In an unknown place.
"...Was that a dream?"
The figure pushed himself upright from the bed. His hand pressed against his forehead as if trying to steady something that refused to settle.
"No..." he muttered, eyes narrowing slightly. "That wasn’t just a dream. It felt different."
He swung his legs off the bed and stood, pacing once before stopping near the window. The faint light outside did little to ground him. His mind was still replaying fragments of the voices, pressure, that strange sense of being somewhere beyond reach.
"A Quest..." he said under his breath.
The moment he accepted that possibility, the confusion in his expression began to fade. Slowly, it twisted into something sharper. His lips curled upward.
"He sure made a fool of us by saying that he was from the future," he muttered, letting out a quiet chuckle.
He leaned against the wall, tilting his head slightly as if addressing someone who wasn’t there.
"That bastard..." he continued. "You’ve got some nerve trying to trick me with something like this."
For a moment, he went silent. Then he laughed softly again, though there was no humor in it.
"I’ll be damned if I don’t meet you in reality. And when I do, I’ll return the favor properly."
...
In another unknown place.
A hill stretched quietly beneath a wide sky, the wind moving lazily through tall grass. At the top stood a single tree, its branches spreading wide enough to cast a soft, shifting shade across the ground.
A young man sat beneath it, leaning against the trunk. A strange musical instrument rested loosely in his hands, its strings untouched as he slept.
The breeze carried a faint rhythm, but he didn’t respond to it.
Not until his brows tightened.
Then his eyes opened.
He blinked slowly, adjusting to the light, before letting out a quiet yawn. One hand came up to rub his eyes as he stretched slightly, still half caught between sleep and wakefulness.
"What a strange dream..." he mumbled.
He lowered his hand, staring ahead for a second.
Then he froze.
The haze vanished almost instantly.
"...Wait."
His posture straightened. The instrument slipped slightly in his grip as his mind rushed back through every detail. Unlike a normal dream, nothing was fading. Every piece was still there, clear and intact.
"...That wasn’t a dream. It was someone’s Quest," he said quietly.
A slow smile spread across his face, replacing the earlier laziness.
"Looks like master’s life is getting interesting."
He tilted his head back, looking up through the gaps in the leaves. Light flickered across his eyes as the branches swayed.
"Should I meet her?" he wondered aloud.
There was no urgency in his tone, but there was interest, and genuine curiosity.
After a moment, he chuckled softly to himself.
"...Yeah. I probably should."
...
In several locations across the world, more awakeners stirred from their sleep.
Some woke in confusion, brushing off the memory as nothing more than an unusually vivid dream. Others lingered longer, sitting in silence as they replayed what they had seen and heard.
A few recognized it immediately.
A Trial.
Not just any trial, but something far beyond what most had ever experienced.
The Moonline-Trial.
The realization spread slowly, but once it took root, it refused to leave.
As for what it would mean for Isaac, that was something only time could reveal.
...
Selene’s POV
[Moonline-Trial completed.]
[Successfully defended Ladder of Heavens for six months.]
[Calculating reward.]
Selene stood still as the messages appeared one after another in front of her.
[Rewards gained:]
1. Species Evolution Potion
2. Class Evolution Ticket
3. Moon Dragon Royal Bloodline Potion
4. Moon Dragon Royal Stamp
5. 100 Gold Coins
6. Attack-type Relic (Imperial Grade) x1
7. Defense-type Relic (Imperial Grade) x1
8. Shattered Moon Sub-Dimension
The list was long enough that she couldn’t properly process it all at once.
Before she could even begin to go through each item carefully, the space around her shifted.
For a brief moment, everything went blank.
Then—
She blinked.
She was standing in Isaac’s house.
The same living room. The same table. The same quiet atmosphere as before she had entered the Trial.
A faint sound broke the silence.
A box appeared on the table in front of her.
Selene didn’t move to check the box with her rewards.
Her gaze dropped slowly to her hands.
"...I completed the trial," she whispered.
It didn’t feel real.
She had prepared herself for something far worse. The Moonline-Trial had a reputation for breaking people. It wasn’t supposed to be something you walked out of intact.
And yet—
She did.
It hadn’t been easy. Not even close.
There had been nights where she couldn’t sleep at all, forced to remain alert because a single mistake could undo everything. There had been negotiations that felt more dangerous than battles, where one wrong word could cost her months of progress.
There had been moments where she thought she might actually fail.
But she didn’t.
She raised her hands to her face, covering her eyes.
Her shoulders trembled.
A quiet sound escaped her, somewhere between a laugh and a sob.
"I actually did it..."
The emotions came all at once. Relief, disbelief, gratefulness, and something deeper that she couldn’t quite put into words.
Tears slipped through her fingers.
She didn’t try to stop them.
It took a few minutes before she managed to calm down. When she finally lowered her hands, her breathing had steadied, though her eyes were still slightly red.
She wiped her face quickly.
Then she reached for the Soulbind Pendant around her neck and tapped it.
The air in front of her warped.
A moment later, three figures stepped out.
"We are back," Isaac said as he looked around, his gaze moving across the room before settling on Selene. "Congrats on completing the trial."
"Thank you," Selene replied with a small smile.
"Congratulations, Selene. Now, I will go back to the farm. I need to recharge myself. Please pardon me," Avery said.
Selene nodded. "Of course."
Avery didn’t linger. She left almost immediately after, her figure disappearing as quietly as she had arrived.
The room grew calmer again.
Now only three of them remained.
Isaac exhaled lightly as he pulled out his device and connected it to the internet.
"Let me check the date," he said, tapping through a few things. "Looks like only one day passed here while we spent six months in the Trial."
Selene blinked. "Only one day?"
"Yeah. Time difference is pretty extreme," Isaac replied.
He paused, then opened his status window. A low whistle escaped him.
"I still have all the skill levels I gained in there. It should be the same for you two," he said.
Selene checked immediately.
Alice did the same.
Both of them nodded after a moment.
"It’s all there," Selene said quietly.
Alice crossed her arms, looking thoughtful. "That’s... better than I expected."
Isaac gave a small nod. "Yeah. We basically kept all the growth without losing anything here."
He stretched slightly before glancing toward the box on the table.
"I want to check what happened to the seeds, artifacts, and livestock I brought back. But first... you should go through your rewards," he said.
He paused, then frowned slightly.
"Actually, you might want to check them alone. Sorry, I didn’t think that through."
"It’s fine. Let’s check together," she said with a faint smile.
Isaac looked at her for a moment, then nodded.
"Alright."
Selene stepped closer to the table and opened the box.
The first thing she picked up were two small vials.
She stared at them, reading the system descriptions carefully.
"There’s a Species Evolution Potion. This should help me reach Apex rank. But there’s also a Moon Dragon Royal Bloodline Potion... which should be a type of bloodline evolution potion. Why are there two bloodline evolution potions?"
"Maybe the bloodline potion gives you additional abilities," Alice suggested.
Selene’s expression brightened a little.
"That could be it," she said.
She had studied Royal Moon Dragons during the Trial. Even a fraction of their abilities would make a huge difference.
Without wasting time, she reached into the box again and pulled out a small, intricately designed stamp.
"This is... the Moon Dragon Royal Stamp. It says I can command all ruins left behind by Moon Dragons," she said, reading its description.
Isaac raised an eyebrow.
"With the bloodline and that stamp... doesn’t that basically make you royalty now?"
Before Selene could respond, Alice spoke casually, "Of course she is a royalty. Haven’t you been putting your hand on only princesses until now?"
Isaac froze.
He opened his mouth, clearly ready to argue, but then stopped.
Selene’s face turned bright red.
She quickly looked back into the box, pretending she hadn’t heard anything.
"I—I’ll check the other items," she said, her voice slightly unsteady.
She pulled out two more objects.
"This is a weapon... and this is a defense-type relic. Both are Imperial Grade. But I’ve never heard of such a grade."
She looked up.
"What exactly is Imperial Grade?"
Isaac’s expression changed immediately.
"Imperial Grade?" he repeated, his tone more serious now. "Let me see those."
Until now, they only had two items at that level.
One was the Treasury Chest of Evergold, which generated gold daily based on territory strength.
The other was the Blight-Steel Centipede, the whip-blade Catherine used.
Both were rare to the point of being irreplaceable.
And now—
Selene was holding two more.
Isaac stepped closer, his eyes fixed on the items in her hands.