I thought I had died.
For a moment, everything went white—too bright to breathe, too sharp to think—like the world had collapsed into a single blinding point.
Then I gasped and found myself back on the narrow bed inside my tiny apartment in Bratislava.
The ceiling felt closer than usual.
A water stain spread across it like it was trying to escape its own outline.
The thin curtains let the morning light slip through, making the stain look even worse.
My chest still hurt.
My legs were sore.
My heartbeat hadn't recovered from last night.
So it hadn't been a nightmare.
I sat up slowly.
The room looked normal…
but something in the air felt misaligned, like reality hadn't fully snapped back into place.
A soft breathing sound came from the corner.
The cat was sleeping there—belly up, paws relaxed, as if it had zero concerns about the world.
It looked way too comfortable for something that had dragged me out of danger.
I stared at it.
"What kind of cat sleeps like it saved my life?"
My stomach growled loudly in response.
Right. Breakfast.
I boiled water, made instant noodles, and added an egg and some vegetables.
It wasn't fancy, but it was enough to remind me how a simple meal could ground me.
Steam rose from the pot.
The smell warmed my chest for a moment.
But the peace didn't last.
Images from last night clawed their way back:
The street bending out of shape.
Light smearing like melted glass.
The cold ripple tearing open.
And the creature stepping out of it—
I clenched my jaw.
My chopsticks froze mid-air.
I didn't even ask myself why I ran.
Maybe I've been running for a long time…
from work, from life, from everything that stopped making sense.
Before moving to Slovakia, my days felt like a broken ERP loop—
same inputs, same outputs, same bugs no one bothered to fix.
Coming here was supposed to be my reset.
Book a flight.
Find a room.
Start fresh.
Everything went too smoothly.
Too perfectly.
Almost like someone paved the path for me.
I finished my noodles and looked at the cat again.
It had woken up.
It was staring at me in a way that felt… intentional.
"If you didn't show up last night… I'd be dead, right?"
The cat blinked slowly, as if bored with obvious questions.
I reached for my phone.
The moment my thumb touched the screen, it blurred—
like the pixels were scrambling to find their place.
Before I could react, the cat flicked its tail across the phone.
The display snapped back to normal instantly.
I froze.
It wasn't the first time.
It kept fixing things—
things I didn't even know were breaking.
I forced myself to breathe and walked to the window.
The sky over Bratislava looked wrong.
Clouds above UFO Park appeared smeared, like someone dragged a wet brush across the sky.
Not enough to terrify anyone…
but enough that staring at it made my skin prickle.
That was the direction where everything had gone wrong.
A chill ran down my spine.
I had only been in this city for a few days.
Barely knew the language.
Barely understood the streets.
Yet I found this apartment in under three days.
No competition.
No delays.
Just… convenient.
Too convenient.
The creature.
The warped street.
The ripple.
The cat.
Something connected all of it.
I placed my hand on the window glass.
My fingers trembled slightly, though I pretended they didn't.
Bratislava looked quiet.
Too quiet.
The kind of quiet that felt like the world was holding its breath.
If last night was real…
then it wasn't the end.
It was the beginning.