For a while, I couldn’t think at all. I just caught my breath.
The studio apartment was the same as ever. The bed was the same, the clothes I’d tossed off were the same, and the air in the room was the same.
And yet what I’d seen just moments ago had not been a familiar, perfectly normal scene like this room.
Humans beyond glass.
A giant hand.
The words “breeding zone.”
It had been far too vivid for me to insist it was a dream.
I sat with my knees drawn up, my back against the wall.
“Haa...”
My breath trembled.
The certainty that it had been real came later than the relief that I was alive.
That made it even more unpleasant.
A blue window quietly appeared at the edge of my vision.
Dimensional Archive.
A long vertical list of names was arranged before me.
[Dimension List]
Human Ranch-4614 [Saved]
Glass Beach-3227
Fleshscript Corridor-3721
Atlantis-1334
Black Universe Breeding Farm-9648
Astrania-1337
Nameless-8224
Earth-0382
Paradise Exile Zone-6915
The list was far too ordinary.
For something that had shown me a world where people were treated like livestock, it was excessively calm. It looked like a grocery list for a supermarket run.
The fucked-up part was that this calmness made it feel even more real.
I ran my tongue over my dry lips.
‘It’s not all like this crap, right...?’
If I didn’t check, I felt like I’d never be able to use this ability again. If I got scared and shut it away, that would be the end of it. Then what happened today would remain forever as some horror story lodged in my head.
It would be better to learn the rules.
If it was dangerous, I could run right away. I’d made it back alive from the Human Ranch, and Return had worked too.
Clinging to that one fact, my mind started to work again, if only a little.
I was about to press the list as I was, then stopped.
“Ah, wait.”
I lowered my gaze.
I was barefoot.
Only then did I realize it.
Earlier, I’d been so out of it that I’d practically shoved my body in first.
Not this time.
If these were real worlds, then at the very least, I shouldn’t enter them barefoot.
I picked up the clothes strewn carelessly beside the bed.
I immediately set down the short-sleeved shirt. I opened the closet and took out a long-sleeved hoodie. I avoided shorts too. I picked up a pair of long pants and put them on, making sure they properly covered down to my ankles.
Next were my sneakers. I picked up the sneakers I’d thrown on the floor, put them on, and tied the laces tightly. I tied them once, then pulled on them again.
For a moment, I found myself a little ridiculous.
I was about to travel between dimensions, and here I was, tying my damn shoelaces.
But this trivial action helped in a strange way. At least it didn’t feel like I was stupidly charging in with nothing.
I looked in the mirror once.
A face that had become handsome.
A body that had changed.
And fear still hot on top of it all.
At least my outfit was decent.
Long sleeves, long pants, sneakers.
“Okay, done.”
It wasn’t as if I was saying it for anyone to hear.
I turned my gaze back to the list.
‘Down.’
As I willed it, the selection line moved down one space.
Glass Beach-3227.
Judging by the name alone, it seemed like the most okay option. And that was precisely why it felt even more unsettling.
Human Ranch had sounded fucked from the name alone, so I’d been wary right away. But Glass Beach sounded like the name of some travel agency package tour. Or maybe the name of a pretty café.
Things like this were more dangerous.
Because what made people lower their guard was always the side that looked normal.
I took a breath and confirmed the selection.
A thin vertical line appeared in the air. The line slowly opened like a fissure, soon becoming a rectangular dimensional gate.
I couldn’t see the other side very well. All I could see was a blurry surface where it was hard to tell whether it was bright or dark.
I walked up to the dimensional gate.
There was still no smell. No wind. No change in temperature. No sound of waves, no birds, nothing.
The Archive was silent too. It displayed no environmental information, no warning, nothing.
It was as if it wouldn’t show me anything until I went in.
‘Unfriendly to the end, huh.’
Standing before the gate, I brushed my fingertips once over the pocket of my hoodie. I checked my shoelaces one more time too.
“Just one foot?”
There it was again.
‘Let’s seriously just take a quick look and run right back. If anything’s weird, Return... no, even if nothing’s weird, return immediately anyway.’
Having reached that conclusion, I stepped into the dimensional gate.
‘All right, let’s go!’
In that instant, sunlight flooded my eyes.
The sea spread out before me.
It was a beach. Not pure white, but glittering transparently.
A coastline drenched in sunlight. A shallow, clear sea stretching far into the distance. The waves were quiet, the ripples calm, and the horizon was unrealistically sharp somehow.
Everything was so clear that, for a moment, I couldn’t help but think it was beautiful.
For a moment.
Really, just for a moment.
Truly, only that much.
Crunch.
A strange sound came from beneath my feet.
It didn’t sound like stepping on sand. It was too thin, too sharp a scrape.
I reflexively tried to look down, but before that, I felt a stinging numbness on my right cheek.
“......Huh?”
When I touched it, a wet sensation came away.
It was blood. Red blood spread thinly over my fingertips.
My heart dropped.
Only then did I see it.
The sand was strange.
It wasn’t grains of sand. It had looked like powder, so I’d thought it was sand, but up close, every bit of it was finely shattered transparent fragments. What had been sparkling in the sunlight wasn’t a sandy beach but a heap of glass shards.
I raised my gaze to the waves.
Even the edges of the waves rolling in as they broke transparently were sharpened.
The things embedded in the beach like rocks, and the small pebbles rolling around near my feet, were all glass too.
All of it.
The entire world was a cutting edge.
“Insane...”
My voice slipped out softly.
The sensation beneath my feet changed in an instant.
Until just a moment ago, I’d thought I was stepping on a beach with the soles of my sneakers. Now it felt like I was standing on a pile of glass shards. No, it didn’t just feel like that. It was real.
From beneath my soles came the faint sounds of glass grinding. Crunch, crunch.
‘If I hadn’t worn sneakers, the soles of my feet would’ve been fucked first...’
The thought sent a chill down my spine.
If I fell, it was over. Planting my hands would be over too, and getting swept up by the waves would be over.
A red window appeared forcefully in the center of my vision.
[Emergency Alert!]
The entire environment is composed of high-risk cutting materials.
[Physical Damage Confirmed]
Facial bleeding detected.
[Advisory!]
Do not stop!
Return immediately!
The sentences were short.
It had the tone of someone swearing first at a person gasping for breath. If I didn’t get out right now, I would really die.
Frozen in place, I swept my gaze over my surroundings once.
Even the waves breaking in the distance weren’t beautiful. They were glass fragments catching light as they scattered. All the beauty of this world glittering under the sunlight came from the side of weapons.
A weapon pretending to be pretty scenery.
That phrase fit exactly.
“...Fuck.”
I muttered through clenched teeth.
I immediately confirmed Return.
A dimensional gate opened before my eyes, and I threw myself toward it without hesitation.
The world flipped as if folding in on itself.
The dazzling coastline split like a hairline crack, then was sucked in all at once.
I drew in the familiar air of my studio apartment again and set my feet on the floor.
A harsh breath burst out of me.
I nearly staggered as I braced myself against the wall. My heart pounded.
I rubbed my cheek with my right hand, then immediately frowned. It stung and burned.
I hurried to the sink and looked in the mirror.
A thin red line had been drawn across my cheek.
It was real.
Very thin. A wound like I’d been lightly cut by paper. But that one thin wound proved the entirety of that world just now.
I held on to the edge of the sink and stared into the mirror for a long while.
The face of a sculpted handsome man showed first, and then the new thin wound on top of it.
Two mismatched images were stuck together on one face.
“Ha...”
A sound came out that was neither laughter nor a sigh.
‘Now I get it.’
Just because something was beautiful didn’t mean it was safe. If anything, the beautiful ones were more cunning.
The Human Ranch had been rotten from the name alone, but the Glass Beach had deceived people with its scenery first.
I turned on the water and wetted the wound.
“Ah, it stings!”
The sound of running water seemed unusually loud.
At the edge of my vision, the Dimensional Archive appeared again.
[Record Updated]
Reality Time: 2026-03-26 18:49:40
Dimension Entry
Glass Beach-3227
[Record Updated]
Local Status: Unknown
Location: Glass Beach Coastline
Environmental scan initiated
[Record Updated]
Local Status: Unknown
Facial bleeding detected
[Record Updated]
Local Status: Unknown
The entire environment is composed of high-risk cutting materials.
Immediate return advised
[Record Updated]
Reality Time: 2026-03-26 18:49:40
Returned to Reality
Earth-0300
[Record Updated]
Extended stay not recommended
Coordinates saved
Glass Beach-3227
As I read those sentences, I met my own eyes in the mirror.
“Is this really an ability?”
My lips moved slowly.
“Not a curse?”
The Dimensional Archive did not answer. It merely kept displaying the dimension list indifferently.
Below Glass Beach.
Fleshscript Corridor-3721.
The moment I saw that name, my stomach churned a little for no reason.
□ □ □
Fleshscript Corridor-3721.
I stared silently at that name for a long time.
After returning from the Glass Beach, the atmosphere of the dimension list had completely changed.
Until just a while ago, it had felt like a line of unpleasant names floating there. Not anymore.
Now I knew.
Those names weren’t decorations. Each and every one was a real world, and each and every one could kill me or break me thoroughly enough.
I stood in front of the sink and touched the thin wound on my cheek again.
It stung.
One very small, thin line.
This one line felt more realistic than that entire beach I’d seen just moments ago.
The sand had been glass, the waves had been glass, and fuck, this tiny wound proved all of it—that it had simply all been glass.
“Haaaaa...”
I let out a long breath and returned to the room.
The blue window floated quietly.
Fleshscript Corridor.
The name itself felt damp.
It wasn’t as if I smelled blood, but for some reason, it gave off a strangely mushy and unpleasant feeling.
The word “corridor” felt bad too.
A hallway with nowhere to run.
A passage stretching on and on.
That kind of image came to mind first.
‘Not going in is the obvious safe bet.’
Stopping here would be normal.
I’d already been shaken badly enough at the Human Ranch, and the Glass Beach had confirmed it once more.
‘What’s the point of looking any further?’
This wasn’t verifying an ability. It was closer to self-harm.
A normal person would stop here and make some other choice—go to the hospital, call the police, phone their parents, whatever.
But I was standing in front of the dimension list.
In the end, I would look.
That’s just how people are.
If people could completely close their eyes just because they were scared, there would be no horror movies in the world, no ghost stories, and no one would ever open the basement door.
Besides, this was a door that had appeared in the middle of my room. Whether I wanted it or not, it was the kind of door that would remain in my head for the rest of my life.
I slowly swallowed.
“This time, let’s really return right away... No, but if you think about it, I ran as soon as I entered last time too. Isn’t that cautious enough?”
After muttering an excuse and a resolution to no one in particular, I pulled down my hoodie sleeves once more. I straightened the ends of my long pants and pressed the toes of my changed sneakers against the floor to check them too.
Only now did I feel, just a little—only a very little—as if I was preparing like a human being.
I fixed my will on Fleshscript Corridor.
The familiar vertical line appeared in the air. The line opened quietly and soon became a dimensional gate.
Beyond the dimensional gate was dark.
There was no smell. No wind. No temperature I could feel. The Archive displayed no interpretation either.
From outside the door, I still couldn’t see anything.
I grimaced.
“Shit...”
I could have stopped here. But for some reason, I wanted to check this dimension even more.
The Human Ranch had been blatantly oppressive, and the Glass Beach had been far too pretty at first.
But this was ambiguous.
Quiet, dark, old, and unpleasant in a way that was hard to explain.
That made it even more unsettling.
‘Hoo... Let’s go.’
I clenched my teeth and stepped inside.