It was a vast plane of endless white, stripped of color—except for a single figure hanging in the void.
A tall man, broad-shouldered, bronze-skinned, his muscles tense beneath a skin once full of promise. His head was bald, his eyebrows thick, his expression—unmoving. He was asleep, or at least he pretended to be.
But his body betrayed him.
It jerked.
The movement worsened his condition. A crude hook embedded beneath his chin dug in deeper. Each twitch made the blunt point tear more through muscle and flesh. The pain wasn't sharp—but slow, grinding. Maddening.
Time here didn't move. Or maybe it did, but in a way only the trapped could understand. For the man on the hook, time was less a concept and more a torment.
He was young—only 18 years, 4 months, and 3 days old. He remembered that clearly, strangely.
He remembered his uncle, the man's warmth, and the hope he'd had. He remembered that his Talent ranked among the highest known. He remembered believing he had a future.
He was supposed to live.
His hands trembled, reaching toward the hook's shaft—but he pulled them back, clenched his fists, cleaned away weakness. He forced his breathing into calm, like meditation. He made himself pretend to be asleep.
But how do you sleep in a dream?
He knew this was a dream—but it wasn't just a dream. It meant something. This place was a mirror of reality. Every choice he made here would echo beyond.
Pressure closed in on his consciousness, dark and relentless. His jaw tightened as the hook bit deeper. He could ignore the pain—but the meaning of it brought him fear.
He didn't want to show pain. Or fear. Or worse—regret.
"Uncle... I'm sorry."
The thought resounded like thunder across the white abyss. The hook responded, sinking deeper. A sickening sound—wet and sucking—rippled in the silence. His body began to shrink, thinning, like he was being drained of everything that made him him.
Buddhist Hand reached toward the hook—no force stopped him.
Only himself.
It would be easy to survive.
All he had to do was pull.
If he yanked the hook out, he would awaken, unharmed, whole. But deep inside, he knew the price: the two strangers he had fought beside—Sasha and Elias—would die.
The sucking of the hook, louder now, became a song of doubt:
Why save them?
They're not your friends.
You owe them nothing.
The questions looped, a cruel melody playing in his bones. But from the storm came a whisper—not from outside, but from his soul.
I am Buddhist Hand.
A great man is not measured by how long he lived, but by how he lived.
I am Buddhist Hand.
I will not bend to the choice of a beast. I will die defying it.
But as the conviction rose, so did the pain of memory.
His uncle—frail, loving, devoted.
His hopes.
His plans.
His dreams for his nephew to become a great Buddha—one who walked the world in peace and power.
And now, that future would die with him.
He hadn't had the chance to give anything back.
To say thank you.
His hand surged upward—almost touched the hook.
But stopped.
"I...am…sorry, Uncle."
Memories burst behind his eyes—his fiancée's smile, his uncle's tired hands, the path he could have walked. His Talent... his gift... the uniqueness it could have offered the world.
Gone.
If he died.
He clenched his fists again.
All he had to do was pull the hook.
Save himself.
Let the strangers die.
His hand shot upward—
"NO!"
The cry tore from his soul, but his hands slammed back to his sides.
He would not.
He refused.
The pain multiplied. His skin thinned. His once-mighty frame began to wither.
---
In the real world, outside the dream—
A doctor stood by his side, watching his body shrink. She scribbled into her stone tablet, eyes cold, and she turned to leave.
"Please, help him!" a woman's voice cried out—Sasha's.
The doctor sighed, glancing back at the boy whose body thinned with each second, emaciated before their eyes.
"There is nothing we can do."
She walked to the next tent.
***
It was a vast white expanse, like hardened paper forming a dream of a city.
Two tall buildings stretched to the heavens, their shadows creating an alley between them. In that shade walked a young man—red skin, red hair, ashen eyes. Elias.
His steps were measured, heavy.
Each footfall made his veins pulse. His fingernails darkened. His body was responding.
Darkness bloomed through his veins like ink in water. From his roots, his hair began to change—black flooding upward, each strand a channel of power.
Tendrils lifted from his blackened hair like smoke, reaching and attaching themselves to the shadows around him.
Elias understood it all.
What he needed to do to wake up.
What he needed to accept.
All he had to do was step out of the alley and into the light.
The reward?
Reconstruction of his right hand.
Healing of his left.
Power—power equal to Buddhist Hand.
He welcomed it.
But deep beneath the excitement, something stirred.
A seed of fear.
Still, he walked forward.
And as he neared the edge of the shadow, just meters from the light—
His stump began to grow.