The moment they stepped off the ship, Topaz walked beside Kiana toward The Reverie Hotel to check in. Numby trembled in her arms, still shaken from the landing. On the lobby, Topaz approached the reception desk with her usual calm confidence.
"Good evening. I already have a room booked under the name Topaz," she said, sliding her elegant name card across the counter. Her name, position, and title as one of the Ten Stonehearts gleamed under the lobby lights. The receptionist straightened her posture the moment she read the card and saw the word IPC, one of Penacony's major shareholders.
"Y-yes, ma'am. Of course. We've already prepared your room. This is your card." The receptionist typed quickly on her keyboard to check her in, and then placed the key card before Topaz with a stiff, nervous smile.
"Thank you. However, I'll need an additional room. Preferably adjacent to mine. Can you make it happen?" Topaz asked with a polite smile. There was no hidden meaning behind it. Just a simple request. But the receptionist immediately froze. She glanced to her side at her senior, who nodded furiously, signaling her to agree even though they were already fully booked.
"O-of course! Right away!" she blurted, nearly jumping as she began typing furiously into the system. "We'll arrange a Deluxe Suite for your companion immediately."
Kiana blinked, startled by how fast the staff moved, barely processing the sudden flurry of activity around them.
Topaz calmly adjusted Numby in her arms and gave a small, polite nod. "Thank you. That's a relief to hear."
"Y-yes, it's our pleasure to have both of you," the receptionist replied, forcing a nervous smile as she kept glancing toward her colleague, waiting for the signal that the room was ready.
A moment later, the receptionist's earpiece chimed. She straightened, swiftly finalizing the booking before placing another key cards neatly on the counter. One for Topaz, one for Kiana.
"We hope both of you have a pleasant dream," the receptionist said, bowing deeply.
Kiana could only stare, thinking,
'Is this… normal?'
"Let's go, Kiana," Topaz called, already turning toward the elevator and walking away with the calm confidence of someone used to this kind of treatment.
Kiana half running to catch up to Topaz before asking. "I read some of your list, and where should I make this exhibition?" Kiana asks, didn't think it's a great idea to make exhibition in a place like this because the vibe is mismatching.
"Just you wait, we still need to walk quite a bit. I will explain it further after we got inside."
Hearing Topaz's explanation make Kiana tilt her head. She doesn't get it what inside are Topaz talking about. But she keep quiet following behind her.
Inside Kiana's room, Topaz explained their destination, Paperfold University College, and the method to enter it.
"Umm… so I need to sleep in a bath?" Kiana asked, unsure. Mei would always scold her for dozing off in the tub, warning her she could drown. Now, hearing this from Topaz, she couldn't help but suspect she was being teased or tested.
"Yes," Topaz replied. "Don't worry. Everyone here does this. Your mind goes to the Dream World, and your body stays safe in the bath."
"Should I… undress first?"
"…" Topaz stared at her, completely dumbfounded. Kiana immediately realized she must have asked a stupid question, something no one in this world would ever think to say.
"I don't think you should," Topaz said at last. "If there's an emergency, the staff might enter your room to wake you up."
"Oh… okay." Kiana lowered her head, cheeks warm with embarrassment.
"If there's nothing else you want to ask, I'll return to my room," Topaz continued. "We'll meet again in the Dreamscape, at the Golden Hour. From there, I'll walk you to our destination."
Kiana nodded. After Topaz left, she stepped into the tub, still fully clothed. The water wasn't cold like she expected. It was warm… almost soothing.
But when she fully lay down, the sensation of her clothes clinging to her skin felt a little gross. She barely had time to complain internally before a heavy drowsiness washed over her. Her eyelids drooped.
And then, before she could think about anything else, she drifted into sleep.
When Kiana opened her eyes again, everything felt strangely light, like her body wasn't fully there. A cool wind swept past her, brushing her hair back and carrying the faint scent of something sweet, like a syrup and carbonated drink.
"Where am I…?" she murmured, blinking as her surroundings slowly came into focus.
Towering buildings stretched high into a night sky, their surfaces gleaming like polished marble and gold. Neon lights shimmered in slow, dreamy waves. Everything looked luxurious, fantastical, too perfect to be real.
But before her eyes could fully adjust to her surroundings, a deafening honk blasted from behind her.
HONKKK!!
"DON'T STAND IN THE MIDDLE OF THE ROAD!!" yelled the driver inside a sleek, floating car.
Kiana jolted, practically jumping to the side on instinct.
"Not a bad start."
Kiana whipped her head to the side and saw Topaz standing on the sidewalk, a faint smirk tugging at her lips. Numby stood beside her, much steadier than before.
"Why didn't you pull me aside if you saw that?" Kiana demanded, irritation bubbling up after nearly being run over.
"It's a precious first-time experience for anyone entering the dream world," Topaz replied calmly as she began walking toward their destination. Clearly, she had no intention of wasting time standing around.
Kiana hurried to catch up. "Is it always like that?" she asked, still frowning.
"Depends on the person's personality, I guess." Topaz lifted a shoulder in a casual shrug. "One of my friends fell straight out of the sky when she arrived for the first time. And another started in a casino, right in the middle of a cheating argument, or something like that."
"Besides," she added, glancing back at Kiana, "you can't actually die in here. Even if you get run over, the pain is minimal. More like a sharp poke than… well, real damage."
Kiana stared at her. "This world is really full of weird stuff, huh."
After that, they walked in silence toward Paperfold University College. The closer they got, the more Kiana noticed a strange pattern: monkeys. Small ones, tall ones, fluffy ones, even one wearing a little vest. They were everywhere. On benches, on railings, swinging from lamp posts.
"Are we… going to a zoo?" Kiana asked, suddenly unsure if the words "university" and "college" meant the same thing in this world.
"Zoo?"
"You know, a big place full of animals behind bars or thick glass? People walk around and look at them?"
"Ah. Yes, we have those. Just under a different name. But no, we're not going there. We're going to a university. A place where students learn." Topaz replied calmly, as if Kiana had simply mixed up basic definitions.
"If it's a place to learn…" Kiana gestured around them, bewildered, "Why are there so many monkeys?"
Topaz paused, lips curling in an amused smile.
"You could say… It's part of their charm."
"I see…" Kiana murmured. She couldn't argue. She had no idea what counted as normal here, so she simply accepted whatever Topaz said as fact.
Before long, the towering structure of Paperfold University came into view. In the center of a wide field stood an unfinished stage, half-decorated, surrounded by piles of unopened boxes. Students bustled around it, unpacking materials, assembling frames, and arguing about where certain pieces were supposed to go.
"Alright, Kiana. It's time to work." Topaz said, stopping just short of the field. "Start by talking to the students and checking their progress. I'll head to the principal's office. See you later."
Kiana let out a quiet sigh, bracing herself before heading toward the group of arguing students.
"Hey, how's the progress going?" she asked, trying her best to sound friendly.
All of them glanced her way. But then immediately turned back to their argument as if she hadn't spoken at all.
Kiana cleared her throat loudly, trying again to get their attention. When that still didn't do much, she decided to approach from another angle. She listened for a moment, catching bits of their debate about the lighting setup.
"Why don't you put the lights evenly on both sides?" Kiana suggested. "Whether the stage staff ends up needing them or not, it's better to be safe than sorry, right?"
"…I guess so," one of the students muttered.
The group reluctantly began adjusting the lights according to her suggestion, moving with the kind of sluggish cooperation that said they weren't fully convinced, but they were doing it anyway.
After checking on the stage team a little longer, Kiana glanced down at her clipboard and moved toward the students constructing a wooden pen.
"Is everything okay over here?"
"Yeah. Just… a lot of heavy lifting," said the thin student hammering a wooden post into the ground. She wiped sweat from her forehead, her arms trembling from the effort.
Seeing that the task didn't suit her build at all, Kiana stepped closer.
"Why don't you unpack the decorations and set them up around the pen? I can handle the hammering."
"Really!?" The student's eyes lit up, overflowing with gratitude.
"Yes," Kiana confirmed, already putting her clipboard aside and rolling up her jacket sleeves.
"Thank you! You seriously saved me!" the girl said as she hurried to the boxes. "I feel like I'm dying doing that. I keep hammering and hammering, but the post won't go deep enough, so it keeps wobbling every time someone bumps it."
"Where are the other students? Why didn't you ask them to help?" Kiana asked while hammering the post into the ground with ease.
"Who wants to do the boring job?" The girl let out a long sigh. "As you can see, most of them would rather join the decoration team." She nodded toward the noisy crowd of students working around the stage, the same ones Kiana had helped earlier.
"I see… then you're a kind person!" Kiana said brightly.
The girl froze for a moment, cheeks turning pink from the unexpected compliment.
"I-I'm not kind. I just figured someone had to do this, or the whole event would fall apart."
"Whatever the reason, you still chose to do the boring job. Plenty of people think like you and walk straight to the fun stuff anyway. But you didn't. That's impressive!" Kiana grinned, warm and genuine.
The girl ducked her head, flustered but smiling.
After that, without realizing it, Kiana continued helping more students who needed an extra hand. Especially with heavy lifting, completely forgetting about her actual task and her clipboard while Topaz finished her meeting.
"Good work, everyone," Kiana said proudly as the students wrapped up. A wave of fatigue washed over her. Usually, she never got tired this quickly, but now…
'I didn't know it's this hard being normal,' she thought, still smiling at the new experience, feeling the world in a new way.
"Hi, Kiana. How's it going?" Topaz approached from behind, with Numby waddling after her.
"Oh, hi, Topaz. I think it went pretty well?"
"Can I see your clipboard?" Topaz asked, noticing Kiana wasn't holding it.
"…," Kiana froze. She had just remembered. Her job was to oversee the students, not run around helping them and then forget the clipboard somewhere.
"I'm so sorry, Topaz! I'll go look for it right now!"
It wasn't long before she came back, breathing heavily, hair slightly mussed from running all over the place in a panic. "I'm… sorry, Topaz…" she wheezed. "Here…"
She held out the clipboard. It was mostly clean, with barely a smudge of ink but noticeably wrinkled, as if something had manhandled it.
Topaz raised a brow. "…What happened to it?"
"A monkey took it," Kiana said flatly, still out of breath. "I had to chase it."
"…Right." Topaz chose not to question it further.
She flipped through the pages. "So… none of them finished their work?" she asked cautiously, trying very hard not to sound like she was judging her.
"Yeah," Kiana admitted. "But everything's halfway done. A lot of them were complaining they got assigned tasks they weren't good at, like hammering posts, lifting boxes, moving animals into pens, stuff like that. So I decided to help them."
Topaz winced, imagining how much manual labor that was. "I'm really sorry I didn't tell you this earlier… but they have something called architects here. They can make anything you ask for, like the pen, just by sketching it and imagining it."
"What!?" Kiana stared at her, utterly dumbfounded. It felt like all the sweat she poured out today evaporated into nothingness.
"I'm really sorry," Topaz said again, genuinely apologetic. "I forgot to tell you to leave the building tasks for later. I'm still negotiating whether the family will help us build everything or not."
"…So can they?" Kiana asked, rubbing her forehead.
"I don't know. Some of the family members still hold a grudge against us IPC folks," Topaz sighed. "They might drag out their answer just to keep us on edge."
Kiana exhaled slowly. "Then it's fine. I don't mind doing the hard work. It'd be too late if we waited for their answer anyway."
Topaz blinked, taken aback. "…Really? You're the best, Kiana."
Her smile softened, touched by Kiana's sincerity.
In her head, though, one thought crossed her mind,
'Maybe freeing that scammer for her was worth it after all.'