I opened my eyes and knew instantly — this wasn’t my room. The air was too quiet, too still. The ceiling above me was a glowing silver sky, its light pulsing softly like a heartbeat. There was no sound, no wind, no distant hum of life. Just silence.
I sat up slowly. Beneath me stretched a vast glass-like surface — cool, smooth, and completely transparent. Through it, I could see stars. It was like lying on a window that overlooked space. I touched the ground. It was solid, but unreal.
“Where am I?” I whispered.
“You are in the Mirrorworld.”
I turned around quickly. A girl stood a few feet away, floating just slightly off the ground. She looked around my age, with white hair that shimmered like starlight and eyes that were—impossibly—just like mine.
“I’m Lyra,” she said gently. “And you… you are the Seeker.”
I blinked. “Seeker? Seeker of what?”
“Every hundred years, someone from your world slips into this one,” she said, stepping closer. “The Mirrorworld is a place made from reflection — memories, fears, forgotten feelings. Only a Seeker can walk through it and return.”
I tried to stand, wobbled slightly, but steadied myself. “So how do I get back?”
“You walk,” Lyra said simply. “Across the Path of Memory.”
As soon as she said it, a glowing bridge of floating mirrors appeared before us, each piece hanging in the air, leading into a distant light.
I hesitated. “And if I fall?”
“You won’t,” she said. “As long as you face what you see.”
The first step lit up as I placed my foot on it. Beneath the glass, an image formed — me, five years old, holding my father's hand on the first day of school, crying but smiling. The memory filled me with warmth.
The next step showed something different — my first fight with my best friend. Her angry face. My pride.
The third step was lonelier. I saw myself curled in bed, crying silently on my birthday, pretending everything was okay.
Each step forward brought a memory — some happy, some painful. But with each one, I felt lighter, as if something inside me was shifting.
“You're remembering what built you,” Lyra said beside me. “Good or bad, all of it matters.”
We continued walking. Around us, the air shimmered with whispers — songs without voices, laughter without people.
At some point, I asked, “Who are you really?”
Lyra paused. “I’m… you. Or part of you. The part that remembers wonder. The part you’ve forgotten.”
I wanted to ask more, but suddenly, the bridge beneath me cracked.
A sharp sound echoed. The mirror under my foot shattered. I screamed — and fell.
The fall was endless, but soft. Like falling through a cloud. I landed in a strange forest.
Trees made of silver. Leaves like feathers. The air was thick with reflection — each surface mirrored something different.
I saw dozens of versions of myself — as a child, as a teenager, as someone older. One image showed me shouting at my mother. Another, me ignoring a friend in need. Another, walking away from someone crying.
Each mirror whispered, “Do you remember?”
I closed my eyes. “I don’t want to see these.”
“But you must,” came Lyra’s voice, even though I couldn’t see her. “The Mirrorworld doesn’t show you what you want. It shows you what you hide.”
I opened my eyes slowly and approached one mirror. I watched my past self slam a door and shout, “I don’t care!” — and walk away.
I touched the glass. My reflection met my eyes.
“I’m sorry,” I whispered.
The mirror cracked — then turned into light. So did the next. And the next.
Forgiveness. That was the key.
I walked for what felt like hours, shedding layers of guilt, regret, forgotten pain. I cried once. Maybe twice. But I kept moving.
Eventually, the forest cleared.
I stepped into a vast field. In the center stood a clock — ancient, beautiful, made of silver gears and stars. It wasn’t ticking.
Lyra waited beside it.
“You’ve reached the Heart of the Mirrorworld,” she said. “This is where time begins again.”
“What do I do?”
She held out a glass orb. Inside it swirled colors — golden light, blue ripples, soft pink clouds. “Your truest memory,” she said. “The one that defines you.”
I took it. It felt warm, like a heartbeat in my palm.
“What happens when I place it in the clock?”
“You go home. And the Mirrorworld resets for the next Seeker.”
I hesitated. “Will I forget this?”
“Some of it,” she said. “But not all. You’ll remember in dreams. In mirrors. In quiet moments.”
I reached up and placed the orb in the clock’s center.
For a moment, nothing happened.
Then—tick.
A sound. Soft but powerful. The sky shimmered. The ground glowed. A wind swept through the field, and for the first time, the world felt… alive.
Lyra smiled. “You’ve done it.”
A doorway of light opened behind me. I turned to her.
“Thank you.”
She touched my hand. “Thank you. For remembering who you are.”
And then everything faded.
I woke up in my bed, sunlight on my face. My ceiling fan whirring lazily. The soft beep of my alarm clock.
It was over.
Or had it just begun?
On my desk was a mirror. One I didn’t remember owning. But when I looked into it — just for a second — I saw Lyra’s eyes staring back at me.
And I smiled.
Because I hadn’t just visited another world.
I had rediscovered my own.
Moral:
The journey within is the longest — but it brings you back to who you were always meant to be....
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