped speaking for the first time. Grey seemed relieved to see them. But like Icy and Red, it didn't talk. Only the flickering swarm of particles around it indicated that it was still here with them. But for how long? Suddenly, the swarm surrounded White, and another type of...coldness filled its core. But this one was...bizarre. It felt like it was way too distant from the other two, and White noticed how the learned emotions of Red and Icy didn't quell up anymore.

"Rationality," figured White, and instantly memories of moments in which only a logical approach would count came up. But what was immediately apparent were the gaps and jumps in the memories. These concerned some 'profession', but White could not make sense of those fragments and knew that it would never learn from them either.

Sadly, Grey vanished after this, and a new wave of hatred ran through the thread. Somebody dared to damage them like this. How dare they!

White was furious, but the others had priority right now. So the group followed the next direction forged by pinkish shimmers. This path felt giddy, irritatedly fluffy, loaded with sugar clouds and buns. White felt small, really, really small. And for the first time, it smelt. Everything was filled with a rosy scent which became stronger and sweeter. The sight of Pink mesmerized White completely, but i couldn't figure out why. Then the first wave of memories hit White, and a mother with her child appeared before it. She nursed her child, and the kid was simply happy about it. The attention it got, and even when it would do something wrong, the mother admonished it with a warm tone. White felt like it was in a thick haze of joy from which it would never want to leave. Everything was just perfect, just too blissful. But then it felt a change, and suddenly it was uncomfortable to be small, uncomfortable to sense that it could not take care of it itself. And the mother disappeared, and the father emerged into the scene. And suddenly, all joy was gone, and the only thing remaining was being too 'small'. And White learned that love was not something you could always expect, even from those closest to you. And he realized that 'his' father had been evil. Were all fathers like that? Probably not, because in the memories that felt distant, White also saw families without mothers or fathers, and they seemed so happy too.

"So I guess not everyone is blessed with a good family?" asked White, a question to which it did not expect an answer.

White turned around and simply left, knowing that Pink would follow them. And with every thread White met, it felt more and more whole, but also not like the person in the memories. White already figured out that it died, and it should feel sad about this fact and happy about the new chance to continue 'his' life, but White wasn't him. Who was White to begin with? More mysteries to uncover, it thought.

But suddenly, the thread tensed as if something was wrong. It hurt, and at the same time, it had a...taste? It was about to rejoice at having found the last sense, but everything just contracted inside again, and it wondered if 'taste' was such a dreadful thing. The others seemed to be fine again, and a new emotion ran through White. It didn't know how to describe it, but the thought of the others doing better than it for no reason made White...angry? Furious? It couldn't place it.

While all this was going on, they hadn't stopped moving despite everything, and it was only now that it noticed how the environment around them was prickling with a quasi-yellowish glow. The thread responsible for this seemed to have been Yellow, and as White made contact with it, the novel sensation permeated White's being, and once again, memories flowed.

But unlike the piercing twinge, the memories were filled with pride, happiness, and a past that showed 'his''s successes. Everything seemed so optimistic, bright, but then came the sour aftertaste. Everywhere the person turned, a sharp sting ran through them with the recurring question of why they weren't capable of doing this, why they couldn't also have what the others had. Love, family, freedom, time, the list knew no end, and White realized that the emotion it felt had been envy. And as quickly as this realization came, everything it had felt just a moment before disappeared. Only the sour afterglow remained, and White now knew that the life of 'him' had not been a happy one. At least, that's how it seemed to the thread.

"Was that really me once? The more memories I find, the more I understand, but I still fail to grasp myself. Has death really changed me that much already?"

And only now White noticed how itself and the other threads were connected by particles whose origin came from White itself. And like gears that would intertwine, White became aware of something. It was the template for the new self, everything that it found and understood let White become more and more something that "him" once was but would never be again. But one piece of the puzzle was still missing, and this had to be found as soon as possible.

The thread used its senses to find a path, to find the way to the last broken piece. But it felt insecure to do so. Was White really able to create a new self? Wasn't White, in the end, only artificial, unnatural? A thread that only absorbed the former self and stole its everything. Was White even allowed to be independent?

"Why shouldn't you be allowed?" asked a voice.

White recoiled and looked around but didn't see anything. Or so it thought, but out of nowhere appeared Violet.

"You came a long way, oh piece of origin. We were eagerly awaiting your arrival," mused Violet.

"B-but why? Why would you wait for something...something like me?" asked White, bewildered.

"Look outside of our core, and you will understand what happened," replied Violet in a motherly tone.

White wanted to rebuke, but the last pieces of memories marched straight into it. And now it understood, understood why everything was so utterly shattered in here. The System tried to erase 'him' entirely, instead of only that part it said it would. They were really reborn, as a...as a seed! Of course, it is dark here; they were deep inside the soil! Soil? For the first time, White truly felt the 'world' around it, not only the inner self but also the outer shell.

A 'ding' interrupted White's thoughts.

[Congratulations. You learned the ultra-rare hidden ability [Wooden Conciousness].

'Ding'

[All requirements fulfilled. You are now able to evolve into [Awakened Weeping Willow Tree Seed(♀). ]

[Do you want to evolve? Y/N ]

"Yes," ordered White.