In a small town in the south of France, in a coquettish house with blue shutters live a cheerful girl with her family. Her name is Flora, she's a tall blonde girl who never stop when she has new ideas set in her head. Quick tempered, she doesn't think much before acting, leading sometimes to troubles. With a high sense of justice, Flora always help those in needs. There is even a story going on in her high school where she kicked the ass of bullies hitting on lone girls. She's got a very inconvenient default, she sleeps too much, in conclusion she's always late. In her own words, "the dreams I have at night are so realistic it feels like I live a new adventure each time."

Today too, she's still dreaming in her bed. This time the dream is even more realistic than the others. She's in the body of a girl running in the rain, late at night. She's being followed by numerous footsteps, their rocky voices yell something in a language she can't decipher with this heavy rain. Luckily for her, she arrives in a small town, at first sight it comes right off a medieval book, with ox-carts each side of the main road.

She's well ahead of them, at the entrance of the town she looks back. a dozen of torches are running in her direction. Sobbing but not stopping, she goes right around the corner of a house, hiding under a ox-cart stationed there. The people who's been following her run past her cart except one.

- You and you, go ahead to see if she didn't advance more in that direction. The others, search this place from top to bottom.

The deep voice goes in the direction of the young girl without noticing her under the ox-cart. She then hear the man unzip his pants to start peeing in the mud next to her. This is so gross but she also hold her mouth in front of her mouth, she doesn't want to make a single sound. In fact, if she could change herself in a mouth to run under the house and set a new life hear, I'm pretty sure she would.

- Captain, there is nothing here, I think she went in that direction.

- Are you sure of it? You really searched thoroughly?

- Sir, I assure you we all searched and found nothing.

- Bah, let's go catch up with the others, they must be far ahead of us now.

After saying this phrase, the man with his underlings went where the other left to. The girl under the cart is still waiting. Quite some time passed, so much that the rain stopped in the meantime. It's her time, she's got a plan, she will go in the opposite direction. Like that she will win a lot of time on them. She cautiously walk out of under the ox-cart, carefully walking in the mud mixed with the old man piss.

In the corner of the barricade next to the house she look where they went, no one. On the other side from where she comes, nothing to be spotted too. She run as fast as she can. The faster she get out of here, the safest she will be.

On the corner of her eyes she spot someone, she immediately recognize the uniform he wears, with a heavy and metallic mas covering half of his face. On his left eyes is a unclean scar, the masked man has one brown eye and the other is yellow from the infection he got. The girl stop, like a prey spotting her predator ready to pounce on her.

- Well, if it isn't our test subject number 113?

The girl start crying, she can't talk, petrified in fear. The man take a few steps toward her, she instinctively step backward. As they continue, she fell to the ground, stumbling on a rock.

- Oh poor thing, let me help you get back on your feet.

The man calmly grab her by the neck. The girl is defending herself in vain, the man has a strong grip, the tiny arms of her won't do a thing against it.

- Why don't you go back with us like a cute obeying cat, will you?

The man doesn't loosen his grip at all. Air start missing to the young lady, her vision is filtered by a light, faint filter.

- Sorry, I didn't know I was hurting you, the master won't be happy if I bring him back a broken toy.

He let lose the girl, falling on the ground and coughing as she gasp for air.

- Have a good night princess, in a matter of time you will be back to your castle.

He punches her, enough to make her faint instantly. At the same time Flora woke up from her deep slumber. She fell off her bed in response of the nightmare she just had, holding her neck, still feeling the pressure of the grip.

- Ouch, what a weird dream.

As she scratch the back of her head, her gaze fall on her alarm clock: 8:39. The bus she has to take to go to classes passes in 10 minutes. She run around her room while changing herself as fast as she can. When she finished she looks herself up in the mirror to see if it's okay. Her socks are mismatched, she didn't tidy her hair so they are messed in a high ponytail held by a rubber band  too loose to keep anything up. a hair strand fall in front of hair face, she blows it up.

The rest is not organized but enough for Flora to continue with the rest. She runs to the bathroom to wash her teeth, in the meantime she goes down the stairs by jumping all of them. Landing in living room, there is a note on a cup protecting her breakfast."I'll come back late tonight, Mom." Flora pout while she thinks to herself it's been a long they didn't have a dinner in family.

This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road. If you spot it on Amazon, please report it.

She lift the cup to reveal at piece of bread with a jar of strawberries jam next to it. She doesn't have the time to spread with a spoon so she directly pour the jam from the jar on the bread. She inevitably pour too much but this doesn't stop her. With her finger she take the remains of jam on the tables and goes to the door. Her bag is waiting patiently for her, she anticipate she would woke up late by positioning it here.

She closes the door, put the keys with a cute cat winking key chain in her schoolbag. She lives in the higher part of the town so she can see the whole town. The bus, it's coming down the road but she needs to run if she wants to catch it in time. With all her might and a piece of bread in her mouth she runs down the alley, without caring if she would fall or not. Just like in her house, she jump up the stairs in front of her, grab a pole to easily change direction and run straight to the bus. She arrives last in line but enough to catch it up.

- Hewwo!

Said Flora with a piece of bread stuck in her mouth. The driver is not amused and roll his eyes while pressing a button to close the doors of the bus and drive while students didn't finish finding a place to sit. Obviously Flora had already a sit ready for her: her best friend Alix takes the same bus.

Alix lift her bag of the seat she reserved for Flora. She sit while finishing her last piece of bread while swiping the jam off her face.

- Hey, did you start the series i advised to you?

- Oh I tried but I was not into it, I went to sleep right away.

Said Flora while she gets something from her bag. It's a notebook where she scribbles some things that happens to her, either in real life or her dreams in this case.

- You had a vivid dream this time again, I assume? You shouldn't really focus too much into it. Especially with the exam we have today!

Flora stop suddenly what she was writing and yell in the bus.

- An exam?! Why didn't you tell me sooner!

Everyone in the bus stopped talking and all look in the direction of Flora and Alix. The only sound left is the sound of the driver who grumble something inaudible. Flora smile in an embarrassed way, she lifts her hand in a way to say sorry to disturb. She bend herself to get closer to Alix.

- I'm super dead, I totally forgot to prepare myself for the exam! Wait, what is the school subject? Maybe I can pull something off.

- Flora, it's mathematics.

- oh no, this is super duper dead.

She said while holding her head down, reviewing all her choices in life. Alix pat her shoulder by habits, she's used to it since they are young kids so she's not too surprised.

- In case you forgot I prepared to you a summary of the test subject, thank me later!

Alix give a sheet of paper with the lesson summarized for her. It's true Alix has always been first in class and it's not for no reason, she can easily memorize a lesson after reading it once. Flora looks at Alix with a friendly smile, what would she have been if she went here for her? Even though they arrive in a matter of minutes, she can at least memorize a thing or two.

At the bus stop in front of their high school, everyone go out and they all walk toward the entrance. Flora is still concentrating to learn the lesson until the last minute. Alix knows her pretty well, when she concentrate on something you can't get her attention so she goes ahead, leaving her where she is.

Flora walk with her lesson in front of her so she can't look where she's going, she bumps into the janitor that was sweeping the floor. The bucket next to him spill everywhere at the entrance.

- Oh, I'm so sorry mister Gurti! Here, let me help you.

- Don't worry, I'll just wipe everything don't you worry, just concentrate on your study will you? You don't want to end up as a janitor like me.

The old man take a pose with his broom in one hand and laugh. This is one of the most humanly person around here. His priority is the safety of the teenagers, he does it kindheartedly but since he is old, the others from the age of Flora tend to mock him around. He doesn't care this much, he is sure they will change in the future.

- Say, isn't it yours?

He lift a piece of paper drenched in water. What was carefully written on it is now indecipherable. The last hope of Flora is soaked.

- The note!.. Thanks anyway. I'll be on my way now if you really don't need my help.

She goes in the direction of her locker, she's already late to go to class because no one is around in the corridor. She passes the stairs leading either up or down. A feint but weird sound come from the level below. Usually it's mister Gurdi that use the vacuum cleaner, but here she just bumped into him. While she looks above she can't quite see what is down below. A feint blue light come with the sound, she suddenly comes back to her sense, shakes her head and head straight to her locker.

Why would she even bother with this, she's late and the exam is now! she puts books and useless stuff to the exam in it. On the door of her locker is a little mirror she uses sometimes. Here, from where she can look at it, it reflect what is in the corridor. When she lift her head up after finishing grabbing what she needed, the mirror reflect a strange light that resemble the one of a flashlight.

When she turns her head to look what is up, a blue portal is right in front of her. This is the same sound as the portal down the stairs and it also match the feint light it emit. Flora is stunned by what she is looking at, the scenery out of a magic book is happening in front of her. She doesn't dare to approach nor to step backward. What could she do in this kind of situation?

Curious from nature she finally makes a move, she decides to carefully approach the blue and shiny portal. When she was about to try and touch it, two hands pushes her in it.

- Wah!

She fell right into it, the feeling of grass caress her face. When she opens her eyes, she is now in a luxurious forest in the middle of nowhere. She gets up and quickly look around her, there is no portal in the vicinity. The scenery is beautiful, she's in between giant trees from species she never suspected to exist. They are measuring 100 meters or more, they are covered with a layer of moss on it. The roots are so big they do about 4 to 5 Flora, the canopy lets sometime a little ray of light descending to the ground.

- Am I dreaming again? That must be it, I fell on the ground after bumping into this poor mister Gurti.

After all, the sensations are exactly the same as her dreams! She pinches herself to verify.

- Ouch, if it is a dream, it is even more realistic than all the dreams I had.

Suddenly a shrieking bird fly between the trees. His plumage is green emerald, the feathers of his wings beautifully curves up while he glides. His talons looks sharp and deadly. The head is like those of the eagles, a curved beak with lightning patterns cover the whole area. On the top of his head he has three strand of golden feather. The eyes are the scariest Flora get to witness, it seems to look for something in this dense forest.

He finally get on a branch, now that she realizes, he is about 15 meters tall and his wing span must be around 35 meters. The sense of danger strikes Flora, she rushes against the roots of the nearest tree. Even if the creature is magnificent, she doesn't want it to spot her from afar nor closer.